Mamas Korean Restaurant @ Sunway Giza, Petaling Jaya

While most Korean restaurants in Kuala Lumpur and Klang Valley are centralized in Little Korea Ampang, Mont Kiara and Solaris Dutamas, Mamas Korean Restaurant has chosen to open his first shop in Sunway Giza, PJ instead, putting more chance for residents in PJ area to have a taste of Korean delicacies. But to the owner’s surprise, their good food has been spread by word of mouth and now, locals and Koreans from near and far visit Mamas Korean Restaurant during lunch, or dinner.

The restaurant is named “Mamas” because everything here is heartily prepared by a pretty Korean mummy with impeccable cooking skills. You will feel like home here, having delicious homecooked, mama’s food without MSG and preservatives.

In fact, this restaurant is difficult to locate. It is not housed in the Sunway Giza Mall blossomed with cafes and restaurant, or neither the concourse area buzzling with pubs and bars. It is actually behind Public Bank, just above Tokyo Kitchen, and can be acessed through lift or staircase next to Tokyo Kitchen.

Once pushing the door in, we were welcomed with a clean, spacious interior. A raw and earthy tone of exposed bricks wall, wooden flooring, wooden furnitures blended into contrast with walls painted in dark grey, customized steel racks adhered to them and lined up with bottles of drinks, greeny potted plants.

We grabbed our seat and excitedly waited for our food! Generous plates of ban chan arrived not long after, one.. two.. three… four… we lost count on it. There are actually 8 types in total. Mamas Korean Restaurant is prides for their homemade ban chan, freshly prepared daily even though is time consuming. The restaurant highly recommends the sweet pumpkin, which is tenderly sweet. The honey sweetness we tasted is actually the natural sweetness released by the pumpkin through slow braised process. No sugar is added, not even a mili-gram.

Kimchi Jigae (Kimchi Stew) RM20
Kimchi Jigae, Summergirl’s must have every time she walked into a Korean restaurant. Mamas’s version is concentrated with meat and kimchi sweetness in the beginning, but gradually developed into spicy, fiery hot sensation in the palate. Generously loaded with pork belly, tofu, kimchi and needle mushrooms.

Bibimbap (Mixed Rice in Earthware Pot) RM20
Bibimbap, the signature Korean staple, or generally means Korean mixed rice. Served warm in a stone pot, the dish is filled with white rice, then arranged with julienned cucumber, carrot, mushroom, bean sprouts, spinach and more, topped over with an egg. Pour in the chilli paste served along, then Stir everything together thoroughly to result in a messy but delicious, flavourful dish.

Japchae (Glass Noodle with Sauteed Vegetables) RM35
Portion is huge for Mamas Korean Restaurant’s japchae. The sweet potato noodles is stir fried to fragrance with pork slices, spinach, carrot and egg. We enjoy slurping up the silky smooth and chewy noodles, which at the same time bursting with aroma of sesame oil.

Apart from ala-carte dishes, we can’t deny that Korean barbecue also serves as a highlight here. The restaurant offers wide range of meat for grilling, from Beef Sirloin, beef tenderloin, marinated beef short ribs, beef briset, beef loin to wine pork belly, pork belly marinated in Bulgogi sauce, pork belly marinated in Spicy Sauce and thin cut pork belly slices.

They even have pork large intestines, beef large intestines, pork large intestines for diners who love to indulge in offals. Mixed barbecue set and dakgalbi set are also avaiable, featuring different types of meat with Kimchi Stew and white rice.

Besides having the staff to grill the meat you order, another good thing about Mamas is, diners can choose to have those meat grilled in front of you, or not. The reason is because some diners are afraid of being “I smelt like grilled food” after the BBQ session. However, we prefer the meat to be cooked on our table, as we love to witness the sizzling and cracking of food on grill.

Depe Samgyeopsal (Thin Cut Pork Belly Slices) RM40
Devour in this fresh, smoky pork belly at its most original taste!

 In the middle of grilling the meat, the staff cracked in an egg onto a bundle of needle mushroom and start tossing them like cooking scramble egg. Such a brilliant idea! Of course, the end product is so good with a pleasant combination of juiciness and creaminess.

Dakgalbi (Spicy Grilled Chicken) RM30
Cabbage, rice cake, potato and chicken chunks coated with tastebud tickling sauce. Oh-so-spicy but it is so addictive that we just can’t stop tucking in one piece after another.

Bulgogi Samgyeopsal (Pork belly Marinated in Bulgogi Sauce) RM40
Not a fan of spicy food? Don’t make this a reason that stop you from visiting Mamas Korean Restaurant. Try their Pork Belly marinated with special sauce made in house, which has almost no sign of spiciness. This juicy, flavourful pork belly blends in a pungent, slightly sweet and salty concoction. Too salty to eat it alone, best to pair with a wrap of vegetables.

Differ from other Korean restaurants which usually serves only lettuce along with your Korean BBQ set, Mamas on the contrary, provides three types of vegetables to wrap with your grilled items. We were told that they used to serve also Pak Choy, but eating Pak Choy in raw didn’t seem to be generally accepted by locals, so they decided to omit it from list. But still, there are three choices of vegetables. Have more and ask for refillable, it is good to in relieving the heatiness of grilled meat.

Steamed egg is the complimentary item in their barbecue set. Never underestimate this FOC egg, it is beautifully done, fluffy soft and laden with moisture plus a touch of carrots bits.

Overall, among the Korean restaurant we have visited, Mamas is by far one of the best. *Summergirl is already missing their delicious dalkgalbi and grilled pork belly now.

Photography: Summerkid
Write Up: Summergirl

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Address:
Mamas Korean Restaurant
C-1-1, Sunway Giza Mall,
Jalan PJU 5/14, PJU 5,
47810 Petaling Jaya, Malaysia.
Contact: 03-6151 1816
Business Hours:
Weekdays: 11:00 am – 11:00 pm,
Weekend and Eve of Public Holidays 11.00 am – 1.00 am
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MamasKoreanRestaurant