This was the cleanest K Bbq and the service was actually amazing Hillary was my server. She is amazing so amazing in fact I am leaving her my number 7064901791. I would like to take you out to dinner Hillary.
Kasey E.
Place rating: 4 Los Angeles, CA
Ciclavia! Pretty good variety of food and not a very long line. The beer Garden was a bit of a dive.
Adriana R.
Place rating: 5 Manhattan, NY
Who doesn’t love a Korean BBQ cookoff?
Peter K.
Place rating: 5 Norwalk, CA
Great event! Great food! Beer garden! Looking forward to next year!
Ann N.
Place rating: 3 Los Angeles, CA
The variety was pretty good. this is a late review so i don’t remember, but i think 4 – 5 restaurants participated and all the food looked amazing! But, pretty pricey for what it is(pretty much restaurant prices). I prolly won’t go to this again because of the location… Right smack in koreatown… i can just head over to any of the other korean bbq restaurants in the area and give it a go.
Rain F.
Place rating: 3 Reno, NV
I love Korean food. I love Koreatown. So you’d think this would be an automatic five stars in my book right? Nope. How about we don’t charge $ 12 a combo? Because unless you brought your( Unilocal) friends with you who are willing to split dishes so you can try different ones, I don’t see how it’d be possible to compare the different Korean BBQs represented. I think it’s unfair to the vendors as well. This year it happened the same day as CicLAvia and it wasn’t as crowded as I expected it to be. Maybe it’s cause people were just cycling by. I did like the souvenirs. Got me a «I heart K-town» recyclable bag and shirt :)
Kislev A.
Place rating: 4 Granada Hills, Los Angeles, CA
Small and VERY well organized. A short walk away from the Wilshire Western Metro Station, it was super convenient. We were greeted as soon as we arrived and directed inside. They organizers closed down a short street and they set up along one side only to allow room for foot traffic on the other side. The whole thing is long and narrow. There were only a few food stands and they were pretty pricey but good. I got beef ribs veggie and kimchi rice platter for $ 10 from Park BBQ. Another stand was selling the the same thing in a smaller plate for the same price. After that is a huge tent with a lot of chairs and a DJ playing music… Past that is a pretty spacious beer garden… Past that are plenty of tables with chairs all under nice patio umbrellas… And past that are the porto potties and portable handwashing stations. Like the stereotypical Asian people, it is small and very organized. :)
Patty l.
Place rating: 3 San Francisco, CA
Review for 3rd annual — the food vendors were ok, but I’d like to believe their actual rest. establishments, eg, Park BBq(very reputable for k-bbq — need to add an overdue review), Palsaik, to be better… but the venue was a great way to get a sampling of some well-known, but modernized, traditional korean items. The venue was on the smallish side, w/long lines for most of the food vendors… music was pretty good w/live or good dj(pete ross?) mixes, and entertainment of inpromptu volunteers in rap, singing, dance… and the final cookoff judgement… which I would’ve loved to have tasted! All-in-all, ok way to spend your sat afternoon for lunch or just to hang out for a couple of hrs.
Gerardo S.
Place rating: 5 Los Angeles, CA
Korean bbq FESTIVAL… what more do u need to know!
Alex G.
Place rating: 5 Los Angeles, CA
I really enjoyed myself… The plates were all $ 5, so the size of the line generally directly reflected the value of the dish. Some lines were half an hour or more, and some stalls had no line. Me and a friend got in the Ham Ji Park line first, but as it was the first, we were too hungry to wait and immediately tried Byul Gobchang, which had no line at all… for the reason that the portions were small. Tasty stuff though, both the pork and the intestines. I really wanted to try Kalbi Burger but they have their shop right down the street and it’s take out anyway, so we tried the short rib sausage sandwich. That was a far better value than our first dish, nice sized sausage on a roll with kimchi and mayo, very good. Last we waited in line for Ham Ji Park pork ribs, which I have been meaning to try and have a reknown reputation. The food came out in pulses, and it took us half an hour to get to the front. They were in a constant process of cooking and running out of food… because the portions were kind of huge! 6 ribs for $ 5, and really tasty, and they gave me a cool shirt for waiting. My biggest complaint is the heat, they need to tent up more of that parking lot and have more seating. Pity the fool who didn’t wear sunscreen. I can’t wait for the next one though.
Christy L.
Place rating: 1 Brea, CA
I won’t break down the vendors who participated and the types of bbq/food they had since Aire did a fantastic job listing them. I’ll just jump right to my own experience at this festival. Compared to last year where each vendor charged their own prices for each full size plates, this year was quite different. They had you buy tokens that were $ 5 each. That means that every single vendor you try would be $ 5 a plate. Sounds pretty good, eh? Well, that’s what we thought at first. We were debating between the Kalbi Burger or Mr. Parks. Since I have always wanted to try Mr. Park’s kalbi, we decided to wait in that line. it took us 1 hour before we got to the front. By that time, they had ran out of salad and rice AND kalbi. They were offering bulgogi only. At this point, we were just hungry and wanted to eat. The portion was small.(see picture) The meat was 80% fat and the marinade was worse than something you’d taste from a premade bottle sold at the korean markets. And I waited 1 hour in line for this!!! Grrrrr~ I was completely done with this whole festival after experiencing our first sample. But to make the most out of our trip to LA, we decided to give another place a try. «Green tea Kalbi» was their name and it barely had anyone standing in line for this one. Ok, so we were hungry and just wanted to EAT. The meat was stale and old tasting but the marinade was a lot better. It was different but not something I’d want to eat again. We noticed a short line for«Byul Gobchang» where they were serving pork or intestines. We chose pork. Came with salad and sauteed kimchee. The portion of pork we got was equivalent to made 2 Sun chips cut up into little pieces. That’s right…2 Sun Chips! And that was $ 5? Arrugh~ Overall, rumor has it that the Kalbi burger was the only decent food at this festival. But I can’t say that even that’s worth the 1 hour + wait just to try it. Standing underneath the sun for 1 hr + just to eat a measly 5 pieces of meat is not something I’d ever want to do again. I give it 0 stars. Waste of time and money and gas.
