Ruran Korean Chinese Restaurant: Korean Chinese restaurant in Port Coquitlam
Ruran is a Korean restaurant located in downtown Port Coquitlam. They specialize in Korean-Chinese cuisine.
This review is based on an in-dining experience prior to COVID-19.
Interior
The interior is kind of gloomy because of the dark wood furniture and oddly strange lighting (dim in a bad way). But the restaurant is large and can fit lots of tables. The booth seats are comfy.
I never had any issues where I needed to wait to get seated.
Food
Whenever I try out Korean-Chinese restaurants, I always try one of their classic combos to test the waters: the black bean sauce noodles, spicy seafood noodles and a sweet & sour pork or chicken.
Combo B ($40)
Combo B features sweet & sour chicken + the black bean sauce noodles and spicy seafood noodles.
Jajangmyeon (black bean sauce noodles)
I always love my first bite of jajangmyeon, but over time I find them to be too oily. I think it’s the sauce itself that overwhelms me and the noises it makes when I mix the sauce in with the noodles (squish squish). Aside from this black bean sauce, there isn’t a lot of other components – some onions and maybe minced meat.
This noodle is not spicy at all and a lot of children like it.
Jjampong (spicy seafood noodles)
When I get sick of eating the jajangmyeon, I switch to the jjampong. But after awhile, I need to stop eating this too because it’s usually too spicy for me lol.
Ruran’s jjampong has a decent amount of seafood and veggies in their jjampong. If it wasn’t as spicy, I would prefer this over the jajangmyeon.
Sweet & sour chicken
The sweet & sour chicken here is very delicious! Upon first bite, you can hear that crunch when you bite into the batter. The sauce on the sweet & sour chicken is really good too. Has a good amount of kick but not so spicy like the jjampong.
A difference I’ve noticed between the sweet & sour pork vs. chicken is that for the pork, they often separate the sauce so you kind of just dip your fried pork in there instead. Also, the sauce has a lighter colour.
Final thoughts
Loewe’s rating: โญโญโญโญ
In general, I liked Ruran because their sweet & sour chicken is above average compared to other Korean-Chinese restaurants I’ve tasted in the neighbourhood. The black bean noodles and spicy seafood noodles hover around average.
Portion size is huge, as expected of Korean-Chinese restaurants. On the menu, they say the combo B can feed 2-3 people but I think it can easily feed 4 adults because I came here with my boyfriend and 2 parents and only ordered 1 extra jajangmyeon and we still had a ton of leftovers.
Prices are just a few dollars higher for comparative combos, not a big enough difference for me to complain about especially since I find their sweet & sour chicken better than most places.
Sincerely, Loewe