Daedo Sikdang — Restaurant in Los Angeles

There are a lot of great things about this place, but also some things that I was disappointed about.

Great: meat quality, attempt at service.

Disappointments: high cost, long wait, napkins not provided, water not refilled, wait staff difficult to flag down, meats not cooked to order, vegetables not cooked, misleading information.

Details: we waited 50 minutes, sat down and waited about 15min, then another 5min to flag down a server. The server did very little to explain the menu and restaurant concept, which is different than most Korean bbq restaurants. I recommend the wait staff all get trained on what distinguishes this establishment from others and highlight menu options. We ordered prime meat options, den jongg porridge, dodae yolmu noodles and dessert. The meats arrived with cooking utensils and after 10min cooking started. Delays were due to wait staff leaving, heating up the cooking surface and rendering a cube of beef fat. The placement claims this beef fat is made of fatty acids from the kidney of cows, but anyone with knowledge of anatomy knows that there is no significant fat in kidney tissue. The placemat also claims that chefs carve fat off the meat cuts, so it is a logical conclusion to me that this meat cube is just your usual fat from meat trimmings. If you see traces of hemoglobin and connective tissue, you may reach the same conclusion. Our meats were cooked well at first and mostly medium rare. They were delicious, quite probably the best meats I have ever had at Korean bbq. One member of our party wanted it cooked a little more, which is understandable, since medium rare is still red in the center, but the wait staff was unable to accommodate, leaving us to manually do the cooking, thereby rendering the cooking service unnecessary. We asked for the usual small dishes that are common at all Korean restaurants and the server said this restaurant did not provide them, explaining that it was an Americanized restaurant. With each round, the cooking staff changed and the meats became progressively carbonated on the outside and rare on the inside. The meats were eaten before the rice because the rice was cooked on the same cooking element. If you are used to eating rice with beef simultaneously, ask the staff if it's possible. The meats were garnished with some veggies like cabbage, eggplant, and green onion. Garlic was cooked first, then instead of presenting the garlic to the diners, it was left near the cooking utensils. Half of the cabbage was cooked, but not softened, just barely cooked. The other half of cabbage was not cooked. The eggplant was started and 2 of 4 pieces were overcooked, they were placed on the same plate as the raw eggplant. There were no further attempts at presenting the veggies to the diners and after 40 minutes or so, the barely cooked cabbage, overcooked eggplant, and raw eggplant and raw green onions were cleared by the bussing staff. We were not given napkins and when we asked we were given napkins the size provided on airplanes. Hahaha, that is just comical. It's kind of like going to a steak house and given a cocktail napkin. Our waters were not refilled and took 10min to refill when requested.

My assessment is that since all the wait staff runs serves all the restaurant, there is no one dedicated to each patron, so none of the wait staff is responsible. In other places, a call bell can help to flag down a server, but at the time of this review it was not implemented. I also suspect the management is inflexible with other suggestions, so no need to include them here, but I am open to provide private feedback if they...

Excellent refined balanced Korean BBQ. Famous in Korea for decades, recently to LA. For meat they just serve wet-aged prime black angus ribeye butchered into seperate cuts. Waiter handles all the cooking. Meat portions are small, we ordered one of everything and maybe would have have liked a couple more. A few simple free side dishes and some dipping sauces are included. You’ll want to add on the cold noodles (the big bowl serves 4-6 as a side dish), a hot soup (big bowl serves 4 as a side dish), and the fried rice (which has a few options, it’s served and cooked at the table at the end of your grilling session so prepare to wait for it but it’s worth the wait). A double order of fried rice was not really enough for the 3 adults and 3 kids we had with us. They serve free milk flavored soft serve with a rice cracker at the end which finishes off everything nicely. Did not try the porridge. Everything on the menu is carefully planned to balance out the meal. So work your way through the whole menu don’t overloaf on the meat.

Be prepared for some training wheel hiccups as this restaurant has only opened in July of 2021 and has a set system of operation to manage the large scale of the place. Waiters we had were Korean native speakers who did not have great English, tended to spend more time with the Korean speaking tables, so be patient and just go along for the ride. We got there at 4:30pm before they opened at 5pm and did not leave until around 8pm and was one of the first tables to leave. So they probably only flip the restaurant twice a night currently.

Drinks are small so I would order them ahead of when you think you’ll need them. They will bring water on request but again order ahead of when you think your glass will be empty.

It’s an attempt at an elevated dining experice then the rest of Koreatown with a cost of about $60 a person, but no reservations makes dining here more frustrating then it has to be which is probably damaging their brand somewhat, saw lots of people parking with the valet, going in and then leaving mad because they were told it was a two to three hour wait even though the restaurant just opened a few minutes before they arrived (and then the valet ($3 plus tip) having to shuffle cars around to get them their car back, delaying the next few cars trying to come in to relive the same pain). Requiring a credit card to reserve would still ensure the restaurant gets its money. Parking lot is very small but has valet. There also seems to be some kind of special waitlist (or maybe Yelp?), we were the first people there and yet they had sat 3/4ths of the resturant before they sat us.

If you get their before 4:30pm-ish expect the parking lot to be closed and you’ll have to park on the street (good luck) or across the corner at the mall with the Super H inside (the mall also has a Somi Somi for great Taiyaki waffles for dessert). A well coordinated wait list plan would be to drop by the Yifang fruit tea a couple blocks down first, or send someone down while you wait, so you have some boba to ply the time with).

Accessible, restrooms, valet parking (cash only), street parking (limited)....

Omg. After Daedo started popping up in my friends ig stories I’ve been dying to try them but every time I came it wait was crazy!!! So- I made a plan: grab my friends and told them… “EARLY SUNDAY DINNER BECAUSE WERE OLD NOW!” 😂

Just kidding- I told them Daedo opens at 5 so let’s get there at 445 because I really want to try this place.

It was confusing- there was a line already before 5pm… and it wasn’t until a Korean ajusshi who said… this is a fake line you have to check in with the hostess- that we went and put our names down and were told it was a 50 min wait (at 450pm). So we went off to hmart and daiso… when we suddenly got notified our table was ready.. at 515!!! HOOORAAAAAY!

Food. Menu is small. If you can’t navigate it then I don’t know how you’ve navigated any Korean bbqs or well ANY ASIAN RESTAURANTS. We got: 1x Daedo cut 2x daedo special 1 x large yolmu cold noodle 1 x kkakdooki fried rice (add rice puff and egg) 1x denjang porridge

Portion size this was perfect for the 4 of us (3 girls 1 guy) we could skip the porridge, in fact I would say if you want to skip anything on the menu.. skip the porridge.

Service. The service was on point. Maybe because we were the first round, our server lady (pretty) only had us and another table so she was on top of our meat. I think when the restaurant filled up she disappeared- BUT other waitstaff and servers did step in to flip the meat and check on us. ESPECIALLY THE SERVER WHO CAME TO SEE OUR GRILL… (he was the cute ajusshi who kept trying to relight our grill, it was turning off randomly and hard to light) so with the bokumbap at the end… he came twice and eventually just stayed and made our fried rice for us!!

He was so nice he even gave us extra rice cracker to eat with the milk ice cream omg (it was so good)

I find out later.. this inconspicuous ajusshi was the president of daedo Korea.. 😂😂😂 he was the nicest server… (with a nice watch which I noticed and thought it was strange to be cooking with a nice watch..)

Drinks. I had a bottle of beer- they’re not individual sized theyre the bigger bottles lol oops. (I shared because sharing is caring and I’m also not down for so much liquid carbs) Got a cass to wash down everything. They didn’t have any of their cocktails today 🤷🏻‍♀️ and I did see some interesting drinks other tables were having…fancy soju I think!

Verdict? MY NEW GO TO SPOT FOR KOREAN BBQ! I’ll drag any and all of my...