Joomak | Eat in or Take Out?

This post was first published on HAPPIEBB.com
bb | July 2, 2011




surely i ain’t the only one who likes korean food, ya? in fact, i’d get a craving for it so often!

but but but… to be honest, there ain’t that many korean restaurants that i like here in singapore, so i always end up at nearly the same old places. yea, i know, i know, i’m boring like that.

what if you’ve a craving when you’re at home? or what if you’re doing some entertaining at home and you wanna feed your guests some authentic and hearty korean food? whilst food delivered to your doorstep is a way of life in korea, it ain’t the same for korean food in singapore.

hey, now i’ve the perfect answer for you! hee, but only if you live at the holland/bukit timah area or in the west, alrighty? here’s the skinny on this establishment i’m talking about.




주막 Joomak Korean Restaurant
Address: 144 Upper Bukit Timah Road
#04-01 Beauty World Centre (macs at the street level)
Singapore 588177

Telephone:
6466 – 7871 / 8229 – 4055

Opening Hours:
11:30 AM – 3:00 PM / 5:00 PM – 11:00 PM

Buses:
(Upp. Bt Timah Rd): 67, 75, 170, 171, 173, 184, 852, 961
(Jln Jurong Kechil): 66, 77, 157, 173, 174, 185, 645, 970, 989

Delivery Charges:
$4 (for delivery of $60 below)
Free (for delivery of $60 and above)


in case you’re wondering this ain’t a caterer. in fact, Joomak is a full restaurant just that it also offers delivery services on all of its food and beverages for peeps living in the the west. i’m highlighting this coz i can totally imagine ordering the food and have it delivered to my place, keke!


how did i chance upon Joomak?

a korean friend brought me there. i was asking her about which korean restaurants she likes here and stuff, and she told me there’s this place that many koreans go to at beauty world centre (in fact, Joomak has mostly-korean patrons). she told me the restaurant doesn’t use MSG in their food and how she loves their kimchi jjim with saba and also the bean pancake.

then one day, she decided to take me to the restaurant to try it for myself. not one to keep good food all to myself, i decided to ask TIFFANY and WONDERRRGIRL along.

i know, i know… beauty world centre ain’t the most convenient of places, unless you stay in bukit timah. but hey, we singaporeans (yup, including singaporeans who think they’re koreans, keke!) are the sort who will travel for good, ya?


here, the outside of the Joomak.




Joomak is simple and unpretentious in its look and feel. before you go thinking it’s so shabby looking place, let me stop you there.

nope, it’s not at all that. on its walls are korean characters and also traditional korean paintings/murals (of old-style drinking places!), and its furniture in dark wood. no adding of chandeliers that nearly-always look like the restaurants are trying too hard, too funny lighting effects… just good, old-fashioned simplicity, everything you need in a restaurant that lets its food do the talking.



and no fancy-looking utensils and crockery… everything’s just like what you would expect in a typical eatery in seoul. i like, i like, like!

we started off lunch that day with… (what else?!)… MAKGEOLLI!



the banchan…!



and let me tell you this, the kimchi is… POWER, keke!



the menu!



are you curious about the name Joomak (주막 / 酒幕)? i know i was!



actually, it’s an ‘old’ word… in that the word already existed in the ancient chosun days. it refers to drinking places like this one!



well, Joomak (주막 / 酒幕 and can also be romanized into Jumak) refers to taverns or inns that serve alcoholic drinks. So Joomak actually hopes to create and maintain the same sort of relaxed and friendly atmosphere amongst friends who gather to have a drink.

It has air-conditioned indoor sitting area, as well as an open area (you can even BBQ meat yourself outside!) my observation when i went was that the women seem to prefer sitting inside, whereas the men prefer the outside, keke!


okay, back to the menu!

gotta say this is one of the more comprehensive menu i’ve seen amongst the korean restaurants in singapore. they’ve most of everything! just give you a sampling of what you can expect to find here at Joomak and also an indication of prices.


Casserole / Pot Dishes (Shared dish) $20 – 35
– Spicy chicken stew
– Kimchi Jjim (pork belly or saba)
– Budae Chigae (mixed korean soup / army casserole)
– odeng soup
– spicy seafood soup

Fried Chicken (shared dish) $15 – $26
– Combination (mix of fried chix + seasoned spicy chix)
– Fried chicken
– Seasoned spicy chicken

Single Orders (served with rice) $8 – 25
– Kimchi soup
– Spicy tofu soup
– Soybean soup
– Spicy beef soup
– Ginseng chicken soup
– BBQ saba
– Hot plate BBQ (beef/pork/chicken)
– Squid + vegetables
– Kimchi fried rice
– Bibimbap

Dishes $15 – 25
– Spicy oyster with vegetables
– Jap Chae
– Seafood pancake with spring onion
– Kimchi pancake
– Mixed pancake
– Mung beans pancake
– Egg roll

BBQ $15 – 30
– Pork belly
– Pork ribs
– Beef ribeye

Others $6 – 12
– Ddeokbokki (spicy ricecake)
– Rabokki (spicy ricecake + korean ramyeon)
– Black bean ramyeon
– Ramyeon
– Dumpling
– Dumpling with soup

Happy Hour (12nn to 7:30pm) $20


the above list is not exhaustive… yup, there’re more!

but i reckon i shouldn’t be putting up everything lest i bore you to tears even before i put up the pics of the food we had that day, keke! but i really wanted to convey to all of you the message that the menu really is pretty extensive! price-wise, they’re pretty much comparable to what most of the other korean restaurants are charging.

ok now, let me share some pics of the food we had over lunch that day. first order of the day… ZZANG!!

spicy octopus soup!!

it was spicy alright, but truly yummylicious! gotta ‘fess up that i can’t really handle overly-spicy food and this one was almost over my tolerance level… just almost, but i bore with the spiciness coz it was so tasty! (i’m really surprised that no MSG was used coz it was so flavourful!)

if you like spicy food, i strongly recommend this dish.

sorry the pics are not so nice. i was too engrossed in the food and the conversation that i forgot to take nice shots of the stew after the octopus was cooked. mianeyo!



next, i wanna recommend one of my fave dishes at Joomak, the good old-fashioned jjajangmyeon (짜장면)! me thinks the noodles at Joomak is just so wonderfully textured and soft!!

wanna share abit of background info on this dish that’s practically reached cult status in korea and is arguably one of its national dishes. i think no one will argue with me if i say jjajangmyeon is the most popular delivery noodle dish in korea.

yup, in korea, jjajangmyeon is mostly served in chinese restaurants. and yup, it does have some chinese origins, as you might have already guessed since its origins can be traced back to incheon, where there is a substantial chinese community, especially in the earliest days.

slightly over a hundred years ago, the chinese started arriving in korean (via the incheon port) and they’re mostly from northern china due to the geographical proximity. the chinese brought along with them the chinese classic black bean noodles known as zha-jiang-mian (炸酱面), which translates literally into noodles with fried sauce.

however, after adaptation and localization, today’s jjajangmyeon bears very little resemblance to the original in both method of cooking and taste. the korean jajangmyeon consists of wheat noodles topped with a thick sauce made of chunjang (a salty black soybean paste), diced meat and vegetables. as for the original chinese zha-jiang-mian, it does not use chunjang nor onions. the irony now is even the chinese in china are taking to the korean-adapted jjajangmyeon!

one key point to note that jjajangmyeon is that the noodles are made entirely by hand and not by machines; these noodles are called sutamyeon (수타면; 手打麵), translated literally into noodles that are beaten by hands.

another interesting point about jjajangmyeon is about the sauce. as mentioned earlier, it’s made with a dark soybean paste called chunjang (춘장; 春醬). get this, the chunjang paste is made from made from roasted soybeans and… (are you ready?) caramel! hee, the sauce is called chunjang when it’s still unheated; but once it’s heated and stir-fried with diced onions and ground meat or even chopped seafood in some cases, it becomes jjajang (literally ‘fried sauce’)!

more often than not, jjajangmyeon is served with danmuji (단무지), which are pickled radish slices. yup, these are the yellow bits that you often see in kimbap (korean rice-rolls).

anyway, a bowl of drool-and-slurp-worthy jjajangmyeon costs only $6 at Joomak!



people who know me would know that i love food in general, and in particular i’m the queen of flour! so i love rice, hot cakes, bread and yes, pancake! my all-time fave has gotten be the seafood pancake (해물파전) at Red Pig! but but but, i’ve now found a healthier pancake version at Joomak, the mung beans pancake!

best eaten when piping hot!



now we’re finally gonna be tasting the very dish that triggered this Joomak outing, the kimchi jjim (김치찜) with saba!

yea, remember i was saying my korean friend kept raving about this dish? ZZANG…!!




this is a rather generously-portioned dish with a whole head of kimchi cabbage and an entire saba. of course, you can choose to have it with pork belly instead of fish.

whoa, boss-nim himself came to our table and helped cut the kimchi for us!

incidentally, if you’re new to korean food and have not taken to the taste of kimchi yet, this might be abit too ‘potent’ for you. but for those of you who love love love the unique taste of korean food, this is jinjja one mighty heavenly dish! usually aged kimchi is used for kimchi jjim, so you can imagine how the soup taste after steaming/boiling the kimchi. it’s got the perfect balance of sourness, tastiness and heat.

at the first taste, it might seem a teeny weeny pungently sour, but hey, do give it another chance. if you really like most korean food, i can almost guarantee that this dish will grow you. each spoonful and each taste will only get better and better; in fact, i personally found it ‘addictive’ as i found myself reaching out for more of the soup.


boss-nim at Joomak is a nice and polite man too! gotta tell you that this ain’t one of those restaurants whereby the korean owners just decide to hire cooks to prepare the dishes. here at Joomak, boss-nim himself is the chef!

according to my friend, he’s an experienced chef in korea for years and years before moving over to singapore. backed by his years of training and experience, his own passion and desire to spread the love of korean food to singaporeans.

how to resist such sincerity, you tell me…



personally, i like hearty korean meals and i heart even more unpretentious good food that focus on freshness and quality of ingredients. if you’re like me, i suggest you try Joomak one of these days.

if you do go, let me know how you like it, k? meanwhile, let me go ponder why on earth i’m torturing myself by blogging about food that i like in the middle of the night…