Little Korea: budget hotties

ut it it would be too spicy!" quoth our waiter when I ask where is our kimchi we were supposed to have as a side order. Well, well, well, you did not see me eating spicy yet. From our faces and accents he must have gathered we can't take hot peppers but why would we come to a Korean restaurant then at all?

Little Korea is tucked away at the very beginning of Lisle Street in Covent Garden. It is a cafeteria-looking budget eatery with an extensive Korean-Japanese menu. I stumbled upon it when walking around Covent Garden with my visitors from Amsterdam but they refused to eat "foreign muck", so I kept it until a more auspicious time, namely, Floyd's visit.

As once again I failed to get hold of my sanchae bibimbap, I went for one with seafood in a hot plate (해산물비빔밥). For the price (£5.99), it is quite a treat even though the seafood mix comes from the frozen section of the supermarket. I won't act a prissy purist, I use it myself.

Floyd had a jjam-bbong (짬뽕), which actually is the same as Japanese champon, just spicier, a generous bowl of spicy-ish udon with veggies and seafood. I must say the way I fix it is much more exciting, but don't we all think our cooking is the best! However, to give due credit jjam-bbong was hearty and honest.

The banchan (Korean side dishes customarily accompanying bigger orders) consisted of three entries.

• Firstly, rather bland if not inedible kongnamul (blanched bean sprouts) that lacked the sesame flavour I expected.
  
• Secondly, somewhat insipid courgette pickles.
• Very nice classic kimchi from Chinese cabbage, done just the way you expect, crunchy and spicy.

As it goes with Asian food and two big guys who regularly work out, that did not quite feed our faces. The bulgogi with rice (불고기 덮밥) we decided to share turn out very nice, if obviously not freshly cooked just for us. Luckily, it was not of the slimy texture of constantly reheated muck that you get all too often in many a Chinese grease joint in the area. For five quid you can't ask for more.

I love Korean food for the punchy kick of fresh flavours and, of course, hot chillis. I love the smell of gochujang and barbecued meat, what a blessed combination! The hwe moochim, a Korean cross between sashimi and spicy carpaccio that I always get in this place is always a very special treat.