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Choon Ha Choo Dong
Categories: Restaurants Korean Restaurants Barbeque Korean, Barbeque [Edit]
36 Broadway EVancouver, BC V5T 1V6
Neighbourhood: Mount Pleasant
(604) 874-4131
- Hours:
Mon, Wed-Thu, Sun 11 am - 10 pm
Fri-Sat 11 am - 11 pm
- Good for Groups:
- Yes
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Attire:
- Casual
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Good for Kids:
- Yes
- Takes Reservations:
- Yes
- Delivery:
- No
- Take Away:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- No
- Good For:
- Dinner
- Alcohol:
- Full Bar
- Noise Level:
- Average
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- No
22 reviews for Choon Ha Choo Dong
Review Highlights
"...dish here is the spicy seafood soup with dumplings."
(in 3 reviews)
"...the cheap kalbi, sliced short ribs (the are three different..."
(in 4 reviews)
"Also, the side dishes were well made and fresh."
(in 2 reviews)
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22 reviews in English
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Review from Kim L.
Vancouver, BC
12/7/2011 2 Check-ins Here
Great for groups since they have several private rooms. Many times, you need a large group for Korean food to enjoy a variety. I especially like the preset menus for 2, 4, 6+ people that includes bbq, soup/stew, japche, etc. I particularly like their Korean Rice Cake and Dumpling stew that comes in the group combos--flavorful and satisfying.
Service has always been great and there is plenty of parking in the back! -
Review from Chris W.
Vancouver, BC
Updated - 11/20/2011
Gave Choon Ha Choo Dong another try last night and was glad we did! They clocked in at a solid 3 stars. It was just my husband and I, so we ordered the set dinner for 2 for $30. We got 4 appy plates (a salad, potatoes, kim chee, and bean sprouts), a plate of tuna/sushi sashimi, fried gyozas, rice cake and mandoo soup and a plate of raw beef, short ribs, chicken and pork for the barbecue. The sashimi portions were big and fresh. The gyozas were deep fried and pretty average. As with our last visit, the rice cake and mandoo soup was very tasty! The BBQ meats were well marinated and tasty once once cooked. Dinner also came with 2 bowls of rice. We were stuffed by the time we were done!
The restaurant was a healthy 80% full on a Saturday night and the service was fantastic, the wait staff checked in regularly to refill our tea, take away empty dishes and to exchange the charred grill pans.
All in all, a pleasant dinner!1 Previous Review: Show all »
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7/16/2011
I've been wanting to try this place for a few weeks after finding it on Yelp and so highly rated.… Read more »
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Review from Quinn M.
Vancouver, BC
11/9/2011 2 photos
This is my new favorite place. The sushi is the best i've had yet! Huge pieces: quality AND quantity. I always tip really well here because the service is so good, and i'm not the biggest tipper :P
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Review from Joseph H.
Richmond, BC
4/30/2011
The challenge with making authentic korean cuisine in Canada is that most of the special ingredients have to be imported and tend to be much more expensive. It is difficult for a korean resto here to offer the same taste at a reasonable price. Choon Ha Choo Dong has come the closest that I've seen in reaching an acceptable compromise between authenticity of taste and affordability in price.
I got the lunch special for $10.99. It came with 5 side dishes (re-fillable). Most korean restos here only offer 4 side dishes so having 5 was good. Also, the side dishes were well made and fresh. The kimchi squid is a rare find for a "free" side dish.
The sole female waitress was so pretty and cute, like yoon eun hye from Goong. I think seeing her was worth making the trip here.
The entrance to the resto is essentially a hole in the wall, next to the furniture store and a construction project. Fortunately, the dining area upstairs is quite nice, with genuine korean styling and designs. The instant coffee machine is a nice touch as it is essential appliance at virtually every korean family resto in korea. -
Review from Kassim D.
11/14/2010 ROTD 12/18/2010
This place is a little hard to find, but as other yelpers have said - it's a gem.
We went on a Thursday and decided on the the "grill it yourself" option.
Ended up with marinated steak, scallops, and a seafood soup medley with funky green noodles. We couldn't finish everything but the food was quite tasty.
The service was not fantastic, but apparently if you get one of the secluded rooms (with curtains etc) you get a buzzer of sorts and the staff seems to respond quickly to them.
I had to venture over the counter to ask for cutlery and plates, and as it turns out they ran out of knives, and get this - offered me scissors (awesome) instead and only brought one plate and one fork.
Worth a trip if you are craving the Korean bbq and some DIY action.Listed in: Essential VanCity +…
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Review from Bill T.
BC
11/11/2011
I think yelp should do an an article on Bibimbap. Seriously, I'm addicted to this stuff. Ever since I had the (delicious) bibimbap for the first time at a now-closed Korean restaraunt on Robson, I keep my eyes peeled for the traditional dish at any Korean restaruant I go to. Some have been great, and some not so. The best one I found (so far!!) came to me about a week ago when I went to a birthday dinner for a friend at this unassuming little restaurant. We sat at 2 huge tables, and there were 30 of us! Everyone had interesting dishes.. I liked the barbecue they had! But myself, I had to have the Bibimbap, and the one I had was the spicy pork one. The service was very good, though not spectacular. The food I got though... was AMAZING. The beef and rice and vegetables were dynamite tasty, expecially the beef. Spicy spicy! but not HOT. Normally they have a squirt bottle of sauce to put in, but this baby was so packed with flavor that there was no need. I eagerly warfed all of that goodness up. So so good. And CHEAP! the bowl I had was 8 bucks! The only problems I had was where we were sitting, which was close to an exit, and the cold air was rushing in, and since there was so many of us, the dish wasnt as hot when it arrived as I would have liked. But those two complaints are minor, just because we were sitting in a special place and there were so many of us. I'd definitely come back here in a heartbeat!
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Review from Janet Y.
Vancouver, BC
2/18/2011
This place is difficult to find and limited parking at the back of the store. Street parking would be your next best option.
The bbq here is great, and the service is very courteous and attentive. We were seated in one of those rooms with a buzzer. Lots of bbq options to select from. They also have sashimi too. I would stick with their yummy Korean bbq food though.
Definitely worth going and worth the time finding parking! Recommend!
Bring your GPS with you, otherwise you will miss the entrance just driving by. -
Review from Daniella F.
Vancouver, BC
8/16/2011
I came here with some friends and really enjoyed my dish (bi bim bop or the hot pot). If you're vegetarian and order the vegetable hot pot, make sure you tell your server that you don't want any meat in it! Very tasty, good value for money, and full of Koreans. Can't wait to go back!
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Review from beki L.
Vancouver, BC
9/28/2010 2 photos
I have finally gotten my chance to check out this hidden gem!
I have read over all the previous reviews to see a common must have and the spicey seafood soup with dumplings popped out.
my friend and i decided upon the buckwheat soba noodles with vegetable-large.
we were both still fairly new to korean cuisine so we asked our server if the thought that would be enough for the two of us. he replied that it was way more than enough.
the service we received was awesome. very polite, courteous and helpful.
the food we had was amazing! the spiciness of the soup was hot enough to leave beads of sweat on your face but not bad enough that you couldn't continue to drink it. SO GOOOD!!
the smell coming from the salad was intoxicating..and the portions of both were enourmous! our server was right, waaay more than enough!
i look forward to coming back here to order more of the delicious authentic korean fare they have to offer...!Listed in: The Spice is Right!
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Review from Mike P.
As far as Korean food anywhere close to where i live this is as good as it gets. Sure it's a little rough around the edges (this place has been a Korean restaurant under different owners for many many years), but as there isn't an abundance of Korean restaurants close to me I REALLY appreciate that they have excellent food.
My wife and I have been here a number of times and each time we walk away happy with the meal we had. The menu has pretty much whatever you want (the full spectrum of Korean cuisine) and the prices are very reasonable. The clientele is almost entirely Korean, in fact the last time we were there, a tour bus of Koreans were just leaving the restaurant (this is how I KNOW this place is good).
The service at most Korean restaurants I always find a little lacking compared to western restaurants (and this place is no exception). My wife tells me it's a cultural thing, that being said, if you sit at one of the tables in the restaurant with a service button and you press the button there will be someone at your table within seconds.
The banchan here is always very good, and the dishes they serve vary from visit to visit. My favourite dish here is the spicy seafood soup with dumplings. -
Review from Barry Y.
Coquitlam, BC
7/18/2011
I went to Choon Ha Choo Dong over the weekend for Korean food simply because it was convenient. The restaurant is located on the second level with free parking at the back lane.
Choon Ha Choo Dong serves both Korean and Japanese cuisine. Sushi bar is stocked with the bare essentials. Nothing spectacular. The restaurant is clean and looks newly renovated.
For a Saturday late morning, it was extremely quite. We were the only customers there! The host/manager is Chinese - very attentive & polite. The menus were CONFUSING! There's a Korean group meal menu, Japanese menu and a standard ala carte Korean menu. The ala carte menu was TOTALLY confusing. Multiple pages with the same heading and the items on these pages were the same numbers.
We ordered the japchae, Korean tofu soup, goat soup, beef bogogee and chicken bogogee. Japache is pretty standard everywhere you go and it's difficult to mess it up. The Korean tofu soup was bland at best. It's typically served bubbling hot...but not here! The goat soup was OK but it tasted more like lamb than goat. All in all, there were maybe 2-3 cubes of 'goat' meat. Both the beef and chicken bogogee dishes were good. Guessing each of these 2 dishes were no more than 4 oz of meat! For $15, it's pretty pricey considering its raw and you have to cook it!
Overall the food was average! My daughter brought up a great point, what do you expect when its Chinese owned! The manager/host was great. He did everything to make our visit great. Offered us extra rice for our soups, always there with hot tea.
The restaurant is clean. Waitress and host was attentive and very nice. Unfortunately, the food is just average. -
Review from Reena M.
This was my second experience with Korean food ever. I went once 5-6 years ago with a bunch of Korean exchange students. They did all the ordering and I had no idea what I would get if I ever went back.
SO I wanted to try Korean food and see if it was something that I could like. We went to Choon Ha Choo Dong (I love saying this name.. hehehe ) after one member of our party heard her friends rave on about it. We ordered the Korean BBQ and spicy gyoza. The Gyoza was really nice and the BBQ was good too. I thoroughly enjoyed my entire meal and was really full by the end of it. According to my friends, who had Korean before, this place was actually one of the best for Korean BBQ.
I would totally go back for the BBQ. It was really fun and tasty. The final bill for the 5 of us came out to be $83 something without tip and we didn't order any drinks or anything. The BBQ was huge and came with short ribs, some beef thing, pork, and chicken. As well as black bean noodles that had squid and scallops in it.
Yummy in my tummy!Listed in: Reena M's Guide to Main St.
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Review from Annie M.
Vancouver, BC
We got seated right after we walked-in the restaurant. However, we waited over 8-10 mins for somebody to give us a water and take the order.
The foods and services were sucks!!
We ordered steamed pork dumping, spicy pan fried squid rice, pork bone and potato soup.
Steamed pork dumping was fine, the skin just a bit dry. The pork bone potato soup was good and quite tasty.
However, the spicy pan-fired squid rice was awful !! It soaked in spicy oil!!
We didn't have much of it. -
Review from Adelina W.
Richmond, BC
1/12/2010
I was really craving some delicious Korean food and when I read all the reviews on here I was super excited to go and try this place out. My excitement quickly diminished as the meal went on... Here are my thoughts:
1. Shady and difficult to find - from the outside, you can barely tell there is a restaurant. Its on the second floor of a somewhat shady looking building. We drove past it the first time and if I didn't know where it was exactly, we probably would have missed it. Walking up the stairs to the restaurant, I was somewhat apprehensive of what we were about to enter, but once in the restaurant, we were met with a clean, and well lit environment. Most of the customers were Korean so that helped as well - if its good enough for the them, it must be pretty good.
2. Weird service - we ordered the Japchae, 2 dishes of BBQ (beef and beef short ribs) and a spicy pork rice dish. After we had ordered, the waiter came back and said that her boss felt it was TOO MUCH FOOD... There were 2 of us, yes its probably a tad too much, but we could always take it home right? We assured him that it would be fine and he went on his merry way. We felt this was a bit inappropriate for the waiter to come back to the table after the initial order was placed. I've had waiters question me right when I've ordered, mentioning that its too much food, but to come back was a bit weird. I don't see how it matters to the restaurant how much we order - doesn't it mean more money for them? A note about the menu - if you wanted a bbq combo, they're really expensive so go with a large group, but if you just want noodles / rice its pretty reasonable.
3. Japchae - it was so small! We sort of felt like they were giving us smaller portions on purpose, especially after that comment from the waiter. The ratio of noodles to vegetables was also off with a lot more veggies. This wouldn't really be too much of a problem, except the majority of the veggies were still raw. Ever ate a raw onion before? Not the most pleasant experience as my friend assured me. The veggies made the whole dish cold too.
4. BBQ meat - usually its the raw meat that comes first, but this didn't arrive until we had polished off the japchae (it was like they were testing us or something). The BBQ beef was actually really tasty. The beef ribs were meh.
5. Spicy pork - this was pretty decent too. The right amount of spiciness - not too overpowering, but enough to give you that tingle.
6. Banchan or side dishes - they did not come with the japchae. Usually they're the first things that come to the table. We didn't get them until we asked for them. There were five of them: kimchi, bean sprouts, tofu, sweet potatoes and some leafy green veggie that I couldn't identify (possibly seaweed?). The bean sprouts were spicy, which was very different from other restaurants I've been to and the sweet potatoes, normally my fav banchan, were pretty bland and undercooked. The tofu was also spicy, but sweet as well - a weird combo.
7. Service - throughout the whole meal the service was poor. It was difficult to get the attention of a waiter. At one point during the meal, everyone in our section of the restaurant needed their attention, but no one was paying attention. They forgot our tea, but as we were leaving soon we just let that one go. I just wasn't very impressed with management or their ability to serve their customers.
Primarily because of service, I will not be returning to this place. The BBQ beef and the spicy pork rice dish were pretty good, but they do not out weigh the negatives. They're expensive and I much rather take the drive out to Burnaby or Coquitlam for better prices, better service and better food. -
Review from DIana N.
Vancouver, BC
9/7/2011
Wow, we think that this place is a gem of a hole in the wall. They recently added some japanese food to the menu and so far, it's been quite spectacular. We usually go here for lunch as it is close to work. Will definitely be returning.
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Review from David H.
12/3/2009
This place was probably the best Korean food place I've been too. Disclaimer: I'm not Korean and am no expert on Korean cuisine. That being said, the food is great. Kim-chi is amazing, probably not as spicy as some would want it but perfect for me. The BBQ is fantastic, we had the sliced pork and the cheap kalbi, sliced short ribs (the are three different versions). I was delighted to see that the pork came with the skin still attached which meant a nice crispy treat, also the kalbi came without the bones which might have resulted in some loss of flavor but I couldn't tell and they were much easier to eat that way. They also give you lettuce leaves, marinated green onions and soybean paste for the meat, something that most cheap Korean BBQ places do not do.
All in all a great meal highly recommended if you have a Korean craving in the Vancouver area. -
Review from Yoony P.
9/24/2009
Best Korean in the hood. There are not many korean restaurants in this neighbourhood so this is my old faithful when i'm craving it. The food is great -- try the mandoo jjamppong (spicy seafood soup with dumplings). The servers are very nice as well.
Listed in: Korean Yummies
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Review from Xixi L.
Vancouver, BC
10/19/2009
Based upon some other internet ratings for the place, my friends and I decided to try it out for dinner this evening. I would have never thought the restaurant was there by just walking around. It wasn't very busy tonight, and the service was prompt and friendly. There's a little call button you press for service and they come by right away. We had the Combo B and between the 3 of us, we all feel like overstuffed turkeys. The food is quite decent for Korean restaurant style in Vancouver. We will DEFINITELY be going back to try other things on the menu.
Listed in: Restaurants
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Review from wind T.
9/30/2010
Pretty good place to have Korean food. We have soontofu and bibimba.
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Review from Vancouver T.
Vancouver, BC
5/16/2010
Good food and fresh too. was a pleasant surprise. the waitress is always eager to serve us. I would definitely come back!
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Review from shawn t.
Vancouver, BC
7/4/2009
This was my first ever Korean restaurant, and I loved it! Fantastic squid with noodles, super deep fried gyoza with fresh cabbage and herbs, and the marinated beef done on our own little grill in the middle of the table was tender and rich and totally memorable. I will go back to this place again and again. It will be hard to not order all the same stuff, but I have to try other stuff too and can't wait. Korean BBQ is my new best friend, and this place is where I'll consummate that friendship.
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Review from mike k.
6/16/2009
luckily stumbled into this place during our vacation. feenin for some korean food and hit the jackpot~! this places has everything from jajang myun to sashmi...the one stop shop if you need to get a kimchi fix. by the way i live in ktown LA...this place is up there
