Bibimbap (Charlotte St): Why this is the place to go if you're after a tasty, quick and good value meal in London

Bibimbap restaurant in Charlotte Street, London, is a fantastic little Korean eatery specialising in - you guessed it - bibimbap.

What is bibimbap?

It means 'mixed rice' in Korean and is a popular dish in the Asian country.  It's best to visualise this, so this is how my fillet beef bibimbap (with optional egg) at +Bibimbap Charlotte St looked like:

Fillet beef bibimbap with rice and vegetables inside a hot stone bowl, plus an optional egg.  

Their menu features a decent choice of different bibimbaps (10 in total), each one full of delicious rice and toppings inside a very hot stone bowl.  Vegetarian bibimbaps are available, as well as ones with chicken and pork.  Other Korean side dishes are on the menu too, including favourites such as seafood pancake and kimchi.

To eat it is simple: as soon as it arrives, begin mixing all the ingredients together inside the hot bowl.  The trick is to regularly mix everything, otherwise the rice can become dry and overcooked at the bottom.  (And in case you're wondering,  only the fillet beef bibimbap has raw meat, the others are pre-cooked).

How my bibimbap looked after I gave it a good stir.

Bibimbap is wonderfully tasty, quick, healthy and affordable - most dishes are under £10.  If that floats your boat - and it should - give the Bibimbap chain a go - there's one in Soho too ( +Bibimbap Soho ).

The interior in Bibimbap is relaxed, informal and cosy.  Korean popular culture is very apparent with many posters from films and musicians on the walls.  

A (home made) Korean night in London

So rather than go to a Korean restaurant, my friends and I decided to have a bit of fun and do our own 'Korean night' at home.

Before I go on, I want to explain that I am NOT a Korean food expert, so please allow for some allowance if things don't look 100 per cent authentic!  However, we did try our best and got all the ingredients from Korea Food Mart, a big Korean supermarket in New Malden, London - the town that's home to 30,000 Koreans.

We decided to make a Korean hot pot soup and a bibimbap.

How does this look?  I think it looks not bad!  We didn't heat the stone bowl for long enough though, but we'll know for next time.  As a result, we couldn't put an egg in it :-(.

For the soup, I got some beef slices, Korean beef stock, soy bean sprouts (much better than mung bean sprouts), Chinese leaf kimchi, enoki mushrooms, Korean glass noodles and tofu. I was a little lost on how to make the soup base, but it tasted good.  Let me know if you have any suggestions.

Yummy beef slices.

We washed everything down with some makgeolli rice wine, soju and Hite Korean beer.

What do you think?  Let me know if you have any suggestions for the future!