Gaon Noodle & Dumpling — Restaurant in Port Coquitlam

It's a self serve place, You can order at the kiosk and there is a self service bar you can bring everything you need including hot/cold water and hot bailey tea, side dishes.

The dumplings were huge sized. The filling was generous and these are filling. However, the dumpling skin was too tough and dry.. That tough skin could prevent a hole in the dumpling, but softer skin would be much making sense to many people. With this tough skin, the dumplings tasted better when you put in the noodle soup. If you do take out those dumplings, it will be completely dried out.

The noodle dish - called Kalguksu, is a traditional noodle dish in Korea. We had non-spicy one. The noodle was chewy and good. The soup was made from beef bone and meat. The topping were simple with veggie and cooked beef meat. (I think they use beef flank meat in a good way.) If they can adjust the saltness and put more toppings on top, that would be more attractive to more patrons. For the price, when you can get a bowl of heaty Pho with lots of beef at the same price level, you know what I mean. More major Meat toppings were needed here to compete with those Pho dishes or Asian Beef noodle dishes in the similar category.

All of us got a bit thirsty after the meal, so I hope they don't use MSG or just little amount of pre-made stock to add to the soup to make taste better :)

Anyone can add some salt or spicy/soy sauce to adjust the saltiness level they want from the self bar, so the soup was not needed to be already salty.

However, this place has good potential. They have fresh kimchi and sides and those were very good and these are Unlimited at the self bar. The onion pickle was crunch and fresh. The Kimchi, too. The noodle itself was well made and cooked perfectly chewy. The dumpling size was big and filling was good.

A few things about the foods could be revised and fixed easily because they started the place recently.

The place was also feeling welcome and clean. And, it's a comfortable self serve place, so No Tip option here. Wow in Vancouver. There are very few places you can expect No Tip option in Vancouver when you actually dine in. All the dishes and utensils are good quality ones to use.

If you would like to have a homey feeling bowl of Kalguksu dish with dumpling, with a little improvements day by day on the top of good things they already have, I would come again and again.

I hope the place can last for many years with...

I've been going here with one member of my extended Korean family almost weekly since it opened. Every time it's fresh and tasty and reminiscent of my late grandmother's home-cooked food, especially the kalguksu, mandu, and dipping sauce (ganjang).

We typically order the standard kalguksu plus an order of their huge pork dumplings, comes with 5 fist-sized dumplings. The noodles are chewy and plentiful and the beef bone broth is flavourful but not overly salty so you can season to your taste with the ganjang or pepper that is readily available on every table. Typically in the summer, I'm sharing an order of noodles and dumplings and it's enough to fill me up, but I see myself downing an order of noodles myself when the fall/winter months hit.

I recently tried the clam kalguksu and it is a new favourite! Super savoury broth with the right amount of clams and veg. Being able to season either broth to taste is great for my toddler too where I'm more careful with salt intake.

Tea, chopsticks, bowls, etc are all self-serve too. The banchan bar is stocked simply (but generously) with cabbage kimchi, a salty-sweet radish/onion pickle, and a soy dipping sauce - all are perfect with the noodle soups and dumplings.

Self-serve is a simple but common dining concept in Korea and I hope to see more places like it around here (McDonalds has been nailing it for years). It's honestly a welcome change from the current tipping culture where you're prompted to tip min. 18% at most restaurants and cafes all while the server is watching over your shoulder...

In the franchise-heavy north Poco area, it's nice to have a locally owned and operated, niche Korean spot to get a hearty, non-bbq meal for under $20-$30. Right now too it is kind of a hidden gem so you don't have to wait nor make a reservation. Plenty of seats and fast. I'd recommend dining in for freshness. Even though all are obviously welcome, it's usually full of other Koreans so that's a...

I would like to review Gaon Noodle Dumpling Restaurant in Port Coquitlam.

We ordered knife cut noodle and pork dumplings.

Food: The dumpling size was huge - the filling had a good balance of tofu and meat making it very tender and moist. The knife cut noodle was very chewy and came with a good amount imof meat and vege toppings. The portion for noodles was also quite large. It comes with a self-serve station of sauces and kimchi which you can refill as needed. Kimchi tasted delicious as well, typical of what you would expect at a knife cut noodle house. It wasn't the best that I've tried but definitely enough to fulfill my cravings for knife cut noodles. 8 out of 10

Service: this is a no-tip restaurant, where you order via a kiosk/order screen and help yourself to sides, utensils and water. However, their level of service was better than most restaurants. They greeted you promptly, explained the restaurant setting and helped with the self-serve stations. We saw one customer who tried to leave a tip after his meal but the owner refused and returned the tip. Restaurant is new and bright, very clean with high ceilings. 9 out of 10.

I will definitely revisit soon. Their no-tip, good service system is very appealing and so hard to find these days. I recommend...