Kunjip
The rating scale of 0 to 100 reflects our editors’ appraisals of all the tangible and intangible factors that make a restaurant or bar great — or terrible — regardless of price.
Read more about the new ratingsLocation
9 W. 32nd St., New York, NY, 10001
212-216-9487
Known For
The lowdown
For every three massive, two-floor, fluorescent-lit eateries in Koreatown, there is one restaurant like this: small and wooden, it teems with mostly 20-somethings, either standing in a long, amorphous line or crammed elbow-to-elbow at tables. The scene is as raucous as its food is satisfying. The lively little dishes — cubes of tangy, spicy pickled turnip, for instance, or strips of chewy, sweet-dried catfish — that appear when you sit down are an auspicious beginning and suggest that any of the stews, noodles, and casseroles listed on the extensive menu will also make a fine meal. Most do: Seafood pancakes are crispy and laced with tender squid; gobdol bibimbap achieves a properly crunchy bottom. The disorientation that sets in after a few bottles of soju might even steer you away from standard fare and toward a bubbling-hot stew of oxtails floating with purplish chunks of blood. Embrace it — it’s fiery and fabulous.
What you need to know
Recommended DishesSeafood bibimbap; seafood pancake; ox-bone stew.
DrinksSake/Soju, Beer and Wine
Noise LevelCivilized