Gomnaru Restaurant

I’m pretty sure that Gomnaru is now gone (closed about a month ago), but I wanted to write a eulogy for this place. Gomnaru was my rock-​solid lunch option. Every other place in the Northside Asian ghetto has gotten me sick at least once (except for Momo Masala). A few of the dishes came with way too much lettuce and mayonnaise, but the lunch specials were always fresh and on point. I always liked that you could see the kitchen as you ordered, so that you knew that what you were getting was right from the wok. It was essentially cheap, simple home-​cooked Korean food, instead of all the fried unhealthy stuff in the places nextdoor. The best was the spicy pork — I always meant to ask for their recipe some day, but now I guess I won’t get the chance.

Portions are small, prices are higher than the neighbors, and the food is a bit below average for korean food. Their ramen is like instant ramen, their meat is skimpy and basically just gochujang-​stir-​fried-​stuff, and their galbi is way too oily. I want to like this place — it’s just that it’s always disappointing every time I try to.

I’d like to this place. The price is reasonable and the taste is okay.
It’s not fancy restaurant. It’s calm and relaxed unless it’s not too busy.
For the lunch menu, you can choose two or three items from the menu.
and There is a lot of option and daily special that changes everyday.
I love Bulgogi, Kalbee and soup!
It’s, actually, true that the food make me little sleepy because of MSG (?)
but it’s delicious and reasonable prices! and there also are many options for the vegetarian.

Bulgogi/​Kalbee lunch plate: Very filling. Comes with Salad and Potato tempura (?) and rice. Simple and delicious. Nothing to complain about.
Service: minimal service. Order at cashier. Grab your own food, utensils, water.
Atmosphere: Not too busy. Calm, relaxed, intimate ambiance. Casual date okay. Indoor/​outdoor seating.
Note: Eating in any restaurant in Northside Food Court after 8:30 has to be to-​go.
Lunch is cheaper! Dinner plates are bigger.
I would come back for an early dinner.

UPDATE:
After succumbing to my massive craving for Korean food, I decided on Gomnaru to hopefully satisfy my belly. I settled into Gomnaru around 8, thankful for its generous hours. After looking at the menu (and wondering how they could price kimchi stew at $ 20), I ordered the combination soontofu, extra spicy (of course!). Clara, my waitress started me off with some side dishes consisting of kimchi, broccoli with Siracha, some (pretty mediocre) jap chae, and some yellow crusty veggie (?) that I have never seen before. The kimchi wasn’t great, as was the jap chae. They didn’t manage to butcher the Siracha broccoli, so I finished that up pretty quickly.
In about 10 minutes my soon tofu came out, and I readily dug in. First thing I noticed was, «didn’t I order this extra spicy?» Because honestly, the soon tofu’s spiciness was equal to that of a ‘medium’ soontofu in LA. So I wasn’t too pleased that I ate my soon tofu without the burning kick I had come to love, but nonetheless I finished it all.
The tofu itself is decent, as are all the other ingredients. The seafood and meat weren’t the best tasting, but they were definitely edible. The broth itself isn’t too salty, but then again, there was no kick to it :(.
The portion size is definitely filling, but I had to go through two rice bowls to satisfy my hunger. They charged $.50 for the extra bowl of rice, but its nothing out of the ordinary for a lot of Korean restaurants.
The check came out to $ 12.50, which I feel is pretty pricey. Most of the dishes are in the $ 10 range, so chances are you won’t walk away from Gomnaru with a $ 7 meal.
Overall, this was a better experience than my previous lunchtime visit. The service has consistently been pretty attentive and nice, so no complaints there. Gomnaru is on par with the other Northside Asian Ghetto restaurants (with the exception of Pizzahhh!), and can be had for an okay price at dinnertime. For me to come back here, however, I would have to have a pretty sizeable craving for Korean food.

I didn’t really enjoy the food here.
They didn’t use enough ingredients but MSG!
Small ice cream spoon doesn’t work well for soup.

Unfortunately the quality of the food at Gomnaru continues to decline. Berkeley seems to agree, as nowadays there is rarely a line even at peak noon hours.
The food served for lunch was at least a day old. Portions have also gotten skimpier and the whole place just doesn’t feel very clean (it is in the northside food court I know, but still). The food that was served was pretty much a slap in the face (and hopefully not food poisoning) to any customers that decide to spend their money there.
I cannot really recommend it to anyone, and I will probably not be coming back for a long while, if ever.

Pros:
— good service! The little LA style boys were super nice
— lunch menus are reasonably priced
Cons:
— their food is not spicy at all –despite the fact i asked for extreme spicyness
— limited amount of menus, both for lunch and regular menus

sometimes you come from a restaurant thinking: «what the hell was that! never again.» that’s the experience this restaurant provided for me. I guess I’ll give them props for bring open as late as 9pm on a Sat night (imagine that… a restaurant willing to be open until 9pm on Sat). since they were going to be closing in 20 minutes, he wouldn’t let us eat in the restaurant, and instead directed us to eat at some outside benches. anyway I suppose I should have been suspicious with that and also when he rang up my tab and it was such an over charge for what I ordered. he even realized that much. I went there with some friends, so he must have messed up some orders. after that when the food was ready, there were more mix ups. all of our orders were confused again, so we had to figure out what was what and what was who’s.
finally to the food. the flavor of the kalbi was decent, but the portion size was really small for the price. Kimchee kitchen on southside is cheaper and gives you a lot more. for a Korean restaurant there were no side dishes at all, not even Kimchee. we also ordered a combo tofu soup… it was so so, and they didn’t add much to make it a combo: I don’t remember there bring much meat or seafood. anyway, decent but also overpriced.
the worst was when we were done eating. since the restaurant door was actually still open, we thought we should return the trays to the restaurant. nope, he signaled us to take them all the way to the other side of the building. even the owner of another restaurant wondered what we were doing, so we had to explain what we had been instructed to do.
anyway, do yourself the favor and avoid this place to avoid overpriced mediocre food and all the aggravation.

Fortunately, this place has a great location. Unfortunately, their food is a terrible representation of even the most lowly Korean food. Kim Pasa, one of the famous Korean fast food restaurants around Korea, would be considered too of the line gourmet compared to this place.
Food is not fresh. Environment is not clean.
I paid about $ 9 for a lunch special with old, dry brown rice, decent dukboki (who can really mess that up?), and tempura fried potatoes (I’d asked for sweet potatoes) that were cold and stale. I ordered it to eat in and it came to me in a plastic to-​go container that was practically melted on the bottom because of the steaming hot dukboki.
So sad to say it, but this place will only do if you are absolutely desperate for some dukboki.

Food was subpar.
Seafood pancake was way too salty-​did not enjoy at all
Soft tofu was mediocre, edible but wouldn’t order again
Same goes for bin bim bop — it was just «meh»
Also, the server is was very sweet but incompetent.
—-
As an addendum, I recently had binbimbop in Singapore and I was hesitant to try korean food because of the horrible experience at this place, but it was lovely! I thought korean food just wasn’t my cup of tea, but I do really enjoy it. Just this place was terrible.

I had to decide to give it a 4 or a 5 because 4.5 was not available. I decided to go with 5 because it is my favorite Korean restaurant in Berkeley. This is coming from a guy who has been to Steve’s Korean BBQ, Kimchi Garden, Koryo, and CRUNCH Korean-​American Fusion Foods. The only reason Koryo and CRUNCH isn’t better is because I don’t go to them often enough to compare. Also I got Bi-​Bim-​Bap at both those places and that really isn’t my favorite dish. Although I will say that I like their Bi-​Bim-​Bap better than Gomnaru’s. Btw, I have been here more than 6 times, just didn’t Unilocal all of them. That’s how much I like this place.
What I really like is their lunch menu because it gives very good portions with pretty good quality food for the price they charge and it comes with free miso soup, kimchi and rice (well no regular rice if you get the kimchi fried rice). Also you can get more free miso soup and kimchi if you want more. You can get a 2 item combo which should be good enough as it includes the rice and the side dishes I mentioned before. But if not you can pay about $ 1 extra for a 3^rd item. And if you do some prepaid card thingy, you can make it cost less. It is self bused and self served during lunch hours, but that is a minor detail as their food is very good and it has been my go-​to place for Korean food. I wouldn’t say I am a regular but I come often-​ish as I do have meal points to spend since I live in the dorms for my 4 years.
As for dinner, they serve for you and depending on what dishes you order, it can come with an array of side items like man Korean restaurants. Since the lunch cuisine is pre-​cooked (but usually doesn’t sit out for too long) it is obvious that the quality of dinner food here is much better. I had Bi-​Bim-​Bap here like I said before and I really enjoyed it. I also had Bul-​Go-​Gi and Spicy Pork plate here before as well and it was great.
I have never had a bad experience here. The people were nice and friendly. It has free tea. A variety of side dishes to come with your food (more if its dinner). And it has pretty high quality food for the price you pay. A person who doesn’t have meal points like me can easily make this their regular place to go to in Berkeley if not their regular Korean place.

Three stars only for the Kalbi here. I’ve had a really hard time finding good Korean food in Berkeley and Gomnaru is the only Korean restaurant on northside close to campus. Dinner comes with sides, which is nice. However, quality of food does not match up to its high price.

I was pretty disappointed with the food at Gomnaru the last time I had lunch there.
— the kimchi was sour
— dukbokki was bland in the middle (possibly the rice cakes were cut too large)
I got a 2 item combo that they have during lunch-​time. I don’t think any price would be cheap enough for me to want to eat the meal I had there again.
I’m not sure if I’d be willing to return there for food. The Korean food places in South Side of Berkeley are so much better and I’d much rather get Korean food from there.

Gomnaru came to my attention when they had a: munch” voucher offer (a year ago) which i didn’t buy.
chanced by here and saw their lunch specials: ramen (5) soontofu (2)
2, 3 items lunch specials (6.49, 7.99)
eats: 3 item lunch special (7.99)
–jap chae
pretty good, restaurant quality
–kimchee rice
not that spicy, gelatinous
–curry vege
potatoes, celery, curry, watery
miso soup, and kimchi banchae came also.
banchan:
–got ja jang sauce by mistake, my pronunciation of jap chae misunderstood as ja jang sauce. so got jap chae replacement. sweet people!
–10 meal tickets available. cc: 10% off, cash-​15% discount.
–4 stars for the excellent value for lunch, food quality very good.

I only came to this place as often as I did because I literally lived 3 minutes away from it and there are just some days when you don’t want to go anywhere. I have to admit that the food here got WAY better after the owner changed but still no where close to good Korean food.
I usually stick to Soft Tofu Soup because it is HUGE and filling. If I’m not getting the soup, I get the spicy BBQ chicken which is just a guilty indulgence because it is by no means lean meat. The small side dishes here are really disappointing. They are covered in oil and really not tasty at all. The Kimchi Fried Rice is so oily that you can just see that it stained everything from your spoon to your plate. Not good at all.
If this wasn’t so close to my apartment, I never would have came. ²⁄₅

|| B A C K G R O U N D ||
Dropped by here for a group dinner before a group meeting. We had purchased the MunchonMe deal about an hour beforehand and were excited to devour.
The prices here are more expensive than what I normally see at Korean restaurants, but then again, I don’t eat at the many Korean places that aren’t all-​you-​can-​eats. The menus are laid underneath the plastic table top for convenience!
We sat down at our table, and the waitress brought us all water. We wanted barley tea, but we weren’t sure if it was self-​service near the counter or waiter-​serviced. We eventually asked our waitress, who brought our tea over.
The banchan are provided with your meal rather than before you meal, which was a bit disappointing for our hungry group. The originally served 5 banchan: tofu, kimchi, bean sprouts (spicy and non-​spicy), and rice cakes. The rice cakes were delicious! When we requested a second round of banchan, they included a 6^th banchan of stir-​fried carrots, zucchini, broccoli, and cabbage. Also yummy!
|| F O O D ||
Beef jap-​chae dinner special: Glass noodles, cabbage, bell peppers, carrots, beef, onions, rice, soybean soup [$ 9 normally, $ 6.75 through Munchonme]
— Soybean soup was decent.
Two mounds of white rice with sesame sprinkled on top. Lots of rice! Lots of starch @___@
— A large portion of japchae with large pieces of beef! I still wish they had more beef though.
— The seasoning and balance of veggies and sauce was well-​done.
|| C L O S U R E ||
The food was good and the service was fast, but without the MunchOnMe, I find it to be pretty pricey. I probably wouldn’t return.

This cold weather makes me crave soup. I was on northside and I figured. Why not get some tofu soup! I had a meeting in 20 minutes so I couldnt dine in which made me sad because I was thinking of all the side dishes I would miss out on. Wah.
After I got my order, I was pleasantly surprised to find the side dishes in its own container, separated by foil so the sauces dont mix! YAY!
I got the Kim Chi Soft Tofu Soup and the portion was HUGE. I could not finish the soup and can make a meal out of what is left over if I made some more rice. YAY!!!
The only NAY out of this meal was that the tofu soup was too oily in a it-​stained-​my-​white-​spoon kind of way. :(Wah. If it wasnt for this, I would have given Gomnaru 4 stars.

Small Korean joint in the Hearst Food Court, the Northside version of the Durant Asian Ghetto (
). Short menu with a few K-​BBQ items, stews (chi gae), soon dubu, and bibimbap (
).
I saw a BBQ Trio deal from MunchOnMe so gave them a try wondering how they compared to Southside Steve’s BBQ (
).
5 banchan came out first with some kimchi, fish cakes, tempura veggies, honey potatoes, and seaweed salad (
). The BBQ Trio had some sesame seed dusted rice and a miso dressed salad (
).
Much better quality than Steve’s. Lean cuts of reasonably juicy meat (chicken was a bit dry). They did give me spicy beef instead of spicy pork, but I can live with that. Also, fresher kimchi /​better banchan than Steve’s. Came with a small bowl of miso soup.
Serving size was smaller (maybe due to deal?), but I think worth it for the better ingredients.
Starving student scale: 4+ stars
Korean food scale: 3 stars

Finally tried this place for lunch after living next to it for 3 years now… and I kinda regret it…
Food:
Tofu soup: WAY TOO MUCH SPICY OIL in the soup. There was literally a highly unhealthy layer or red spicy oil that covered the very top of the soup. It wasn’t too spicy but it just looked disgusting. It completely coated the spoon I was using and the rice I was trying to eat with it. Kinda over did it. I couldn’t really even concentrate on what I was eating I was so distracted with how disgusting it looked.
Service:
None, you order at the counter and your number gets called when your order is ready
Ambiance:
Kinda a small, hole in the wall place. Very dim and shady looking. If there weren’t so many people eating there for a quick fast korean food lunch meal, it would CREEP me out to eat there.
Price:
The tofu soup was $ 7 which was ok for tofu soup but NOT ok for the quality that was served.
Overall:
NOT COMING BACK. Sorry.