Where No Vacancy chef Brian Kang eats Korean food in North York
The Ossington cocktail bar's head chef picks three North York spots, from a cozy cafe to a family-run jokbal restaurant that now has five locations.
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At Café Namoo, at 23 Drewry Ave., Korean aunties socialize alongside students working on laptops. Brian Kang, head chef at No Vacancy on Ossington Avenue, orders the injeolmi bingsoo, a shaved-ice dessert with condensed milk, almond and soy bean powders and chewy rice cake squares, with an iced americano. "On my days off, I like to explore mom-and-pop shops and Canadian-founded South Korean brands because it reminds me of home." The bingsoo also inspired the tiramisu on No Vacancy's menu.
Woojoo Bunsik, at 6026 Yonge St., is a homegrown Canadian chain. The name combines "woojoo," meaning space, with "bunsik," meaning street food. Kang orders the tteokbokki at normal spice level, rice cakes in a spicy-sweet chili-gochujang sauce with sausage, crispy onions and dried parsley, plus the fried calamari and shrimp with a cheddar coating, dipped in the tteokbokki sauce. The restaurant doesn't carry blood sausage, which he would normally order to complete his usual trio.
Hanyang Jokbal, at 6016 Yonge St., started as a family restaurant owned by Jisu Han and Calsey Choi and has grown to multiple locations in Ontario. The flagship is still on Yonge. Jokbal means pork hock, the house specialty. Kang orders the spicy jokbal, braised for hours, stir-fried in a sticky sweet and spicy sauce and eaten as a lettuce wrap with pickles, daikon, raw garlic and chili sauce.
The restaurant is open noon to 1 a.m. Daily and takes no reservations, so it runs first come, first served. The listed menu includes a half-and-half jokbal and bossam platter and haemul pajeon, though the online listing gives no prices.
