After finishing lunch at Danjee at 1PM my friends wanted to go to Bornga that same evening at 8:30PM. I think this was probably my own fault, as I essentially incepted them by telling them I was having Korean that day.
While Danjee bills itself as Korean fine dining, I think Bornga is more suited to hold that title. Bornga’s interior, with its booths, decorations, and BBQ facilities is actually quite nice. We partook in a mixed meal of Korean BBQ and other non-BBQ dishes.
The side dishes were pretty adequate. They were not refilled on their own, rather we had to ask for them to be refilled.
The Japchae (stir fried glass noodles and vegetables – $23) was delicious. It was a nice and warm dish with lots of umami and sesame flavours. I liked how easy to eat and minimally chewy the glass noodles were. I’d get this again.
Bornga’s Bibim Naengmyeon (spicy buckwheat noodles – $17) was the second serving of Korean cold noodles that I had of the day. Compared with Danjee’s this one had far less soup, though I think there was a separate item on the menu with soup to drink. The noodles were much easier to eat, helped by the fact that we were given scissors to cut them up. Eating this dish helped me to realise that I shouldn’t have been so critical of Danjee’s naengmyeon’s minimal serving of meat – two slices is probably the standard. Not bad.
The Yesan tteokgalbi (grilled short rib patties – $23) was a sliced up patty made of marinated beef short rib meat and rice cakes, served with some creamy mayonnaise-like dipping sauce. It was quite good, fatty and moist and juicy, with a sweet flavour to it. It was reminiscent of a fatty and highly minced hamburger patty. Apparently it is rare to find this dish in Sydney, so if you’re at Bornga and there’s room in your tummy it’s worth a try.
The seafood and green onion pancake (haemul pajeon – $25) was the eggiest seafood pancake we’ve ever had. As you can see from the photo almost the entire exterior surface was covered in egg. My colleagues complained that there was not enough seafood within the pancake, however each slice I had did come with some seafood packed inside – not to mention the extra seafood my partner snuck into my bowl (she loves seafood pancake – hates seafood). I would agree, however, that this does not even reach my top five seafood pancakes that I’ve had in Sydney, and would recommend you not get this unless you have a distinct craving for it.
These are salad leaves. I’ve presented a photo of them here to help differentiate against Danjee, who didn’t give us any salad leaves.
Our ex-surgical colleague cut and cooked our Korean BBQ with incredible deftness. We had the wagyu kkot sal (wagyu short rib – $42), Mansinchang Samgyeopsal (marinated pork belly – $24), Woosamgyeop (beef loin – $23) and Samgyeopsal (pork belly -$22). All the meat was of high quality, though a bit expensive. We were keen to order some vegetables to cook on the BBQ as well, but their vegetables were out of stock. The only vegetables we were able to BBQ were two piece of onion, two of pumpkin, and one mushroom with the Bornga logo stamped onto it.
The Bornga Wagyu Bulgogi ($43 – Korean bulgogi hot pot with beef and vegetables) was quite a large servingf and delicious. It was really packed with a lot of greenery, mushrooms, and noodles. One of my colleagues had a lot of this dish.
.VERDICT
$265 at Bornga bought more than enough to feed 4 large Asian boys who often get confused for one another and 2 normal sized women, including a bottle of makgoli to share. Bornga’s food is of high quality, reasonably priced and delicious. I can definitely recommend Bornga as the best Korean I’ve had in the Sydney CBD to date. Make sure to book ahead.
4/5
Bornga
Level 1/78 Harbour St, Haymarket NSW 2000
0417 054 555
