{"id":828,"date":"2010-11-22T17:35:00","date_gmt":"2010-11-22T23:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/?p=828"},"modified":"2010-12-14T14:27:11","modified_gmt":"2010-12-14T20:27:11","slug":"samurai-sushi-korean-bbq-bentonville","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/reviews\/samurai-sushi-korean-bbq-bentonville\/","title":{"rendered":"Samurai Sushi & Korean BBQ, Bentonville"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Todd Barron @ FoodieCuisine.com<\/h4>\n
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Kim-Chi and Various Appetizers<\/p><\/div>\n

I haven\u2019t had good Korean BBQ in over 11 years since I lived in Philadelphia.\u00a0 There was a place in New Jersey that a group of us\u00a0from the\u00a0Software Engineering used to pack up and drive to.\u00a0 It took us two hours to get there but was worth the trip (although we only went once every few months.)\u00a0 They had the best Bi Bim Bap around and the kim-chi was to die for.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As it so happens I was in Bentonville, AR\u00a0the other day and had read on Urbanspoon<\/a> about a sushi\/korean place with a 93% rating.\u00a0 I used Sprint Navigation on my\u00a0Android phone\u00a0and drove to Samurai Sushi & Korean BBQ<\/a> on 14th street.\u00a0 At first look it is not someplace I would normally eat at.\u00a0 They have huge pictures of sushi covering the windows and it\u2019s located in a strip mall that looks like it hasn\u2019t been updated since 1970.\u00a0 I love dives but I detest pictures of food used in restaurants.\u00a0 I figure that if you need a picture of it, you don\u2019t need to sell it.\u00a0 I actually paused in the parking lot and re-looked it up, just to make sure I was at the right place.\u00a0 Luckily I ended up going in because as you will read, the experience was wonderful.<\/p>\n

The interior is on the funky side with pictures on the wall of the owner\/workers with customers (all appearing to have a good time,) football on television screens around, and a dark wood theme with a large sushi bar on one side of the room.\u00a0 It\u2019s a cross between an old-school pizza place, a bar, and a sushi restaurant.\u00a0 It\u2019s very casual and welcoming.\u00a0 I was seated immediately and the waitress took my order promptly.<\/p>\n

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Sushi Taster<\/p><\/div>\n

I ordered the Dolsot<\/strong> Bibimbap ($10.99)<\/strong> in the hot clay pot (you can order the cold version as well,) along with an iced-tea to drink.\u00a0 They had several lunch specials that were cheaper but I wanted what I ordered and wasn\u2019t looking to save money.\u00a0 The tea could have been more fresh but I wasn\u2019t being picky that day.<\/p>\n

The waitress brought me a taster of cooked sushi.\u00a0 She went out of her way to tell me it was cooked so I\u2019m guessing some people react negatively to receiving sushi.\u00a0 It had a nice texture to it although the rice was a bit on the dense side for my liking.\u00a0 The fish was cooked and tasted fishy but I attribute that to the breed and not the freshness of it.\u00a0 Overall the taster (of two pieces of sushi) tasted good and I appreciated them bringing it out.<\/p>\n

On her next trip my waitress brought out six small bowls of kim-chi and other prepared vegetables.\u00a0 If you haven\u2019t had Korean food before, this may seem odd to you.\u00a0 Typically Korean food like Bibimbap comes pre-served with many small dishes of pickled and\u00a0marinated vegetables.\u00a0 You can think of them as the tapas of the Korean world but not large or very filling.\u00a0 Each one was very tasty and I really liked the jalapeno dish.\u00a0 I saved about half of each one for my Bibimbap that was to come.<\/p>\n

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Dolsot Bi Bim Bap<\/p><\/div>\n

My Bibimbap came out next in a large black clay pot and I could hear the rice sizzling.\u00a0 She served it with two squeeze bottles of sesame oil and chili paste.\u00a0 Bibimbap is a dish made of rice, topped with various piles of finely shredded vegetables, and steak cut into small pieces over the top.\u00a0 The whole thing was topped with a perfectly soft-fried egg that broke apart when I poked it.\u00a0 As you are supposed to do, I mixed everything together before eating it and put on a generous amount of chili paste and some sesame oil.\u00a0 I also mixed the six vegetable dishes into the bowl for extra layers of flavor.<\/p>\n

The rice had time to sizzle against the edges and formed a nice cripsy texture.\u00a0 The vegetables were sliced\u00a0perfectly and the egg added a great richness to the dish.\u00a0 The chili paste I added gave the dish the right amount of heat and the seasame oil perfected the texture.\u00a0 The dish reminded me of the place I used to visit in New Jersey and the Bibimbap is the best I\u2019ve had in over a decade.\u00a0 I recently had a version of the dish at Lilly\u2019s Dim Sum Then Some<\/a> restaurant and although it was good, it didn\u2019t come close to this version.\u00a0 I do wish the dish had a bit more flavor on it\u2019s own but I\u2019m guessing they give you chili paste to do this\u00a0to your liking.\u00a0\u00a0Overall the food was great and the next time I\u2019m in\u00a0Bentonville I\u2019ll be stopping by.\u00a0 A great find!\u00a0<\/p>\n

Samurai Sushi & Korean BBQ
\n<\/strong>1100 Southeast 14th Street
\nBentonville, AR 72712-6808
\n(479) 273-1000<\/p>\n

\"Samurai<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Todd Barron @ FoodieCuisine.com I haven\u2019t had good Korean BBQ in over 11 years since I lived in Philadelphia.\u00a0 There was a place in New Jersey that a group of us\u00a0from the\u00a0Software Engineering used to pack up and drive to.\u00a0 It took us two hours to get there but was worth the trip (although […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[326,205],"tags":[61,757,299,300,301,64,262,298,252],"class_list":["post-828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asian-cuisine","category-reviews","tag-arkansas","tag-bbq","tag-bentonville","tag-bibimbap","tag-dolsot","tag-japanese","tag-korean","tag-samurai","tag-sushi"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=828"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":917,"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828\/revisions\/917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/foodiecuisine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}