Big Trouble in Little Korea

Little Korea (645 Manhattan Avenue, Greenpoint, Brooklyn, 11222)

Last Saturday evening Miki and Kevin (in photo above: at the time we loved the effect of glamorous anonymity; now we wonder if we had too much cheap airplane wine at the various openings) and Cafe Drake set out to explore Williamsburg's annual Late Night Gallery Festival, held in conjunction with the four different art fairs ruling the city for the weekend. An unexpected cold spell kept us from venturing too far and wide (though of galleries visited Pierogi 2000's exhibit of vast futuristic paintings/murals by Yoon Lee was most captivating), and soon we ended up snug in a booth in Little Korea, Greenpoint's latest addition to the ever-expanding Asian cuisine cartel.

Unfortunate signage at the front door spelled Doom from the beginning, with plastic faux-bamboo lettering more appropriate to a theme park ride (think Disneyland, you know, Little Korea, right next to Frontier Land or World of Tomorrow) than a serious restaurant. tacky bamboo also appears on the enormous menus and paltry wall decorations, and we're not talking chic lacquered bamboo or we'd be in love. Large glass goblets of good Polish and Czech beer are a bargain at $5, but Cafe Drake's Ginger Kick (a "martini" of fresh ginger, sake and vodka was perfectly G-rated in terms of booze content - and where is the soju, Korea's national alcoholic treasure?) was a 7 dollar disappointment.

Poor service by befuddled Polish waitresses unversed in Korean food further marred our opening moments. And then it all went really pear-shaped. A Seafood Pancake ($7) was greasy and flavorless, saved by tender calamari but saddled with an oil-based dipping sauce. We may be Greenpointers but we don't all want Eastern European arteries! Nastiness continued with Spicy Octopus with Noodles ($12), another bland dish swimming in oil and redolent more of the pasta's cardboard box than the sea. At Little Korea one doesn't get the ubiquitous platter of tiny dishes known as banchan unless you cough up for a table side BBQ. We chose Pork Shoulder ($12), again hoodwinked by the menu's descriptive promise of "spiciness", and got some rubbery discount meat, difficult to cook on an incorrectly heated grille (blame the waitress again, though she was friendly enough). The decent banchan (potato salad, cucumber kimchi, cabbage kimchi, apple salad, rice cakes) couldn't save the pork.

In summary, stick with Queens (especially Woodside, Elmhurst, farther-out Jackson Heights) or Midtown West in Manhattan if you must, for authentic or at least tasty Korean fare, and leave Little Korea to the Greenpoint punters.