Bee Won Korean Restaurant – Korea Town, Ampang

I would list Bee Won Korean Restaurant under one of my “highly recommended” Korean restaurants in KL.

For starters, Bee Won serves one of the best banchan among all Korean restaurants I have tried (by a rough estimation I think I have tried about 15 so far) & I personally opine that good fresh bachan is an important criteria for rating a Korean joint.
For PJ area, a strong contender for best Korean is Korea House in SS2 (post up soon!). Both of these Korean restaurants offers seriously homely, authentic Korean cuisine in good portions and they came tagged with reasonable prices to boot.

Bachan: Small in portion but big in variety. Oh, it is refillable too. I love ’em!

Lightly seasoned and very fresh, most of the bachan at Bee Won tasted as if it was prepared fresh daily and I had no doubt they were.

Another thing that I like about the banchan here; it is non-oily and each small bachan imparts a different flavour. Some are sweet & crunchy; like the peanuts & anchovies, while the pickled cucumbers & cabbage was tangy & moreish.

There were also fancy ones; like the below mayo, apple, pineapple & something deep-fried ( I can’t remember what it was!).

The only grouse I have about this place is simply the ventilation. Avoid Bee Won if you do not want to leave lunch/dinner smelling like grilled meat! The aeration here is seriously bad.

Apparently, nothing much has changed in Bee Won since it started its operations decades ago. Food quality remained consistent and the same can be said for the interior. Ventilation is still powered by ceiling fans (pic below).

Gosh, I certainly hope that the owners of Bee Won would consider upgrading the ventilation system to the suction ones. On the night of my dinner, the whole place was packed & the air was literally smoking.

The choice is yours, would you tolerate the poor ventilation for the sake of honestly good home- feel Korean food? I tried avoiding the main dining area and took refuge in one of the private rooms but it was just as bad.

Anyhow, we added to the ventilation problem by ordering the Red Wine Marinated Pork roll, RM30. LOL.

Though it sounded intriguing, “wine marinated” and all, we barely tasted any wine, or it could be that it was just too subtle.

But it was good anyhow, eating it wrapped with the lettuce & the customary garlic cuts, sesame oil and the green chillies.

A Korean favourite of mine is the Bibimbap. This Seafood Bibimbap, RM15 was as delicious as it is, with plenty of seafood & vegetables and nice crunchy rice bits at the bottom.

I love the colours & mix of so many ingredients in one bowl. Each ingredient imparts a different taste & flavour; some raw (the vegetables), some spicy & sour (the onions) and some lightly flavoured (the stewed seafood).

Having stuffed ourselves with unlimited bachan, and since there were only 3 of us, we ended dinner with the complimentary barley drink and some slices of watermelon. Even the barley drink here is better than some of the other Korean restaurants I have tried. However, one customer is entitled to have only one cup.

Our total bill was only RM55, and that was inclusive of a RM5 bowl of rice – (DO NOT order this! A small bowl for RM5!) & 10% service charge.

Bee Won Restaurant – front row facing front of Jalan Ampang
B5 1-1, One Ampang Business Center, (Korea Town -Landmarks to look out for is Ampang Point Shopping Complex or  De Palma Hotel, Korea Town is right opposite these landmarks on the other side of the main road)
Jalan Ampang, 68000 Selangor.
Tel: +603-4256 8573/8576
Hp: +6017-686 9953