BY GABE HERMAN | In recent years, Korilla BBQ has been a welcome addition to the growing list of fast-casual restaurants that let you build your own order from quality, freshly made dishes.
Korilla’s angle is Korean barbeque, and it offers it in the form of burritos, rice bowls and salads.
A protein for your dish is chosen from roasted chicken, pork shoulder, ribeye or organic tofu.
Rice options include sticky rice, bacon kimchi fried rice, purple rice and broccoli rice.
Seasonal vegetables and house-made kimchi options include red kimchi, cucumber kimchi, kale, roasted corn, pico de gallo, sweet black beans, blue potato salad, squash and beets.
And, finally, sauce options include a mild and smokey Korilla sauce, Korean hot sauce, and Green Crack, which is cilantro lime aioli.
All dish options are in the $10 range. And drinks offered include Kafe, a Korean coffee; Korchata, their house-made horchata (grain beverage); and various sodas.
I recently had a bowl with chicken, purple rice, black beans, corn and pico de gallo, covered with Green Crack. All the ingredients tasted fresh and it was a very filling lunch, with lots of bright colors in the dish to look at as I ate.
Korilla BBQ started as a food truck, run by Queens native Eddie Song. Its popularity eventually led in 2014 to Korilla’s first brick-and-mortar location, in the East Village at Third Ave. and St. Mark’s Place.
That location closed last year, but Korilla is still going strong in the city. It has two stores in Midtown East, one in the Urbanspace Vanderbilt food court at Park Ave. and E. 45th St., and another at Lexington Ave. and E. 56th St. There is also a Brooklyn location at 2 Metrotech, at Jay St. and Myrtle Promenade.
And the food truck is still running, as well. Every day it’s at a different spot, which can be found at korillabbq.com/locations and on Korilla BBQ’s Twitter page.
