At Somaek, a chef continues to evolve
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Somaek's tasty but tiny bossam. Slices of steamed pork are wrapped in napa cabbage leaves with radish salad, sliced garlic, and spicy, savory ssamjang.
Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff/Boston Globe
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Bissonnette comes to the cuisine by marriage: The story goes that he fell in love with these dishes while cooking with his Korean mother-in-law, Soon Han, who is consulting chef at the restaurant. The menu is less freewheeling, more traditional, than what we're used to seeing from Bissonnette. One of the privileges of eating in a city over time is watching its talented chefs evolve. I appreciate Somaek's thoughtfulness and care. I also miss the sense that there's a spark plug on the other side of the kitchen wall, firing away wildly. (The restaurant has captured national attention from the likes of the
Given Boston's less-than-deep Korean dining scene, this is probably the only place in town where one can eat yuk hwe, steak tartare with egg yolk and lightly sweet Korean pear, while drinking a gin and tonic made with Green Chartreuse and ginseng (or a glass of Champagne, for that matter). I love scooping up the tartare with the accompanying gim bugak, fried seaweed chips, craggy and saline with a crackling texture.
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Bibim guksu, cold buckwheat noodles with gochujang, egg, cucumber, and seaweed, feels out of season on a frigid night, but I'm so glad to have it anyway: Even winter meals need light, refreshing counterpoint to dishes like dwaeji bulgogi, a savory, satisfying plate of pork bulgogi rich with umami.
Haemul pajeon, a pancake filled with green onions, shrimp, squid, and mussels, is ideal drinking food.
Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff/Boston Globe
Haemul pajeon, a pancake filled with green onions, shrimp, squid, and mussels, is lightly chewy and a perfect crisp golden-brown. It's ideal drinking food, and a call to order the popular soju-in-beer cocktail for which the restaurant is named. (Take the first syllables of the spirit soju and maekju, beer in Korean, and you've got yourself a beautifully fizzy, goes-down-easy drink.) Cartin's cocktail menu is where Somaek goes to play, with riffs like the Seoul 75 (soju, rice wine, peach tea, lemon, and cava) and the Maekjulada (soju, beer, the chile powder gochugaru, lime, tomato, and soy). Somaek also showcases rice wines from Brooklyn company Hana Makgeolli; the lightly sweet Takju 16 is nice with the pajeon, too.
I enjoy ojingeo bokkeum, a dish of stir-fried squid with tteok (chewy, cylindrical rice cakes), vegetables, and fish cake, although I wish for more tteok and squid. Doenjang jjigae, a soybean paste stew with pork, clams, and more, tastes overwhelmingly fishy.
Godeungeo gui is a piece of grilled skin-on salted mackerel. That's it, and that's all that's needed. Maybe a squeeze of the accompanying lemon, too.
Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff/Boston Globe
My favorite dish at Somaek might be its simplest. Godeungeo gui is a piece of grilled skin-on salted mackerel. That's it, and that's all that's needed. Maybe a squeeze of the accompanying lemon, too. With a bowl of steamed rice and an assortment of banchan, side dishes, it makes a perfect meal.
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Now to the quick of things: the banchan. They are the heart and soul of Somaek's menu. (As is the warm hospitality. Somaek is a small restaurant, and I'm recognized and greeted every time I visit.) Love clearly resides in these small plates of radish kimchi, braised burdock root, and jellied acorn muk.
So why do my tablemates, Korean and Korean American, look like someone just committed a crime?
'Paying for banchan is anti-Korean,' declares one friend, only half-joking. Banchan are generally gratis. At Somaek, one orders three for $16 or five for $25. When a dollhouse-size serving of bossam arrives, the slices of steamed pork to be wrapped in napa cabbage leaves with radish salad, sliced garlic, and spicy ssamjang sauce, someone says: 'But it's so
tiny
!' Another tasty crime, committed via six squares of tender meat.
Dwaeji bulgogi, a savory, satisfying plate of pork bulgogi.
Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff/Boston Globe
Which brings me back to the power of food, to the policeman who cried when he tasted his mother's cooking.
Somaek's dishes don't always taste or look like what one would get in Korea. When we say 'just like mom used to make,' we fail to take into account just how many different moms there are in the world. Sometimes there's vinegar in a dish here where it wouldn't usually appear. Sometimes gochujang dominates, when the main flavor is traditionally sesame. Sometimes the portions are small.
But the dishes aren't a wild departure, either. This isn't Korean food through a kaleidoscopic Little Donkey filter. A little more invention, improvisation, looseness could be fun. At a moment when modern Korean restaurants are flourishing across the country, from Atomix in New York to Baroo in LA, it's hard not to yearn for it.
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Somaek feels like a stage for a talented chef who keeps evolving. As an observer of Bissonnette's career, and a fan of his cooking, I respect and am glad for this trajectory. Twenty years in, every project should be a passion project, and every creative person should continue to grow.
SOMAEK
★★★
11 Temple Place, Downtown Crossing, Boston, 857-449-9003,
Wheelchair accessible
Prices
$14-$25 per plate. Banchan three for $16, five for $25; rice $4. Cocktails $12-$16.
Hours
Mon-Thu 5-10 p.m., Fri-Sat 5-10:30 p.m.
Noise level
Conversational.
★★★★★ Extraordinary | ★★★★ Excellent | ★★★ Very good | ★★ Good | ★ Fair | (No stars) Poor
Devra First can be reached at
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