Gen Korean BBQ House — Restaurant in Tigard

Before I begin, I need to preface this with saying that this group of friends and I have been going to a couple local K-BBQ AYCE places for a few years now. So it’s not like we didn’t know what to expect from an AYCE K-BBQ restaurant. We understand that every restaurant is different and not to expect the exact same things from each of them. We didn’t know what to exactly expect from Gen Korean BBQ House, but given that our experiences from other AYCE K-BBQ restaurants have been great, we figured it would probably be good. Man were we wrong. I’d say disappointed is an understatement for how we felt at the end our meal.

So. We came here this past weekend to celebrate a friend’s birthday that had happened earlier in the week. We were a group of 5 and were seated quickly. The atmosphere was nice as far as decor went, but that’s about it. And that’s where most of the “good” review ends. During our time there we had a variety of issues arise.

For starters, one of the first things I noticed was that my friend’s plate was visibly dirty. The next issue that came about was an issue that followed us the whole meal. We had ordered rice and salad to go with the meats right? We got the rice, but didn’t get the salad until the very end when it more or less didn’t matter anymore. It took 4 reminders and 2 different waitresses to even get the salad to our table.

At one point we found ourselves waiting for our meat for over 10 minutes while other tables around us were getting it frequently. Overall, we felt that the tables surrounding us were getting better service than we were. We more or less felt neglected/forgotten about. We weren’t really being checked up on to see if we needed refills on drinks, or if we were ready to order our next round of meats. One of our friends had finished his soda and more or less didn’t have anything to drink the rest of the meal because no one checked up on him to see if he wanted a refill.

Something else that felt odd to us was a drink situation we had. Someone in our group accidentally spilled their drink and was wondering if she could get a refill, fully understanding they may say no. They told her they couldn’t refill her drink (which was a mocktail), but they could bring her a soda. Our friend politely declined the soda and said it was fine. However towards the end, our waitress came back telling us they actually could do the refill on that mocktail. It left us all confused on what the sudden change of heart was and why that wasn’t an option to begin with instead of offering the soda when they were going to offer a refill on the mocktail later anyways. It didn’t really matter at that point that they could because we were basically done. That part was just odd and confusing to us.

By the end of it, our waitress didn’t even clear it with us if we were done with our meal, she simply turned off the grill when we still had PLENTY of time left to dine. And I’m not talking like 15 min left to dine, we definitely had another 45 min - 1 Hr left to dine. It almost felt like she was kicking us out. Not only that but she never clarified if we had to pay the check up front or not. So we sat there waiting for someone to come get the check only for us to just take the check up front to pay. We were just kind of over the experience at that point and wanted to leave.

As far as the actual food and taste of it all goes… The portion sizes were ABYSMAL. We came hungry and left HUNGRY. That never happens to us at AYCE K-BBQ. We usually are all struggling to finish the last bits of meat by the end. So the fact we were still hungry was shocking to us.

We ended up getting take-out and eating better back at the house party than here. The Cherry Blossom drink, while not claiming it would taste exactly like a cherry blossom, I found it tasted like lychee more than anything with practically no cherry blossom flavoring. I honestly could go on for a while about every item we got, but the best way to put it is that everything we had left something to be desired. For the insane price of it all, I cannot...

Disappointing Experience – Not Worth the Hype or Price

I’ve had Korean BBQ many times across multiple states, including at other Gen BBQ locations, and I genuinely can’t believe this lunch for two cost $65. For that price, this was shockingly subpar.

The biggest issue was the quality and handling of the meats. The brisket came out looking shredded and crumbling — almost like it had been improperly frozen or sliced while too thawed. It fell apart on the grill, and much of it disintegrated before it could even cook. No oil, onion, or fat was provided to help prevent sticking — something most KBBQ spots automatically include with lean cuts. When I asked for something to help, I was basically told to just throw everything on the grill as-is.

Service was hands-off to a fault. Most places will help manage grill temps or check in occasionally. Here, no one adjusted the temperature for us or explained whether we were allowed to. I eventually just turned the knobs myself because no one came by, despite the restaurant being nearly empty. When I asked one server if I could adjust he just stared at me silently then left.

The seasonal vegetables were borderline insulting: one slice of pineapple, two cucumbers, two peppers, and a cross-section of onion. It felt like they gave up before even trying. The calamari steak was unpleasantly fishy.

On the positive side, the galbi was decent, and they did serve a generous amount of salad. But overall? This was one of the worst Korean BBQ experiences I’ve had. If you’ve never had KBBQ before, maybe you’d think it’s fine — but if you have even a little experience, this place will be a letdown. I now understand why this location had initial hype and then emptied out. It was nearly deserted when we visited.

--- appetizers --- calamari ⭐ you can't even bite this in half it's all breading and the inside is super chewy

Salad ⭐⭐⭐⭐ honestly saved some of the dishes

Banchan ⭐⭐⭐⭐ just what you'd expect they don't offer to replace any though even though the place was empty

Seasonal vegetables ⭐ it's not ok to give only 2 slices of cucumber, 1 slice of pineapple and 2 halves of a pepper this was super disappointing as counting as part of a round

--- meats --- Calamari steak ⭐ fishy needed a sauce but they don't give gochujang or anything with this good texture though if you cook it properly

Al pastor ⭐⭐ only ordered to see because I don't recall ever seeing this at other locations my partner liked this but I didn't the tortillas it came with were crumbling and totally store bought salsas were watery

Brisket ⭐⭐⭐ I liked it when we cooked it but I've had this tons of times, it's not supposed to crumble and shred like this if we are in charge of cooking, then the ingredient prep should be focused on and better

❤️Galbi ⭐⭐⭐⭐ a classic the best one, I wouldn't trust much else here this even varied from round to round here I constantly get this sort of cut to eat at home but somehow some of the pieces they gave us were just so insanely fatty it was inedible

Gen Prime steak ⭐⭐⭐✨ descent but not memorable there's a fat cap that we saved to oil up the...

So, TL:DR = disappointing front of house customer service, no lettuce, few banchan choices, their vents don’t work or weren’t turned on so you leave smelling like kbbq (which maybe for some isn’t so bad)

So, the crux of this whole review is that I’m not sure why you can’t seat your customers until at least half of the party is present. I feel like the experience for checking in was terrible.

I walked in and asked if there was a waitlist and your front of house said they only had one table available. I asked what wait time would be for next table that could fit our party of 6 and she said about 30mins. Mind you, I saw many empty tables so I was a little confused by that. Though eventually she did say that they didn’t have a server available. Which, still, is confusing to me. It was 1pm which should have been the lunch rush and you’re understaffed. Anyway, I asked her if they had a waitlist and she said no, you only accept walk-ins and that you only take reservations for 10. I thought that was a bit preposterous - I wasn’t making a reservation. I was a walk in being told there was no available table and had to wait.

We walk around the mall for maybe 15mins, come back and I see a standee by the door with a QR code for a waitlist! I talk to your front of house again and ask about it and she finally says she’ll put us on the waitlist and tells me as soon as your server arrives she’ll seat us. Server arrives, we get the text that table is ready and when we get there your front of house tells me that they can’t seat us until at least half of our party is here. I understand rules of establishments and completely respect them but what she told me from the beginning has been contradiction after contradiction. Also, if that is your rule, I don’t quite understand why if you already have the table ready for us, you can’t just seat the people who are already there and just let the rest stream in. I was thinking maybe there was something special about how you took orders or provided food but after eating, I don’t get it. Customer service and experience was not great. I hadn’t been seated yet and I was already upset and disappointed. Not a great introduction to your restaurant.

Really think you should have lettuce in your menu as traditional kbbq has it. Also, expand your banchan please.

You had a vent over the grill but it obviously was not turned on and of course we all left smelling like grilled meat, which maybe isn’t so bad for others but why have it present and not turn it on?

Chadol - not great. Very dry. Nook Gan Sal & Yamyung Galbi - absolutely delicious Salad - Yummy! Would recommend 💯 Rice - 👎 I feel like if you’re a Korean restaurant you can’t not get your rice right. Rice was dry and...