Restaurant Review – Little Korea [LiKo]
I have dined at Little Korea in the past whenever I’m shopping in Leicester Square’s Chinatown and decided to revisit the restaurant to see if anything had changed since my last visit.
The restaurant itself is quite small and seemingly narrow when viewed from the outside but there are additional tables in the basement level. The member of staff at the reception promptly gestured me to go downstairs when I requested a table for myself and a waitress escorted me to my seat. The overall atmosphere of the restaurant layout is cosy, not too crowded and far from intimidating.
Little Korea downstairs
Little Korea downstairs seating
In the past I have ordered a Tempura Bento set and when it comes to the main Korean dishes I often opted for the Dol Bibim Bab, varying the ingredients each time I went to eat at the restaurant to make my eating slightly more adventurous. For my latest visit I decided to try something different and I ordered a Kimchi Bokum Bab (Korean style fried rice with Kimchi and pork) which cost me £7.50.
Little Korea starters
Little Korea’s Kimchi Fried Rice
Little Korea’s Barley teapot
The size of the fried rice was rather tiny for that price and if it were not for my huge pot of barley tea (£3), which could be enough to share between two people, I would not be full at all. Not even the starters that came before the main dish would have helped out. On the other hand I did enjoy the fried rice and the starters (beansprouts, shredded carrots and cucumber) and found the Kimchi was not that salty which a lot of people seem to be peeved by when it comes to eating Kimchi in general. I found the Kimchi delicious and I feel the supposed saltiness it is well-known for tends to be diluted a little when eaten with rice.
The service from the waiting staff was very good. Thoroughly prompt and polite with reasonable English. The food arrivals were also satisfying, even with the busy environment upstairs and downstairs. The chefs who cooked the hot dishes and sushi orders were constantly working as new customers came into the restaurant. When I asked for the bill a waiter assisted me immediately and informed me I had to pay upstairs at reception. To my surprise I was told that credit card payment was only possible if my bill was £20 or over. This was something new since my last LiKo visit. Luckily I had prepared some extra cash as backup.
The Japanese and Korean menus here are quite extensive so you have a lot of choice on what to eat. However the pricing for each dish might be off-putting. I feel the LiKo dishes that represent their pricing are the BBQ dishes, the non-stone bowl rice dishes and Jap Chae (I once ordered this and it was a huge portion for its £6.50 price). The Dol Bibim Bab pricing ranges from £8.50 – £9 but the dish itself tends to fill me up very easily.
Overall – the service, food quality and restaurant layout I rate them all as very good. As for the dish pricing and the dish size to reflect them, one would be better off dining at alternative restaurants in London.
Website – http://www.likolondon.co.uk/ (the Japanese and Korean menus on the site has not been updated as the prices for some dishes have increased by 50p approximately).
