Arisu Korean BBQ: Takeout feast
Arisu Korean BBQ is a barbeque restaurant in Burnaby. I’ve dined at their Lougheed location before for barbeque, but this review is based on a takeout experience.
We decided to order takeout from them on one of the days we got a fat Ubereats coupon so we went ham with whatever we wanted to order.
Food
Haemul pajeon ($20)
This is an assorted seafood and scallion pancake. They cut it up into bite sized pieces so that was nice.
Due to the takeout, it’s not as crispy as how it would taste if it was presented on a hot skillet, but the flavour was not bad and the stuffing in the dough didn’t fall apart too easily.
Tteok-bokki ($14)
This appetizer is the classic spicy stir-fried rice cakes with fishcakes, boiled egg and scallions. It is quite spicy for me but the egg helped a little bit. The rice cakes could have been more chewy but I liked the giant pieces of fishcake they put in.
The price is a little high for this snack.
Yuk-hoe ($21)
This was my favourite appetizer – Korean seasoned beef tartare topped with raw egg! The portion is quite large for $20. The egg yolk was broken when it arrived, which is fine, but I wish they had added more of the pear to break up all the tartare.
Bibimbap ($14)
This is a mixed rice dish – a traditional Korean bibimbap rice topped with assorted vegetables, ground beef and sunny side up egg. Usually, they serve it in a hot stone bowl so that you get some nice crispy rice at the end of your meal. Of course, with takeout, this is not available but check out this takeout container!! Genius!
Grilled mackerel set ($16)
This set comes with grilled and seasoned mackerel with soybean paste stew. I’m not the biggest fan of mackerel and I found this one to be more on the dry side.
Arisu mega bento box ($17)
This is a box set with rice, chef’s choice of 3 Korean side dishes, a house salad and an entree of your choice. We chose the beef bulgogi and spicy pork entree.
Nicely packed and lots of food in this bento. I like that they put the rice in a separate container so that it doesn’t take up space in their bento box – more room for the entrees/meats!
This could feed 2 people comfortably.
Pork belly fried rice ($13)
This was quite a yummy fried rice. I liked the flavour of the dish and the sprinkles of seaweed on top. Wish there was more pork belly though.
Jok-bal ($21)
These are steamed soy marinated pork hocks. I was not the biggest fan of this so I don’t recommend it. However, if you like pork hocks, the portion is pretty big.
Final thoughts
We certainly ordered a lot of food! We had a lot of leftovers but this would be good enough for 5 hungry men lol.
Out of all of the dishes, I liked the beef tartare the most and I liked to pair that with other items like our fried rice. I think the bento is a pretty good deal but I would pass on their snacks like their pancake and spicy rice cakes because they are a little pricey.
Their menu is quite extensive for a bbq place even though they don’t offer bbq for takeout. They will be opening a new location in Edmonds, Burnaby, so we will be sure to pay them a visit and try their actual Korean bbq in-dining!
Sincerely, Loewe