3977 W 6th St
Los Angeles, CA 90020
(213) 387-5459
Los Angeles, CA 90020
(213) 387-5459
Gui Rim Korean BBQ
Category: Korean
Neighborhood: Koreatown
I hosted an event here for the LA Sushi & Asian Foodies last night as I haven't been to an AYCE Korean bbq place in forever... like 15 years ago. The price is $16.99 for AYCE meat and in general it's decent quality. It cannot hope to compete against the high quality of some of the top KBBQ places such as Suhrabal or Soot Bull Jeep but then it doesn't try to.
Logistics: Parking really sucks as it took me 10-15 minutes to find a parking spot on the street as I had some stuff in my car than I couldn't trust leaving it with the valet which I hear is a bargain at only $2. I was next to last to arrive at our scheduled 7pm time and without making reservations, we managed to snag the only 8 seat table in the place. All the other tables are basically for 4 and you can squeeze 5 in but not recommended. This was my first time at this place.
Ventilation was okay for me but my back was to the window and there was a light breeze so people across the table from me might have been getting smoked out more. The grills are gas powered and some charcoal is added, but it ran out well before we were done with our 2.5 hour carnivorous orgy. Service was very spotty, but that might have been our fault as we didn't know to use the service button to request service. I know now.
Our table of eight ordered most of the normal dishes... Kalbi, bulgoggi, tongue, pork belly, spicy pork, chicken, brisket and the rib eye steak which is NOT on the menu. They brought out the usual panchan (Korean side dishes) and they were all good. I liked that they added some apple to the regular potato salad to give that jolt of sweetness of the apples from the regular potato salad. They also give you the rice wrappers and a lightly dressed green salad instead of whole lettuce leaves to eat with your meat and were good about keeping the salad bowl full. The chicken was boneless thigh meat which is a flavorful, juicy dark meat and when cooked it was tasty. It was somewhat semi frozen when it arrived at our table which sorta turned me off at first, but it tasted fine. They also brought out the raw chicken together with the other meats which I don't like as I much prefer to have raw poultry on a separate serving dish from the other meats in case we want to cook the beef rare... But everyone wanted the meat well charred like I do so it was no problem. That un-brined pork belly was delicious too and my second fav dish behind the rib eye.
Service: It was a constant battle with the wait staff as a couple of us liked the meat charred instead of rare and the servers would come over and turn down the stove and then I'd turn it back higher, LOL. I presume this was to reduce the smokiness as the breeze would push the smoke beyond the ceiling vents adding to the smoke in the restaurant. We asked for another steamed egg dish and were surprised that the server replied with a loud and stern NO! Fine... give me another order of the much more expensive rib eye steak please!
We were almost always out of water and it would have been great if we'd had rice. I don't understand why they don't give everyone a big bowl of rice... way cheaper than meat! Ditto with the water... fill up the customers with cheap rice and free water instead of expensive steak! Give us the soup without asking as well. Broth is cheaper than meat!
If the management was smart they'd give better service to our group so that we'd be full and leave... we dined there for 2.5 hours because the service was so slow... again didn't know about the buzzer so I cannot completely blame the servers. This was a Thursday night so there wasn't another big group, that needed our table, but they were lucky for that. Many Yelpers gave high marks for the service... We were getting dirty looks by the servers towards the end of our meal as we kept ordering more meat! It was almost hysterical! This might have been avoided if we'd had a Korean speaking member with us, so in the future, I would be happy to go back but we'd definitely need a Korean to help out with the ordering and service.
In summary only 3 starts because of the poor service, but I'd certainly be willing to give the food 4 stars. I'm willing to go back again and see if I could rate it higher in the future.
Logistics: Parking really sucks as it took me 10-15 minutes to find a parking spot on the street as I had some stuff in my car than I couldn't trust leaving it with the valet which I hear is a bargain at only $2. I was next to last to arrive at our scheduled 7pm time and without making reservations, we managed to snag the only 8 seat table in the place. All the other tables are basically for 4 and you can squeeze 5 in but not recommended. This was my first time at this place.
Ventilation was okay for me but my back was to the window and there was a light breeze so people across the table from me might have been getting smoked out more. The grills are gas powered and some charcoal is added, but it ran out well before we were done with our 2.5 hour carnivorous orgy. Service was very spotty, but that might have been our fault as we didn't know to use the service button to request service. I know now.
Our table of eight ordered most of the normal dishes... Kalbi, bulgoggi, tongue, pork belly, spicy pork, chicken, brisket and the rib eye steak which is NOT on the menu. They brought out the usual panchan (Korean side dishes) and they were all good. I liked that they added some apple to the regular potato salad to give that jolt of sweetness of the apples from the regular potato salad. They also give you the rice wrappers and a lightly dressed green salad instead of whole lettuce leaves to eat with your meat and were good about keeping the salad bowl full. The chicken was boneless thigh meat which is a flavorful, juicy dark meat and when cooked it was tasty. It was somewhat semi frozen when it arrived at our table which sorta turned me off at first, but it tasted fine. They also brought out the raw chicken together with the other meats which I don't like as I much prefer to have raw poultry on a separate serving dish from the other meats in case we want to cook the beef rare... But everyone wanted the meat well charred like I do so it was no problem. That un-brined pork belly was delicious too and my second fav dish behind the rib eye.
Service: It was a constant battle with the wait staff as a couple of us liked the meat charred instead of rare and the servers would come over and turn down the stove and then I'd turn it back higher, LOL. I presume this was to reduce the smokiness as the breeze would push the smoke beyond the ceiling vents adding to the smoke in the restaurant. We asked for another steamed egg dish and were surprised that the server replied with a loud and stern NO! Fine... give me another order of the much more expensive rib eye steak please!
We were almost always out of water and it would have been great if we'd had rice. I don't understand why they don't give everyone a big bowl of rice... way cheaper than meat! Ditto with the water... fill up the customers with cheap rice and free water instead of expensive steak! Give us the soup without asking as well. Broth is cheaper than meat!
If the management was smart they'd give better service to our group so that we'd be full and leave... we dined there for 2.5 hours because the service was so slow... again didn't know about the buzzer so I cannot completely blame the servers. This was a Thursday night so there wasn't another big group, that needed our table, but they were lucky for that. Many Yelpers gave high marks for the service... We were getting dirty looks by the servers towards the end of our meal as we kept ordering more meat! It was almost hysterical! This might have been avoided if we'd had a Korean speaking member with us, so in the future, I would be happy to go back but we'd definitely need a Korean to help out with the ordering and service.
In summary only 3 starts because of the poor service, but I'd certainly be willing to give the food 4 stars. I'm willing to go back again and see if I could rate it higher in the future.
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