DGM (Dwit Gol Mok) otherwise known as (D)amn (G)ood (M)unchies!

the best thing about knowing a panda is their enthusiasm to share their feed with you. fully expecting to find a forest of bamboo shoots last friday night, i was quite surprised by this gritty korean watering hole instead. welcome peeps to DGM (dwit gol mok) and thanks danny for the delicious introduction.

since this was our first visit to dgm, the panda had to escort us the the location or we would have surely gotten lost in this urban forest we call k-town. even though their address clearly points you to wilshire blvd, the actual entrance is from their parking lot which is off of berendo. but like a treasure hunt, once you find the mouth to this gastro cave, your belly will be in for quite a yummy ride.

water is served in beat up gold kettles which adds to the flair of this pub. love it.

their menu is in korean. if you can't read it, do not have a korean friend that speaks it, or a smartphone to show the pictures, then i suggest you learn the names for some of the dishes you'd like to masticate. the servers do speak some english, but i reckon not enough to understand your lively descriptions of the feed or how much you really want to consume it.

and heeellllooo yogurt soju....holy mother of baby jesus. DELICIOUS. this bewitching elixir is a mix of soju and a yogurt drink (possibly yakult or yogu) and was delicious, smooth, and subtly boozy. since you can hardly taste the presence of alcohol, this delicate drink will creep up on you slowly so drinkers beware. after downing a few glasses, all i could think of was, "where have you been all my life?" in fact, i might have shouted that line in my head several times during the course of the night.

the rabukkee was absolutely divine. the ramen noodles and dukboki smothered in sweet and spicy gochujang was a perfect combination of flavors. in fact, it was my most favorite dish of the night and i look forward to devouring many more platters of rabukkee in the future.

fried chicken wings with a side of spicy sauce and a side of cabbage slaw with thousand island dressing. korean fried chicken (aka kfc) is a fixture in all korean pub eats. its presence here was expected and deeply appreciated.

fried oysters, meaty sea animals they were. a perfect snack for drinking.

the spicy intestine soup was a bubbly mini cauldron of intestines, udon noodles, and kimchi. my dining companions were huge fans of this soup, but i had lukewarm feelings towards it. i did not enjoy the floating particles that one typically finds from boiling meat that should be cleared away. the gritty texture from these particles was off putting to eat.

if you head over to dgm between the hours of 5pm-8pm any day of the week, you will get all food items 50% off as long as you order alcohol. if you do not order libation, all food items will be 25% off during those hours. but COME ON NOW, get some yogurt soju baby. i know you will thank me later.

anyways, it was a delicious meal and a wonderful hole in the wall. FOR SURE, my belly will be back. the only question next time is how many pots of yogurt soju should i order?

DGM (Dwit Gol Mok)
3275 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90010
(213) 382-8432

price: $$
verdict: omg, i love it!

ob bear for the chicken win!

i do not advocate drowning one's sorrows in alcohol, but if you MUST haze your memory or dull the pain brought upon you by a disgruntled god(s), then i suggest you drown yourself in a huge pitcher of hite beer at ob bear. that's right, the bitterness of life can be momentarily forgotten here as you experience all levels of delicious excess.

accompanied by danny of kung food panda fame and d, my usual eating partner in crime, we spent a night drinking, chatting, and sweating as the food burned our tongues whilst the beer simultaneously cooled it...as i had remembered, the ob bear menu did not disappoint and was lavish and craveable as usual. but not wanting a food gut on top of a beer gut, we ordered modestly for two lean boy bellies and my very pudgy roaming one.

we started off with the infamous ob bear fried chicken. the chicken skin was fried to such a delicate crisp that it reminded me of savory tissue paper that one finds in a child's art project. the chicken meat itself was moist and slightly salty and did not require any condiments with it. the finely shredded cabbage slaw with the thousand island dressing was intriguingly delicious as well. i found myself plucking strands of cabbage to eat in between my bites of chicken.

the spicy chicken wings were torturously delicious as well. the sweet heat stung my tongue like a million furious korean bees. as i ate, i inhaled and exhaled feverishly to temper the heat, but to no avail. trying to tame that sweet heat was like dousing fire with gasoline...not going to work. as my dining partners sweated the spiciness out of their systems, i just whined "ohhhmyyygoood this is spicy!" but sooooooo good. very craveable and a must order as well when you visit ob bear.

danny then suggested an order of korean blood sausage. since i've had multiple versions of blood encased in a tube from other cuisines, i was intrigued to sample the korean version. once i nibbled on a slice, i immediately fell in bloody love. i absolutely enjoyed the noodles incorporated in the blood sausage. each bite was springy AND spicy. dangit, everything we ate sans the fried chicken were spicy. i was pretty ready for a tongue transplant at the end of this meal.

although my tongue burned slowly from all these spicy eats, the bottomless glass of hite beer momentarily dulled the heat and my worries. ob bear is a place where sorrows do not exist and the only thing i have to worry about is whether there's enough belly real estate to sock down all these delicious spicy eats. what a damn fine meal i had here...and thanks danny for your company!

OB Bear
3002 W. 7th St.
Los Angeles, CA 90005
(213) 480-4910

price: $$
verdict: omg, i love it!

not so cool at finn mccool's

Finn McCool's
2700 Main Street
Santa Monica, CA 90407
(310) 452-1734
www.finnmccoolsirishpub.com

price: $$
verdict: it's aight

friends and i dropped by finn mccool's for dinner and drinks last thursday night. the food is overpriced for what essentially is fried food and beer. i ordered crab cakes on a bed of greens with a side of fries. not the healthiest dinner choice, but it's a pub. what do you expect? their wine selection was small (duh, it's a beer place) but i found an ok glass of wine to wash it all down.

it wasn't crowded at all and the food is alright..it's just not anything special in my opinion.

a sorry roar from a tasteless lion

Red Lion Tavern
2366 Glendale Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90039
(323) 662-5337
www.redliontavern.net

price: $$
verdict: it's aight

don't throw sausages at me, but beer really isn't my thing. so when i partook in the goodies offered here, i really focused on the food and the environment rather than the beer. so my review is based on the food and the ambience alright!

i ordered one of their sausage specials and was not into it. the sausage tasted fatty, the sauerkraut was interesting in a tarty way, and the mash potatoes would lose a fight againgst the mashies at kfc if one was to be had. their thin fries were good though. my friend liked her dish. *shrug* but it's not a place for food. i think it exists solely as a place to drink a lot of beer...hence a few beer guts walking about.

parking is super atrocious too. if you do manage to find a spot in their parking lot, i swear, you will feel like austin powers in his movie when he needed to maneuver his golf cart in a narrow hallway...that's how i felt when i was trying to get out of their lot. reverse, foreward, reverse, foreward....CRASH. j/k. that didn't happen, but don't be suprised if someone bumps into your car or you bump into their's while trying to get out.

i don't mind coming back, but is it really worth it? probably not. i won't shun it though if i'm really desperate.