Buga Revisted

Our visit to Prime Grill had the Missus wondering how Buga was doing. It had been 5 years since our last visit, which was during August as well. And our previous visit was during the previous August too! I had also heard that Buga had changed ownership once again. So, we decided to head on over for lunch.

It was at 1130 and while the parking lot didn't look packed, the restaurant was quite busy. In fact, we waited almost 20 minutes just to be acknowledged. 

The workers were scrambling around and I noticed that the group of 6 behind us, didn't even get seated until we already had our food!

The Missus ordered the combo with Beef Bulgogi and Naengmyun (lunch special - $27.99) and of course I got the BiBim Naengmyun ($15.99 - lunch special) 

It took a while, but our panchan eventually arrived.

Man, this was not good, the namul was bland, as was the dotorimuk (acorn jelly) muychim. Both the cabbage and radish kimchi wasn't very "fermented" in flavor, and that Korean potato salad needed more flavor.

This was not a good start to the meal. 

My BiBim Naegmyun soon arrived.

This version uses an abundance of thinner, very stretchy noodles, which we like. The beef and boiled egg were fine. Because of the amount of naegmyun in the dish, there just wasn't enough sauce to coat all the naengmyun; which was nice and spicy, though it lacked sweetness - sesame oil tones .

The Missus's combo soon arrived. The Naengmyun was interesting, and not in a good way.

While it featured the same generous amount of thin and stretchy noodles; the broth was strangely lukewarm. What happened to the icy-chilled broth; which also lacked the nice, sweet-tangy pear flavor. It was quite sour and very salty, but that temperature threw us off. We always think of Naengmyun as being refreshing; well, this was not.

As for the Beef Bulgogi.

I think you can tell by the look. It wasn't marinated well enough and not evenly as some of the pieces were quite "light" in color. The meat was super tough and cut too thick for our taste. This was really bad; the worse we've had in a while.

This was not a good meal. I have wonderful memories of Buga (under he original owners), as my first post goes all the way back to, yep August, of 2005, when the last, great, Ed from Yuma, premiered his "delici-yoso dance"! It's kind of sad. The place was packed though, I'm figuring all those folks having AYCE BBQ and such. As for us, well, I don't think we'll be back.

Buga Korean BBQ Restaurant
5580 Clairemont Mesa Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92117

Comments

[kat]

bummer

[Kirk]

It was really disappointing Kat!

[Liza]

What a disappointment. We loved Buga way back when. Is Prime Grill your current favorite?

[Elle]

I hope you can review SOT BBQ! They have a soft opening currently.

[Kirk]

Buga used to be our favorite way back when; so we were greatly disappointed Liza. Prime Grill is our current favorite.

I heard their panchan is really good Elle. I have it on our list for a "date night".

[Chris Reed]

Boo! Haemul pajeon was a treat there under old owner. Where to go now?

CR

[Kirk]

I dunno Chris! Didn't have that on this visit, so it might still be ok?