Bowl Square promotes Korean cuisine to a wider audience

If you're looking for tastier, healthier alternatives to fast-food burgers and fries, you can't do much better than Bowl Square.

Everything costs less than $10 at this little Des Plaines establishment specializing in fresh Asian fare, where service is quick and the food all looks and tastes good.

The Jang family, who emigrated from Korea in 1996, opened Bowl Square last July. Young Sun Jang does the cooking with her husband, Gwang Ho, and children Peter and Vicky wait on customers.

The tiny, counter-service spot offers table seating for 18, with another 14 perches at high counters around the perimeter; it must be pretty cramped when it's full. The place reminds me very much of lunchrooms in Seoul. The look is bright and modern, with shiny chrome chairs, silver-colored tabletops and vivid, stylized leaf pictures on the wall.

Although they ultimately decided to open in the suburbs, the Jangs were inspired to open their restaurant after a drive around downtown Chicago.

"We saw all of these restaurants, and we felt kind of bad there were no Korean places," Peter Jang said. He also noted that due to language difficulties, restaurants around the Chicago area that serve the Korean community often seem reserved or off-putting to others. One of the Jangs' goals is to promote Korean cuisine to a wider audience.

"We wanted somewhere more open, easy to approach," he said.

Except for soldiers who served in the Korean War, few Americans had tasted Korean food before the late 1960s, when Koreans first began immigrating to the United States in any number, and even today many are unfamiliar with this easy-to-like cuisine.

The menu focuses largely on simplified versions of Korean staples, plus a few dishes from other Asian cuisines, such as tofu pad Thai, sweet-and-sour chicken, chicken or shrimp fried rice (called "stirred rice" here) and California roll. Those who dine in can expect melamine plates and plastic cutlery.

After opening Bowl Square, the Jangs discovered that many of their customers were so unaware of the dishes they offered that they had to list a lot of them by non-Korean names. So the bulgogi is called "teriyaki beef" and the bibimbap is described as "green rice bowl."

Even then, Vicky Jang said, "A lot of customers don't know what is teriyaki, or what is miso soup."

Miso, a rich, salty paste made from fermented soybeans and grain commonly used in both Japanese and Korean cuisines, makes a cloudy broth that tastes something like chicken soup. The fairly plain version served here comes with a few dishes, or you can order a cupful for 50 cents.

Teriyaki is a Japanese marinade of sweetened soy sauce; the Korean equivalent, yangnyum kanjang, tends to be more complex, with sesame and garlic added to the mix. In Japanese restaurants, "teriyaki beef" usually means some cut of steak. The bulgogi sold under that name at Bowl Square is thinly sliced, grilled beef, presented with rice and broccoli.

Bowl Square's flavorful marinade also coats its delicious kalbi, thinly sliced, grilled beef short ribs, sold here as part of the "Bowl Square Combo." The most expensive item on the menu at $8.99, this combination plate also includes vegetable fried rice and two of the half-moon dumplings called gyoza in Japanese and mandu in Korean.

Typically pork, the dumplings here come filled with a good-tasting mixture of vegetables, sweet potatoes and soy protein. They also can be ordered separately as an appetizer.

Other vegetarian options include an Asian salad and a stir-fry of tofu and vegetables.

Highly recommended, the "green rice bowl" offers a fresh-tasting bowlful of shreds of nicely seasoned beef, lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, bean sprouts, dried gourd and hot rice, with a side of hot sauce. You mix it all up to your taste.

If you really like things spicy, the "hot chili chicken" (buldak in Korean) should suit: morsels of moist and tender chicken breast liberally coated with hot sauce and tossed with bits of carrot, onion and a few broccoli florets.

Also, be sure to order some of Young Sun Jang's zesty kimchi, pickled cabbage seasoned with chilies, which she makes fresh in-house. In a traditional Korean restaurant, kimchi and a variety of other side dishes (called banchan) would be included as a matter of course; in Bowl Square's fast-food format, the kimchi costs $1 extra.

Other entrees include teriyaki chicken, barbecue chicken skewers and spicy garlic pork. A $4.99 lunch-box option presents chicken cutlets with rice and vegetables.

Bowl Square doesn't serve desserts. A beverage cooler offers cans and bottles of the usual soda pop plus some interesting green-tea drinks.

If you're already a fan of Korean food, you'll find Bowl Square's versions a bit simpler than the usual, with an emphasis on fresh ingredients and fast service. If you haven't tried this Korean cookery before, Bowl Square offers an easy, unthreatening way to dip your spoon into the cuisine.

Bowl Square

1051 Elmhurst Road, Des Plaines, (847) 357-8084

Cuisine: Fast, fresh pan-Asian, with an emphasis on Korean

Setting: Bright, clean, counter-service spot in a strip mall south of Golf Road

Price range: Appetizers 50 cents to $2.99; entrees $4.99 to $8.99

Hours: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 3 to 7 p.m. Sunday

Accepts: Major credit cards

Also: Free parking; lunch specials 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday