Cheon Joo Young-Yang Dolsot

Taste wise my favorite Korean restaurant in San Jose/​Santa Clara area.
Ambiance and service wise ²⁄₅.
It’s one of the more authentic hole in the wall Korean restaurant I regularly go to. I highly recommend coming with a Korean because there’s a lot of more authentic food items to choose from. The waiters are very few and are obviously not the best at English.
They have some dishes that may offend some but they also have the generic dishes that also well known as well.
I personally get the intestine or pollack soup! But don’t let that scare you.
I’ve seen many drunken old Korean men as well because they sell soju and beer.

It’s one of my favorite Korean Restaurant in the bay area. The food is Cheonjoo style which is located in the southwestern part of Korea. The taste of the food is relatively delicate and the flavor is weaker. I usually have the seafood stone pot bibimbap, which is especially tastier in winter. It smells like fresh savory seafood and oyster.

Good service, good food, good attitude! I really like here kimchi soup! And mix beef rice! Be here

Came here because jang su jang had hour wait. Casserole beef and octopus had no taste, just spicy. Octopus was way too tough. Kali was fatty and expensive. Seafood pancake burnt and no special dipping sauce. This place gets hot fast. Bad service. Next time I’ll just go to the food court.

The service is pretty bad if you are not a Korean. I noticed the difference between different tables who sit with non-​Koreans v. s, Korean after coming to this restaurant few times.
Since we are non-​Korean, both servers did not come to our table after delivering dishes, therefore, we didn’t get water refilled during the whole time.
Since they were chatting beyond the counter. I also have to go to counter and ask for check after trying to make eye contacts with them couple of times.
After we paid and walked out door, they did not even say thank you to us. However, they did the totally opposite way to Korean, such as refill water, side dish, say thank you in Korean after they walked out.
I still pay tips regardless how they treated us. However, their bad service made me decide not to come back anymore, since I paid not only for food but also for service.

My favorite place for Korean stew! The food is incredible flavorful, especially the soup. The place is a little small, but the food is definitely worth the wait!

So authentic and so delicious! Typical customers here are mid-​senior age Korean men, which tells you how authentic the dishes are.
And they are so delicious. Every time I tried new dishes I never heard of before and none of them disappointed me. A lot of the dishes here can’t be found in other Korean restaurants in this area!

Saturday lunch for 2:
Gamjatang (~$ 30) — good size pork bone soup, meat falling off bones with deep spiced and rich flavours, soft veges with potatos, side dishes (banchans) are good and fresh.
Place is kitchen disguised as a restaurant, nothing fancy, just good for eating/​ranting like those places we see on kdramas :))
We do cook/​eat gamjatang at home but if we crave authentic korean comfort foods prepared by ahjumma & ahjussi, this is the place !

The service was incredibly rude…
Right when my bf and I sat down, this middle aged woman brought our utensils to us, and I said «hi!» (lol I always do just to be nice) and she didn’t acknowledge me or welcome us and continued to hand out spoons. I was dissed lol.
She kind of slammed things down and put my spoon on a napkin and then dropped my bf’s spoon on the table… and missed the napkin. She left the spoon touching the table basically. I’m not a clean freak but I just thought it was hella rude that any waitress would do that? She still at this point didn’t say a word to us wtf?
She was friendly to other customers since they could speak Korean (I noticed other reviews said u won’t get the same respect as the Korean customers)
Then I ordered something and she didn’t give me a chance to add on my order and I continued to talk to her but her English wasn’t that good, then she took the menu from our table, closed it, and walked away…
I walked toward her in the back and said I wasn’t done ordering and she never apologized.
The food was ok, but not good enough to make me want to go back.
In the end my bf decided not to tip since she was so rude to us (I know we should have but he convinced me lol)
We left for 5 seconds and immediately the same lady walks out and shouts at us «no tip??» We were surprised and said «what?» She said «tip!» Which is unprofessional because she gave service that didn’t deserve even a dollar.
Never coming back lol if u read all of this then I suggest u don’t come here bc there are way better tasting and friendlier Korean restaurants

A friend and I were here for lunch. We both liked this mom and pop shop, it is good, affordable and fast.
The mini appetizer dishes are plentiful. Although, FYI– one of the cucumber dish tastes kind sour and, I was caught off guard, but my friend told me that is what the dish should tastes like.
BiBimBap in stone bowl tastes great as well.
Overall, a great place to have lunch, I will be back again.

Trying to figure out why this place is only 3.5 stars on Unilocal.I thought the food was amazing! Definitely one of my go-​to places if I ever want Korean stews.
The restaurant is pretty hard to find unless you can read Korean. It’s located in a corner of Lawrence Plaza, near the Galleria Market, with only a sign in Korean. The windows are all covered up too, so my eyes skimmed past it at first. I honestly would have never noticed or discovered it if my mom hadn’t come here before and recommended it.
The inside is nothing fancy. Pretty much all of the customers were speaking Korean, which made me more confident that I was going to get some authentic Korean food. I’m not Korean so I can’t say I know what authentic Korean food tastes like, but I was very satisfied with my meal. The menu was a little overwhelming because there were a lot of Korean dishes I didn’t recognize, but there’s a short description in English under every item. There are some of the usual dishes, like bibimbap and bulgogi, but most of the menu looked like various stews/​soups.
Service was good. I was worried that we would get poor treatment being non-​Korean, which happens at some Korean establishments, but our server was really nice and friendly. And super patient (we spent a really long time going through the menu, trying to decide what we wanted to order).
We were served banchan after we finally placed our order. There was a pretty good variety here: kimchi, picked cucumber, pickled daikon, seaweed, spinach, black beans, fish cake and japchae. I wasn’t really a fan of most of them though. The kimchi was especially disappointing (it reminded me of pool water), but I liked the seaweed and spinach.
Our food came out pretty quickly and piping hot. We ordered two stews, each supposedly a portion size for one person, but they were HUGE. One stew could easily feed two people. I’ve never had Korean stews before, but they were pretty similar to Chinese ones. Delicious and warming, and great for cold/​winter days.
====================
–GAM JA TANG ($ 13.99) — ⁵⁄₅
[pork stew with potato]
MMMM SOO GOOD. Tender pork, soft potatoes and really flavorful broth. A little bit of heat, but I would’ve liked it even spicier. There were some veggies that were a little bitter, but I didn’t mind them. Definitely recommend!
–HAN BANG SAM GAE TANG ($ 17.99) — ⁴⁄₅
[herb and whole chicken stew with ginseng, dates, garlic and sticky rice]
We were deciding between this chicken stew and the normal sam gae tang (without herbs). Our server warned us that the herbs had a medicinal taste and might be too strong for our liking, but I really enjoyed the stew and didn’t really taste anything strong and herbal. It was pretty similar to some Chinese chicken stews that my family makes, so I might just be used to the taste. The chicken was cooked nicely — soft and tender and came off the bones easily — and the dates added a nice sweetness. I actually forgot that there was supposed to be sticky rice until I broke apart the chicken and found the rice stuffed inside. I think I would’ve preferred the stew without the rice, as it made it too thick and gooey for my liking.

This placed has slipped significantly in quality since my last visit and I’ll never come back.
The Galbi Tang I had here was inedible with tough chunks of beef that I could barely bite off the bone. Also the meat tasted funky… so i know I was getting really cheap stuff.
Also this place treats you much better when u are Korean or come with Korean people i.e. special extra banchan for Koreans v non-​Koreans. I don’t mind shitty service or bad quality of food as much as I mind the inequality…

Disappointed with everything except the haemul pajeon ($ 12.99). They close at 10PM right of the galleria market, small place specializing in bibimbap. Walked in, nobody said anything for a min so bf and I sat ourselves. waited again, nothing… took menu from next table. Ordered seafood dolsot bibimbap ($ 14), haemul pajeon and reg bibimbap (~$ 12). reg bibimbap was odd since the rice wasn’t with the veggies, seafood bibimbap was ok, but too hot for me to eat. seafood pancake was good, but not enough sauce. The fact that there was only 1 other young couple closer to our age whereas everyone else were ahjummas and ahjusshis made it really uncomfortable for me… waitress didn’t check up on us often. total before tip was $ 41. yikes. not worth it for mediocre food…

This is a very traditional Korean place. They have lots of dishes that are home-​style, that is, not your typical restaurant fare. Reading through the menu elicited lots of «Oh, they have this!» comments. I feel like this place is good if you want something different than the typical, more upscale, Korean places that cater to the less down-​to-​earth crowd (e.g., Jang Su Jang).
I decided to get gamja tang aka pork bone soup ($ 13.99), which is rare in the Bay Area, It had lots of bitter green leafy vegetables (Cantonese people will recognize it as sai yeung choi) that will suit traditional tastes. I’m not a huge fan of this kind of vegetable, but I did enjoy the dish and appreciated that they had it! The meat was soft and came off the bone easily, which is the best part of gamja tang.
My girlfriend got the sam gye tang aka whole chicken soup, which we enjoyed less. It had a very bitter, medicinal herb-​y taste which we didn’t really enjoy. It did however bring us back to when our Asian parents would make us bitter chicken soup when we were sick though, so if you enjoy that kind of traditional taste you’ll like the sam gye tang here.
A comment on the banchan: there is lots of banchan variety, but the kimchi is not very good. Surprising for a more traditional place, but I find there are few restaurants with really good kimchi — they give it to you free, after all. They did have especially good japchae though, so that’s a plus.
While this review seems mostly negative, in fairness I do really appreciate the uniqueness of this place. I have a soft spot for these less pretentious places, and I will head back soon to try other things. We weren’t feeling it that day, but I feel it deserves another shot. Conveniently located next to Galleria for grocery shopping, and with ample parking, they have a simple, no-​nonsense ambience and reasonable prices. This is a solid place for me.

The service here is awful. Not only did we never get our water refilled or were asked how we were doing, but it took 35 minutes for the food to come in the first place. That doesn’t sound too bad, but we were starving and came in at around 2, and less than 10 other guests were there.
That being said, the food itself is pretty good. The banchan (sides) were just alright, but the kalgooksu was REALLY good! The noodles were just the right thickness and chewiness, and the broth was delicious as well. It was well worth my $ 10. We also ordered budae jjigae (army stew) in a stone bowl, and it was also really good. However, I don’t think they gave us enough to charge $ 14 for it.
Overall an okay experience. Maybe next time I’ll come in at some random time like 4 when no one else is there so that I can actually get my kalgooksu without waiting for more than half an hour.

This place is probably the most down-​to-​earth, little restaurant offering the most comforting Korean food in town!
Stopped by last night for some gam ja tang (pork bone soup with potatoes) and budae jjigae (spicy stew with ramen, spam, sausage and kimchi).
*Gam ja tang — so delicious! Pork was falling-​off-​bones tender. Broth could’ve been a little spicier for my liking, but portion was hugeee! Their one person portion is enough to feed two! For $ 12.99, it’s pretty awesome for the portion and quality you get.
*Budae Jjigae: tasty, but lacking some salt. Easy fix :) Again, portion was generous; especially with the spam! Definitely a better, bigger budae jjigae than the neighboring Jang Su Jang restaurant. It’s a good deal, too, for $ 11.99.
Both dishes came out magma hot, so be careful! Ban chan was standard and on the night we came, they gave out complimentary pancakes… sweet!
Also, the place can get pretty loud. Seems like this is a favorite hang out place for Korean ahjussis for dinner and drinks, hehe. Service is super friendly, but can be painfully slow. With only one waitress serving the whole place, it’s understandable.
Overall, we had a really good dinner at CJYYD (wow, even abbreviated their name is so long…) and we will definitely be back… probably many times :)

Came here for the Budae Jjigae aka army stew. Sadly it was just ok, not as great as compared to what I’ve had before in SoCal.
Budae Jjigae aka Army Stew is a kimchi based soup with spam, hot dog sausages ramen, rice cakes, kimchi, tofu, green onion, and onions. It’s a dish that’s meant to be shared.
Their version of Budae Jjigae had all the ingredients perviously listed and nothing more. Some places will add mushrooms, cheese, and other ingredients. The stew was served on top of a portable burner. The soup cooked to a boil, then the ramen was added. Their soup was a tad too much on the sour side and was lacking depth. Between 2 girls we were stuffed and didn’t finish. I’d say 3 girls with a good appetite could share this dish.
Banchan (sides) were ok. Veggies were noticeably not as fresh as other restaurants.
Service was all done by 1 lady! She was very nice. A second lady was cleaning up tables.

Love this place. Authentic home cooked Korean food with amazingly nice service. The meat on BBQ shorts practically falls off the bone.
Highly recommend this place

I don’t know how I should write this review… I’ll try to be as nice as I can.
I don’t want to hate on this place, as the lady serving us was super friendly…(considering she was the ONLY one working with at least 8 – 9 tables full of people). When we first walked in, we were faced with super dreary interior with unflattering fluorescent lights that were too dim… it showed all the weird flaws of the restaurant. I also got a whiff of fishy smell right when I walked in. Pretty awesome way to greet customers, I must say.
We ordered one regular and one seafood dolsot bibimbap, assuming this place specializes in these stone pot rice dishes. We were so wrong… Both of our fried eggs on top were overcooked with rock solid yolks, with burnt edges, which is a big no-​no in my book. The whole point of fried egg on dolsot bibimbap is for the undercooked yolk to be mixed in with the rice. Portions were good, but each ingredients were lacking flavor. Our veggies weren’t really seasoned enough, and it just didn’t look or taste fresh. My seafood just had tiny chunks of squids but that was about it.
The only lady working here was friendly, but they really should consider hiring more people. I never got water or side dish refills. Check? Took a lot of waving and patience.
I really don’t have a reason to come back here, when there’s a cheaper food court just down the parking lot with better dolsot bibimbap.

Cheon Joo Young-​Yang Dolsot is a smallish restaurant in the corner of the stripmall which has the much better known Jang Su Jang K-​BBQ joint. Cheon Joo (Jeonju) is a city in Korea known for their Bi Bim Bap and here they have four varieties on the menu including their namesake Young-​Yang Dolsot (
).
I didn’t see the Young-​Yang Dolsot a la carte, but only as part of the Young-​Yang Dolsot Jungsik or Healthy Stonepot Set Meal (young-​yang = healthy & jung sik = formal or set meal) which comes with soybean paste stew (doenjang jjigae) and grilled makerel (godeungeo gui) along with the basic banchan for the bargin basement price of $ 13.99 (
). Couldn’t hurt to ask for it a la carte, if you’re looking for a smaller meal.
You get ten banchan including several kimchis, fishcakes, sprouts, soybean, spinach, and seaweed (
). Everything fresh and tasty except the radish kimchi which needed (imo) more fermentation time.
First out was the bubbling doenjang jjigae and godeungeo gui (
). The stew broth had a rich flavor and was medium spicy from gochugaru (hot pepper powder) and fresh jalapeño slices and had a good amount of zucchini and tofu. The mackerel was room temp and not grilled to order, but was nicely seasoned.
The bibim bap came out along with a complementary gyeran jjim (steamed egg
) which was tasty, but overcooked. Hey, it was complimentary so you can’t really dock them for that, right?
Toppings on the Young-​yang dolsot bap include oyster, dates, chestnut, peas, garlic, and radish on a bed of a purple rice /​grain mixture (
). The rice was very moist and not much crisped up on the bottom. By itself the bibim bap was bland (healthy?) even with some gochujang (hot pepper paste) mixed in so eating it in combination with the other items was a must.
Oh, as a note for vegetarians who might try and get this a la carte sans mackerel, when I skimmed the menu, I thought «oyster» meant oyster mushrooms, but it is actual pieces of oyster so order accordingly.
Young Yang Bibim Bap: 3 stars (too healthy? will come back to try other options)
Jjigae: 4.5 stars
Mackerel: 3.5 stars