Food Review: Jang Ga Nae Korean Restaurant

We recently tried a little Korean Restaurant hidden away in Ortigas. The name of the place is Jang Ga Nae and its formerly known as Minato. Its located behind UA&P and is on the same street as Astoria Plaza. Its not a new restaurant but it has a solid following of mostly local Koreans. You notice this right away as you walk in as 50% of the customers are Korean. When that many Koreans go to a Korean restaurant, you know it must be authentic.

The place has good seating capacity and the staff are very attentive. Everyone greets you when you walk in and they keep on bowing whenever they need your attention to serve you. All very polite and very good service.

The offer free appetizers and they are good. I especially liked the Kimchi Pancake. It was a fried pancake made of cabbage and bean sprouts and its really good. They serve this free so you can ask if your server didn’t give you. On to the main course, we ordered a few variety of dishes but we did not get to order any barbecues this time as there isn’t that many of us eating. I’ll be posting the English names of the dishes as I cannot remember how its called in Korean.

Korean Seafood Pancake

The seafood pancake is very similar to Japan’s Okonomiyaki Dish. Its about 1/4 inch thick and filled with shrimp, squid, and a variety of seafood and vegetables. Its crunchy on the outer layer and soft on the inside. I believe the price is Php 250-ish (sorry I should write these down next time) and is good for about 4 people.

Korean Beef Stew

Their beef stew is also good. The texture is soft and stewed just about right. Its easy to eat and very flavorful. Its a bit sweet but not too much and its sprinkled with sesame seeds. The dish is about Php 350-ish and should be enough for about 3 people. The sauce is creamy and good when paired with Korean steamed rice.

Shabu-Shabu (Php 750)

My mom wanted some soup so we ordered a Shabu-Shabu. This dish featured several different kinds of mushroom and vegetables along with some sliced beef. You can have your choice of how spicy you want to soup to be. You can cook it yourself or your ever-so-attentive server can do it for you as well. It also comes with 2 kinds of Korean noodles one of them being glass noodle like the ones used in Japchae and the other one is flat egg noodles done Korean style. Both are included and all in all, this is a large dish for sharing for the group at Php 750.

Japchae

Lastly, we had to try the Japchae as its really a traditional Korean dish. Again, it did not dissappoint. We were actually expecting some dishes to be bad as its seldom a place have everything right. We were happy to find that we were wrong. Nothing too special about this dish compared to the others but it was done well. Flavors were just right.

After the meal, we were served free slices of pineapple. The Korean lady owner even came by our table to make sure everything was alright. That is the mark of a good restaurant when the owners themselves check up on customer satisfaction. Overall, this is a place I would recommend if you are in the Ortigas area and have a Korean food craving.

Jang Ga Nae Korean Restaurant
8137 Plaza Escriba
Escriva Drive, San Antonio, Pasig

Tel: +632 633-6960
Cell: +63917 8586369