Ondal Crab House | 온달집 | 螃蟹屋 — Restaurant in Los Angeles

Went to LA for a trip and followed a recommendation from Chinese social media. My friends and I were excited to try marinated crab, but as soon as we entered the restaurant, a staff member told us we couldn’t bring our dog inside and could only sit at an outdoor table.

Despite repeatedly explaining that it was a service dog and showing the service dog certification and doctor’s letter, the owner acted as if they couldn’t understand or read English. They kept emphasizing, “Only blind and deaf people can qualify as disabled, and I don’t see that you have these disabilities,” “What kind of disability do you have?” “You can only dine outdoors,” “Take a good look at the notice on the wall (photo 2),” “We don’t allow emotional support dogs inside,” and “Your certificate doesn’t match the examples on our wall (photo 2), so you can’t dine indoors.”

We stayed in LA for seven days, dining at Korean, Chinese, and Japanese restaurants, all of which were accommodating and accepting of service dogs. Not a single restaurant made such ignorant, rude, offensive, and discriminatory remarks. The owner of this restaurant crudely reduced disabilities to only hearing and vision impairments, refusing to acknowledge other types of disabilities. It’s hard to imagine how someone in their right mind could say such things.

The notice on the wall reads:

[Yes! Only service dogs are allowed inside the restaurant, such as guide dogs for individuals with mobility difficulties, visual impairments, or hearing impairments. No! Emotional support dogs are not allowed inside. Even if hidden in a bag, they cannot be brought in. If this is the case, you may dine with your dog...

Wonderful and delicious experience! Great marinated crab and more.

Arriving/planning: Takes reservations online which is very convenient! Parking in K-Town is usually challenging but there's an underground parking area clearly marked for Ondal Crab House and there's some street parking too. We went as a table of 4 and booked a couple days in advance and we're seated immediately.

Menu/food/beverage: We were there for the uni rice and raw marinated crab but the interesting and varied menu meant we ordered more. Uni rice (large size, HUGE urchins) is a must, served to the brim and drizzled with some sauce before mixing gently and self scooped. Sweet, fresh, luxurious. The addition of soy marinated shrimp is a great value too. The raw marinated female crab came with two and were meaty and eggy, be sure to order portions of rice to stuff the shell and get all the flavors. The dough soup seafood stew is excellent and kept hot at your table on the stovetop. The seafood pancake is crispy, hot, and packed with chunks of fresh seafood, one of the best we've had. The banchan is fresh and well seasoned too, not too sweet.

Service: The whole time the lady helping us was wonderful. Helpful with the menu, providing us gloves for eating, laughing as we reacted to the beautiful platters of food, hand-tearing fresh dough for the dough seafood stew, cutting every bit of the marinated crab for easy access.

Instant favorite spot in Koreatown. Wonderful and already making plans to bring friends here next time...

It's such a misleading advertisement (I started following them on IG several months ago, because they seemed so good). I traveled all the way from Colorado to take my sister here for her belated birthday celebration because she loves uni and crab. The first disappointment was being informed that uni was unavailable; next, the crab we ordered was nothing like what was shown in the video--it was extremely small, so I ordered another one and they turned out to be overly salty. The agoo chim (아구찜) we ordered contained only a few pieces of fish and mostly bean sprouts. Even their side dishes (반찬) were excessively salty, with the salad being the only decent item. I wish I had taken photos of what we were actually served. Ironically, I did enjoy their rice, likely because we usually eat brown and grain rice at home for health reasons, and I was also very hungry. I don't mind spending money or even paying significantly more when the food quality is excellent and tasty (especially on this special occasion once a year for her b-day), but I feel deeply disappointed and deceived. It's disheartening to take your favorite sister out for her birthday, filled with anticipation, only to end up...