Alternative Name: 피닉스
Rating: 4/5
Address
Turn left out of Raynes Park Station, on the big road, going toward the Co-op.
Do they even have addresses out in places like Raynes Park?
Type of Place:
Neighborhood restaurant. Specifically, a darn nice one in a particularly horrible and spooky London suburb.
A place you would bring your collegues or family. Apparently there is big space upstair for group customer. Better to book in advance for groups.
Food:
The food's fine. Not perfect -- seng seon jeon was a tad soggy and I couldn't help feeling they'd somehow added sugar to the kimchi.
The good news, though, is the side dishes. We got tons of side dishes, from a little bowl of pumpkin soup (hobak ttang?) at the beginning through two full volleys of kimchi, beansprouts and whatnot. Nice!
All side dishes are FREE including 'Oi kimchi' which you always have to pay other Korean restaurant in central. Ho-bak-jook(pumpkin soup) was not that tasty, but it's free anyway. I had Al-tang(Spicy pollack roe soup with vegetable) and Kimchi-kkenip-jeon(pancake with kimchi and sesame leaves). The pancake was thin and crispy, very nice. Al-tang contained generous quantity of pollack roe. The end of meal, we got Soo-jung-gwa(cold cinnamon tea). Not bad and it's free indeed.
Atmosphere:
Absolutely standard archetypical Korean restaurant. The booth in the corner, the smoke extractor in the ceiling, the grid of tables and the uncomfortable chairs, they're all there. Also, for some reason, there are goldfish.
Phoenix is kind of on the fringes of the New Malden / Kingston Korean belt, but a fair few of the customers are Korean all the same.
가족의 주말 외식 장소로 넘치지도 모자라지도 않는 적당한 규모의 식당. 2층에는 직장인들 회식장소로 이용되는 테이블들도 있는것 같음.(직접 확인은 안됨). 우리가 갔을땐 단체 손님이 없었지만, 테이블 사이 간격이 가까운 편이라 가족들이 많이 찾는 시간대엔 옆테이블의 아이들이 시끄럽게 떠들어대는 것을 참으며 식사를 해야할듯.
Service:
Good. Friendly. Korean. The nice manager lady humored my Korean. That makes me like her.
Friendly manager. The waitress calls a woman in the kitchen as "I-mo" which is Auntie(mother's sister) in Korea. Of course she is not the woman's niece. Just friendly relationship between the people work in the restaurant.
Unique Point:
I'm told that Phoenix make a particular effort with it's sashimi. Now I think I speak for every non-idiot when I say I tend to steer clear of the inevitable Japanese items on an English Korean restaurant's menus. But Phoenix, they say, does sashimi Korean-style. The have a tank of goldfish out front. Maybe they have a tank of tuna fish out back...
Someone should go and find out.
ok