As you may know, I love good food. And Korean BBQ is definitely toward the top of my list as far as good food goes. There’s a Korean street (远景路, yuan jing lu) in my area of the city, and I love going there for good BBQ when I get the chance.

If you want to make an afternoon or a day out of the adventure, you could go to a café in the afternoon and then head over to a BBQ restaurant for dinner. That’s what my friends and I did. Let me share a bit about the café and then we’ll get to the highlight—dinner!

Jessica chose the café, and it’s called Brown Bottle. I thought it was a bit of a weird name, but Elizabeth who lived in Korea for 4 years before coming to China, said that it’s probably based on the Korean chain, the Blue Bottle. Whatever color the bottle should be, the café was lovely. The only thing about a brown bottle was that it kept making me think of the “café” that Flynn Ryder took Rapunzel to in Tangled—The Snuggly Duckling. Flynn pointed out that it mostly made him think of the color brown. Even though The Snuggly Duckling was not the most pleasant place, any café that makes me think of Tangled gets bonus points in my book!

Jessica and Elizabeth arrived earlier in the afternoon to do some work/studying. I came later and we chatted, drank fun drinks and I read my new book. The café was really cute, and even though Christmas has just passed, they still had their Christmas decorations up. I didn’t judge them for it because I also still have my Christmas decorations up. As one friend likes to remind me: Christmas doesn’t technically end until January 6th. That’s a good reason to keep celebrating and keep thinking about the beautiful truth that Jesus came to this earth. Wow!

We ran into a small problem at the café when someone at a nearby table started smoking. I hate the smell of smoke, especially in enclosed places, but when we talked to the staff, they didn’t want to ask him to stop. Instead, they asked us if we wanted to move to another table. We moved to a bigger table with a nice couch.

Jessica and Elizabeth were feeling a bit annoyed since they had already been in the café for a while, but when the staff brought out complimentary drinks, we felt that helped to smooth things over. Since I wanted to avoid caffeine, I ordered a honey ginger tea. It was perfect for a cold day, and they put lots of ginger in it, so it was very spicy! They gave me a refill of hot water, and that was perfect.

At around 6 p.m., we decided to head over to the restaurant for dinner, and I’m glad we left when we did. I forgot that our favorite restaurant tends to fill up quickly. The inside was already full, but we decided it was probably ok to sit outside. When the staff put the hot coals in the hole in the middle of the table, we felt quite comfortable.

Jessica ordered a 2-3 person set from 美团 (meituan), and almost immediately, they started bringing out dishes. First, they brought out complimentary fruit with a little fruit salad. The also gave us three free fruit drinks. They brought out all of the customary Korean side dishes: kimchi, spicy cucumbers, cucumbers in vinegar, mashed potatoes, quail eggs (I LOVE their quail eggs), and seaweed. We started snacking on the starters before the food started coming.

A moment later, they brought out the fried pancake—it’s not like an American pancake. It’s salty and delicious. They gave us some lettuce and then the meat started coming. In China, most waiters will cook the food for you. When I was in Korea, I found out that the waiters only cook it for the Americans. Koreans cook it themselves. Since my friend was Korean, we cooked it ourselves.

But here in China, we let the waiters cook it for us. I’m always afraid of undercooked meat when I cook it myself, so I prefer to let someone else assure me that it is in fact ready.

The boss of this restaurant is Korean but several of the staff are Chinese. Since Elizabeth lived in Korea for so long, she can speak a bit of Korean, so she chatted with the boss a bit when he came outside. He’s very kind, and he loved chatting with her. He told her that he lived in LA for a little while. The boss is so nice that he loves to give complimentary dishes. In addition to the fruit plate, he also gave us an extra meat dish with a beautiful carrot cut like a flower and some extra ribs already cooked to perfection.

Sorry, I didn’t take more pictures of the food because I was so excited to eat it!

I’ve been going to this restaurant for years, and among all my friends, it’s accepted as the best one. I can’t remember if the boss always gives out this much extra food, or if he was doing it because he was so happy to speak in Korean with Elizabeth. Either way, we feasted like kings.

We ate until we couldn’t eat any more, dipping the meat in the delicious sauces and then eating it plain or wrapping it in lettuce with kimchi and other side dishes. We also got a noodle dish that was wonderful. And there was cheesy corn. We had no shortage of delicious food.

And do you want to know one of the best parts? All this food was less than $9 (less than 60 kuai). So great, right?! So thankful for good food that is affordable on a teacher’s salary!

By the time we finished, we were completely stuffed. We didn’t rush, and we chatted while we ate, but when we finished, I was a bit chilly, and I saw there were quite a few people waiting. If you go to this restaurant, arriving around 6 is best, otherwise you will probably have to wait. But it is worth the wait. There are other restaurants nearby, but they are usually empty until this restaurant is so full and the line is so long that I think people give up and go to other ones. Perhaps that’s the benefit of having a restaurant near the best restaurant.

We decided to drop by the Korean supermarket before leaving, so we walked over. They have lots of imported goods including chips and other snacks, instant noodles, a plethora of drinks, and other seasonings and cooking ingredients. I got some powdered kombucha which I tried, and it’s very nice—quite sweet though. Jessica bought us all shots of Vitamin C, and then we headed out. As we were leaving, we saw a Korean-style photo booth and stopped by to check it out. Unfortunately, it was nearly 40 kuai which seemed a bit much for a couple pictures. So we took a free picture in their mirror before leaving.

Visiting Korean street (远景路, yuan jing lu) is always an adventure, and we left with full bellies and happy hearts after a great time of fellowship.

Where is it?

Brown Bottle
Address: 远景路商圈棠景路181号

BBQ restaurant: 江南韩国炭火烤肉(远景店)
Address: 棠景路远景路175号

It’s better to put the name of the restaurant into the map app rather than the address, at least in my experience. The BBQ restaurant is on a back street up behind KFC. It’s kind of tucked away, but when you find it, it is worth it!

Enjoy and let me know if you know of any other restaurants or fun places to eat!