Unli-Samgyupsal, Sashimi & More at Geonbae Modern Korean Bar & Grill!

GEONBAE MODERN KOREAN BAR & GRILL 115 Scout Delgado St., Sacred Heart, Quezon City Tel. No. (02) 429 85 49 Business Hours: Everyday 11am-10pm

Update: They've opened up branches in Marikina and U.P. Town Center while also upping the prices a bit.

We get it- unli-samgyupsal is the current 'in' thing and you can virtually find one just about anywhere nowadays. Despite regular buffet restaurants having more food choices, there's just that unique hype and allure that these Korean BBQ places have over the average modern Filipino.

For most, people would usually go to the famous ones like Romantic Baboy, Samgyupsalamat, or even the lesser-known All4U. Generally, they're all the same, with just a few differences here and there like on menu choices, food quality and service quality.

But do read ahead- Geonbae Modern Korean Bar & Grill has been my best experience yet, and here's why!

MENU

For starters, you can choose from two options: the P499 and P599. The added P100 unlocks the ff.:

Meat: Beef Brisket, Beef Ribs, Hanger Steak, Beef Bulgogi

Appetizer: Chicken Kimbap, Vegetable Kimbap, Spicy Rice Cake, Salmon Sashimi, Tuna Sashimi

Entree: Shrimp Fry, Beef Stew, Korean Ramen, Korean Wings, Bibimbap

Soup & Stew: Beef Rib Stew

Pretty much beats the others in terms of number of food choices at the same price range, right?

Go for the P599. The Hanger Steak and Salmon Sashimi alone make it worth it.

UNIQUE ORDERING SYSTEM

Next, let me tell you about Geonbae's nifty high-tech and efficient ordering system.

One in your group would need to connect his phone to Geonbae's Wi-Fi and he will be given access to a website where you can just click and order whatever you want from there. Yeah, blew my mind as well.

Screenshots of the ordering system | Right: everything we ordered- and wow, that's a lot!

Instead of the traditional and tedious 6-step process e.g. (1) you wait for a waiter to call, (2) you call the waiter, (3) the waiter takes your order, (4) the waiter submits your order, (5) food is prepped and (6) food is served; they just narrowed it to just three: (1) click your order, (2) food is prepped and (3) voila, food is served!

There's no bottleneck and you're sure to get to what you want, when you want! They serve food quickly too.

FIRST TIME

I learned about Geonbae through people posting about it on the Filipino Facebook foodie group Let's Eat Pare®. What drew me in was the unlimited samgyupsal and sashimi as I haven't seen that pairing before.

So my friends and I planned a visit- we arrived at 6:00pm on a weekday and we were already sixth in line.

Waiting wasn't so bad. By 6:30pm we were already able to get a table for seven. But do avoid going here late like 7pm as the lines can get REALLY long. Other reviews even state they waited for 1-2 hours.

My phone was used to log in to take the orders, and the waitress explained to me how the ordering system works before letting us in. She also punched in two orders of the 'First Set' containing various items.

Upon taking our seats, I was surprised that our initial orders were already laid on the table:

First Set x2 upon taking a seat

Kimchi Takoyaki | Japchae | Salmon Sashimi

The grills were quick to heat up and all that's left for us to do was start grilling. And what's nice is we can already munch on the appetizers and entrees while cooking since they're already there!

A plethora of food immediately on the table- quite the opposite strategy other establishments use where they bottleneck and limit the food served to you until you feel full or just get tired of waiting.

Here, I felt like I got my money's worth. The limit per order on the app is 8, but it won't stop you from making another 8 afterwards. If you look at our order list, we had 12 batches containing 68 items! And mind you, we could have ordered more, but man, we couldn't eat any more after that.

Meat quality is good and can be really soft and juicy if paired with someone who knows how to man the grill.

There's a variety of sauces- the typical ones, and of course the melted cheese everyone's crazy about.

You can focus on the different lean beef variants to get the bang for your buck, but the Kimchi Takoyaki and Salmon Sashimi are pretty tasty as well.

Overall, we had a satisfying dinner. Definitely worth the P599! I hope the quality doesn't change over time.

The staff were accommodating and quick to act. If there's anything bad I can point out, it's probably parking. They only have four on their lot so the others must park along either Scout Delgado or Tomas Morato.