Hangawi Visited 10/27/2012 3 Forks

Hangawi 12 E 32nd St., (between 5th Ave & Madison Ave), New York, NY 10016

I had been to Hangawi years ago and remembered really liking it.  It's not that I didn't like my food here last night but my mind wasn't blown away by it.  It could have been that maybe I ordered the wrong thing but I left thinking that I've had better Korean food before (and it has nothing to do with the fact that this place is vegetarian food only).  The decor here is very mature, subdued and formal.  They make you take your shoes off when you enter and you sit on woven straw mats and it's very dark and quiet inside.  We didn't have a reservation but they told us we could sit if we could leave the table by 8:30.  I was fine with that but I do hate it when restaurants kind of start pushing you out before you are ready.  It's their job to manage the schedule properly and while I appreciate them giving us a heads up, I was annoyed that they would have possibly not seated us if need be.

So as I mentioned, everything on the menu is vegetarian friendly and most of it is vegan and gluten friendly as well.  So I felt super healthy eating there.  A funny comment that both Vid and Aarti both made was that they were overwhelmed by all the choices and that this must be what it feels like for me most of the time since in most cases, I can eat anything on a menu but they are limited to the few veggies options.  But I do equally like vegetarian food and was also overwhelmed with all the tofu and mushroom choices.  We ended up ordering the stuffed shiitake mushrooms ($11) and the kabocha pumpkin pancakes with mung bean ($12) to share.  Aarti and I both got the avocado stone rice bowl ($21) and Vid got the grilled tofu ($19).  In all seriousness, if you are a vegetarian you will be in heaven because of all the different options that isn't just a side salad.  The stuffed mushrooms came out first and they were interesting. It wasn't actually a stuffed mushroom, but looked more like a shiitake mushroom on top of some weird almond tasting cookie.  Alright, it wasn't actually a cookie but it didn't seem like a mushroom either but it was tan crispier than a mushroom and it tasted like marzipan.  Next was the pumpkin pancakes.  Apparently I'm on a pumpkin kick since I also had pumpkin tempura at Sushi of Gari the night before.  This pancake was supposed to have shredded pumpkin with mung bean but honestly I didn't taste either of them.  All I tasted was a savory korean style pancake/crepe and it was served with a light soy dipping sauce.  I really couldn't see or tell what the pancake was stuffed with, which was a bit disappointing.  Then came our main entrees and while I knew that the stone bowl would be steaming hot, the exterior stone REALLY seals the heat in.  I mean, it was practically on fire and made it really difficult to eat because it was so damn hot.  The stone bowl was supposed to be served with a variety of vegetables and tofu over rice and mixed with a miso sauce.  But similar to the pancake, what was supposed to be in this dish was hard to find.  I could barely tell there was tofu in there and there wasn't a ton of vegetables.  I poured the entire side of miso sauce and hot sauce to make up for what seemed to be missing.  It was basically a lot of rice and seaweed and half an avocado on the side.   I will say that when I ate my leftovers the next day and it was a lot cooler, I did find the dish much more enjoyable to eat.  I tried Vid's tofu dish and it was delicious.  It was a huge plate of 10+ pieces of grilled tofu with a sesame leaf and seaweed sauce.  Aarti and I both commented how we wished we had gotten that instead.

Luckily by the time 8:30 rolled around we were pretty much done with dinner.  But that didn't stop the waiters from giving us the check and taking away our plates without even asking if we were done or needed anything else.  I completely get that a group of people with a reservation shouldn't have to wait too long for their table, but I thought it was a bit rude to just start packing up our table right away.  I did notice that while we were leaving there wasn't a group of people waiting for our table which made me eve more irritated that we were ushered out so quickly.  Total bill: $36/pp with tax and tip.

Photo Credit: Yelp