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Jeon's joint is all about grilled meats — particularly the beef short ribs that customers cook themselves on gas-burning grills in the center of this restaurant's tables.
"The price of beef in Korea is the highest in the world," Jeon said as he watched one of his servers turn up the blue flames on one of the compact grills (each is about the size of a standard cookie sheet) and unroll a thin strip of marinated short rib over the fire. "But people love barbecue, just like they do in Kansas City."
But unlike Kansas City, which is loaded with barbecue restaurants, South Korea has had to do without American beef for nearly four years. Last month, a processing plant in Arkansas City, Kansas, sent its beef to South Korea in one of the first U.S. shipments since 2003. That was the year Seoul banned beef from the States. Jeon, like most local restaurateurs who serve beef, won't utter the name of the bovine illness that provoked the ban.
The compact, muscular Jeon has his own reasons for emphasizing the positive when it comes to eating meat. He's not just a restaurant owner; he's in the healthy-living business. He originally moved to Manhattan, Kansas, to study engineering but decided to take a few career turns instead. Now he's attending chiropractic school in addition to running his restaurant.
Jeon and his wife created Chosun Korean BBQ — named for one of the earliest Korean empires — in a narrow space between a tae kwon do studio and a Subway sandwich shop in a strip at 126th Street and Metcalf. They're about six minutes away from Overland Park's other two Korean restaurants, Choga Korean Restaurant at 105th and Metcalf and Chung's Rainbow Restaurant at 103rd and Metcalf.
Theirs is a pretty room but not fancy, and the service is eccentric, to put it kindly. Jeon's young servers are friendly but not especially attentive, and there's enough of a language barrier to lead to some unintentionally hilarious misunderstandings.
On the night that I dined with Kym and Stuart, we ordered some iced tea along with a plate of very good pan-fried beef-and-vegetable dumplings. Our server brought each of us a glass tumbler filled with slightly murky water. I asked the young man if this was iced tea, and he nodded. "It's corn tea. Iced corn tea. Very good."
"It tastes like dirty water," Kym whispered. But we bravely sipped the brew, which wasn't unpleasant. It just wasn't tea.
When Jeon came into the dining room, I asked about the corn tea and he laughed. "It's not made with corn. It's made with wheat. And it's not actually tea. In Korea, the water can be very stinky and polluted, so we boil it with a little corn or wheat for flavor. This is what we drink instead of water." By the time he brought us glasses of traditional iced tea, I was kind of into the wheat beverage.
Kym ordered her favorite Korean dish, bibim bap — a bowl of steamed rice mixed with vegetables, beef and fried egg. It's what she orders most of the time at the Royal China Restaurant on Shawnee Mission Parkway, which offers both Chinese and Korean fare. She liked Chosun's better, and it's certainly a hefty version of Korea's favorite one-bowl dish. Stuart ordered young yang galbi, a steamy beef broth full of short ribs, chestnuts, ginseng and mushrooms. He thought it tasted like good ol' Midwestern oxtail soup.
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The comment �Koreans do not eat pan-fried dumplings� is, in fact, false. A friend of mine just returned from Seoul where she enjoyed many versions of gun man doo � Korean potstickers, that were pan-fried. The traditional Korean dumpling is steamed, as Ms. Keenan suggests, and is derived from Chinese steamed buns, mantou. But most Korean restaurants in New York, including the popular Mandoo Bar in New York City, serve pan-fried dumplings. I might also note that the menu at Chosun BBQ describes its mandoo as pan-fried, and that�s precisely what arrived at the table. The story she mentions about the history of Chinese pan-fried dumplings is, by most accounts, apocryphal. But now I�m nit-picking.
As for the wheat-flavored water not being tea: Tea, iced or hot, is a beverage made from brewing tea leaves. When this beverage is made with an infusion of herbs, flowers or spices, it is herb tea. Water brewed with corn and wheat may have a name in Asia, but it is not tea.
The comment “Koreans do not eat pan-fried dumplings” is, in fact, false. A friend of mine just returned from Seoul where she enjoyed many versions of gun man doo – Korean potstickers, that were pan-fried. The traditional Korean dumpling is steamed, as Ms. Keenan suggests, and is derived from Chinese steamed buns, mantou. But most Korean restaurants in New York, including the popular Mandoo Bar in New York City, serve pan-fried dumplings. I might also note that the menu at Chosun BBQ describes its mandoo as pan-fried, and that’s precisely what arrived at the table. The story she mentions about the history of Chinese pan-fried dumplings is, by most accounts, apocryphal. But now I’m nit-picking. As for the wheat-flavored water not being tea: Tea, iced or hot, is a beverage made from brewing tea leaves. When this beverage is made with an infusion of herbs, flowers or spices, it is herb tea. Water brewed with corn and wheat may have a name in Asia, but it is not tea.
Hello,
I just wanted to add another correction to your article. Koreans do not eat pan-fried dumplings. Chinese eat pan-fried dumplings which originated from a mistake made in the emperor�s kitchen while making steamed dumplings. The water evaporated too quickly from the pan burning the underside of the dumpling. Korean dumplings are not made the same as Chinese dumplings. The filling in the dumplings are made completely different and Koreans do not pan fry the dumplings. Instead the dumplings are either fried, this type of dumpling is called gun mandu, or it is steamed, this is called jjin mandu. Please make the correction in your article. Koreans consider it very offensive when the culture is correlated to Chinese or Japanese culture. If you knew the bitter history between the Koreans, the Chinese, and the Japanese you would have probably known better to do a bit more research before printing this article.
Have a Great Day :)
Theresa Keenan
Hello,
I just wanted to comment on Korean corn iced tea not being iced tea. Before incorrectly printing that the Korean corn iced tea is not iced tea, you must understand that not every culture's version of certain foods and beverages will not be exactly the same as what Americans are familiar with. For example, Korean BBQ is obviously not the same as the sloppy and saucy American BBQ. But nevertheless, it is still BBQ. Jewish marinated green bean salad is not exactly the same as the American three bean salad; but nevertheless, it is still a marinated bean salad. And German potato salad is not exactly the same as the American version of potato salad but nevertheless it is still considered potato salad. With that said, I shall now address what is considered iced tea. First of all, not all teas are the same in every culture. It is custom for Koreans to drink teas made from barley, brown rice, corn, ginseng, ginger root, a specific type of tree bark (I can not think of the name of the tree at the moment), green tea leaves, and even pine nuts. Indians drink teas that are made from ginger roots, Assam, Darjeeling, and among other things. The Chinese drink teas made from green tea leaves, flowers such as jasmine, gardenia, plum, orchid, and rose, and black teas called Qi Hong and Dian Hong just to name a few. I can go on with the many different varieties of teas offered in many different cultures. However, my point is that American teas are not made from the same ingredients as other teas offered in different cultures around the world and no matter how the tea is made, when you add ice, it is still iced tea.
Theresa Keenan
Hello, I just wanted to add another correction to your article. Koreans do not eat pan-fried dumplings. Chinese eat pan-fried dumplings which originated from a mistake made in the emperor’s kitchen while making steamed dumplings. The water evaporated too quickly from the pan burning the underside of the dumpling. Korean dumplings are not made the same as Chinese dumplings. The filling in the dumplings are made completely different and Koreans do not pan fry the dumplings. Instead the dumplings are either fried, this type of dumpling is called gun mandu, or it is steamed, this is called jjin mandu. Please make the correction in your article. Koreans consider it very offensive when the culture is correlated to Chinese or Japanese culture. If you knew the bitter history between the Koreans, the Chinese, and the Japanese you would have probably known better to do a bit more research before printing this article. Have a Great Day :) Theresa Keenan
Hello, I just wanted to comment on Korean corn iced tea not being iced tea. Before incorrectly printing that the Korean corn iced tea is not iced tea, you must understand that not every culture's version of certain foods and beverages will not be exactly the same as what Americans are familiar with. For example, Korean BBQ is obviously not the same as the sloppy and saucy American BBQ. But nevertheless, it is still BBQ. Jewish marinated green bean salad is not exactly the same as the American three bean salad; but nevertheless, it is still a marinated bean salad. And German potato salad is not exactly the same as the American version of potato salad but nevertheless it is still considered potato salad. With that said, I shall now address what is considered iced tea. First of all, not all teas are the same in every culture. It is custom for Koreans to drink teas made from barley, brown rice, corn, ginseng, ginger root, a specific type of tree bark (I can not think of the name of the tree at the moment), green tea leaves, and even pine nuts. Indians drink teas that are made from ginger roots, Assam, Darjeeling, and among other things. The Chinese drink teas made from green tea leaves, flowers such as jasmine, gardenia, plum, orchid, and rose, and black teas called Qi Hong and Dian Hong just to name a few. I can go on with the many different varieties of teas offered in many different cultures. However, my point is that American teas are not made from the same ingredients as other teas offered in different cultures around the world and no matter how the tea is made, when you add ice, it is still iced tea. Theresa Keenan
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