Manfriend Spike and I went to Boke Bowl for their first Korean Fried Chicken night. Boke Bowl is a lunch, ramen spot so the the evening meal is a first for the new restaurant. It ROCKED:
The meal was amazing. We had chicken, steamed buns, ginger scallion rice, and pickles. The chicken was juicy and had a light rice wine vinegar jus, and garnished with crispy fried onions. Everything was spot on. Fluffy, light buns? Check. Perfect rice? Check. Pickles? Oh my yes.
Here are the pickles in order (front to back): daikon radish, yellow beet, fennel, cucumber, shitake, cauliflower, red beets, and ginger. They also had a lovely kimchi and a mystery aioli called ODS, Orange dot sauce.
The ODS was made of pickled mustard seeds in mayo. We never figured out what it was good with. It was nice by itself, but didn't add anything to the chicken.
Also, a kooky package of 2 X 3 inch squares of nori landed on the table. We stuffed the crispy seaweed with rice and pickles. Fun.
We added a side of pork belly--which was stupendous with the soy-pickled shitake mushrooms.
The meal gave me a lot of pickle inspiration. Loved the ginger, shitake mushrooms and daikon radish. It showed me a way of contrast ingredients - salty + savory plus the gratuitous use of pickled things. The fatty belly with pickle was perfect together.
I can't wait to go back for lunch because ramen is on my list of thing to make this year.
Note: We're watching the newest season of Top Chef. Now I want to cook octopus and Spike wants to cook rabbit.
Sounds yummy to me.
Bon Appetite!
