Gaonnuri — Restaurant in New York

Let's get one thing straight: You're not coming here for the best bang for your buck. The portion sizes are very small, especially for the prices and the interior decor is minimalistic and ceases to be mind-blowing. Where the restaurant stands out is the great tasting food and beautiful view of the city. Whether you're dining during the day or at night, the city view is spectacular and can make any occasion all the better for it.

The sweet & spicy fried chicken was one of the best things I ever tasted. I would consider returning for this chicken alone. The bulgogi was also amazing and was served with white rice and this peanut-like sauce which I wasn't a huge fan of because it overpowered the flavor of the bulgogi. The desserts were great too. The other people in my party ordered the kiachi stew and hot stone bibimbap. I personally did not try the kiachi stew so I cannot speak about its flavor for myself, but it did look very appetizing. As for the bibmbap, well... I tried it and eh...

Apart from the small serving sizes, the reason I am deducting one star from my overall rating is due to that spicy pork stone pot bibimbap. I thought it tasted fishy and "fresh-tasting" to the point where I felt like my appetite was ruined after I tried it. It tasted like it could have been the seafood bibimbap instead of the spicy pork which certainly would have explained things, but it wasn't.

Also, there are seats around the restaurant that do not give you great access to the outside view so even if you may request a seat at the window in a reservation, it's not always likely that you can get a window seat during a dinner crowd and may get a middle seat which still has viewing access per se, but with the downside of needing to enjoy the view over the shoulders of parties sitting closer to it. This kind of seating also does not make for the best pictures.

Also, something to note is that it seemed like the tables with the BBQ grills in the middle of the table are the ones that are closest to the windows so even if you don't plan on using the BBQ, but want a good view, you should request it. If you're sat at the table without a BBQ built in (further away from the windows), you can still order whatever you'd like, but they just won't make it in front of you on that middle of the table grill.

Another thing to note is that there is quite an accessibility issue just for leaving. Only 4 people are allowed in the elevator at a time and for whatever reason, there was only 1 elevator going up and down at the restaurant so just waiting to get into the elevator to leave was a task that took a good five minutes and resulted in a bunch of people crowded around the bar in a sort of line while waiting for the elevator to come back up and then a small discussion deciding which group got to take the elevator first.

And finally, a somewhat confusing thing was finding the restaurant in the first place. It's located in the Nomad tower, but only one entrance is actually accessible on 32nd street. I passed the entrance using Google Maps until I had to go to the website and find out where there entrance was. I would suggest the Gaonnuri owner remap where the restaurant is pinned on Google Maps to help people avoid that problem in the future.

Overall, had a good experience here and nice food, but I try to reserve 5-stars for perfect or near-perfect experiences and with a dish I really did not like as well as my few mentioned caveats, I have to give Gaonnuri a...

Edit: I am revising my review after I was contacted by the general manager. My previous review was for a dining experience that occurred in 2021 and centered around one particular employee. The current general manager, Jason, found my review and contacted me and was very nice and apologetic about the incident and invited me back to dine at the restaurant. I am updating my review from 1 star to 3 stars for that gesture. I am impressed by the new management so far, and I hope to return and provide an even more updated review in the future.

I have dined at this restaurant twice and the first time went great, however my second dining experience at this place was terrible hence my one star review. At first, I called around 3pm on a Tuesday (Nov 30) to make a 9pm reservation. The lady explained that they needed my credit card because no-shows will be charged. I wasn’t comfortable providing my cc information to her so I asked if walk-in options are available. She replied that yes around 9pm would be fine for walk-ins. Later that evening, I arrived at the ground level entrance and I saw a big sign displaying ‘WALK-INS WELCOME’ so I happily entered and told the man at the booth that my friend from out of town and I would like a table. He abruptly interrupted me and asked if I had a reservation. I told him no, and he replied with ‘Sorry we are not taking walk-ins.’ I explained that I called ahead of time and was told walk-ins were welcome at the time I expected to arrive and he rudely interrupted and said that they are full and that they don’t take reservations after 7. Well I quickly took out my phone and checked Open Table and saw that there were several available time slots. I showed him my phone and said that there is a lot of availability that night, but he cut me off and said Oh then make the reservation. At this point I was already extremely irritated and didn’t want to argue the fact that if there is a lot of availability that night then there is no point in making a reservation 1 minute before going in, so I booked the reservation and told him, but even after that he still wouldn’t let us in. He looked at his screen for a minute and said he couldn’t find it, so I showed him my phone with the confirmation email. He looked at his screen for another minute. I didn’t understand why he was making the whole situation very difficult. After finally going in I couldn’t enjoy the meal because I was still fuming from the awful experience...

Horrible experience, will not return and highly recommend you don’t try this place either…

Went for our anniversary and got a table with a view for the tasting menu. We were seated and everything was fine to begin with. After we finished the first course, the utensils were not cleared for us, and our tables were not replated, which I would expect for a tasting menu. The second dish came out and there was a small black rice sized object that looked suspiciously like a bug on the bottom plate that I pointed out. The servers immediate reaction was “oh it’s just on the bottom plate, not in the food”. He then said he would replace it since we were displeased. Throughout the night, all the plates were slightly dirty. The food was SO mediocre, and some of the servers seemed uncertain about what was in the dishes and what the taste was supposed to be. We had about 4 servers throughout the night… when the bbq was started, one server put our meat on and asked how we liked it cooked (we said medium rare). He then left, and another server came by to check on the meat, and he also asked how we like our meat cooked before taking it off the grill, by which point the meat was beyond medium rare. Also, if the restaurant charges more for an edge table that requires a tasting menu be ordered, I expect tasting menu vibes and ambience. We were seated a foot away from a long table with about 10 ppl who were hollering and yelling like they were at a bar… I could’ve gone to a kbbq downstairs for the same vibe.

The pictures they have up aren’t accurate, the table is far from the windows, and the glare from lights inside the restaurant make it hard to actually enjoy the view.

If we mention that it’s our anniversary, why would you seat us beside the largest table??

Gratuity of 20% is included for subpar service… it felt like they decided to slap “tasting menu” on the menu using the tables with a view to charge more without actually preparing the full experience.

We asked for the manager, and were told they had left by around 10:30 when they close at 11:30.

Their excuse for poor service was that a lot of their servers are young and being trained and that they are understaffed. If you know these issues exist, why is there included gratuity?

Overall, not worth at all especially for the price, go to cote Korean steakhouse instead for an upscale kbbq, or any other kbbq really if you just...