Palsaik Korean BBQ

One of my favorite kbbq spots in the south bay :)
Good food, good atmosphere, best service.
There’s this one server, I think his name is Minsu, he was so sweet. Best manners!
Thanks Minsu!
Highly recommend

I stopped by to grab a quick lunch to-​go since I was grabbing Boba from next door. I only have a 30 minute lunch so I had to move quickly. However, they are more of a sit down restaurant. The owner or manager, not sure, recommended a few dishes and said that he would cook it for me while I went next door. When I got back my lunch was cooked and packed. He showed and explained everything that was in my bag. I got the pork belly in garlic and the peppered one. Both were delicious. I was worried about the peppered one being too spicy, but it was perfect. The rice was cooked well, not soggy or hard. The décor is very cute. There are little piggy accessories all over. I definitely will be back.

Great taste, great service, very reasonable price for a KBBQ, what more could you ask for?
We ordered their combo, which came with their signature 8-​flavor pork belly, kimchi soup, salad and fried rice. So much food, both husband and I were stuffed at the end. We couldn’t finish the fried rice. Their servers kept coming back to cook for us and cleaned the grill in between the cooking. Just a great overall experience.
It’s the first time my very picky husband said everything was tasty. It says a great deal about Palsaik. We will definitely come back again.

Great Korean BBQ experience! They bring out all the food in raw form like beef brisket and 8 flavors of pork bellies to the table. Then they make you a spicy Korean soup right in front of you at the table. It’s incredibly fun and tasty. They bring kimche and salads as well as rice at the end. Then they cook the meat with bean sprouts and explain the nuances of each of the different marinades that the pork bellies come in.
The best thing about the experience is that a team of servers are always attending to the table helping you cook the food properly. Very helpful and fun!
We would definitely go back!

Truly enjoyed the service. For those who enjoy an engaging lunch or dinner experience with friends and family, this is surely the place for you! Bibimbap is well worth coming back for. 5 stars for sure :)

It was my 1^st experience at the Torrance location and it exceeded my expectations.
It doesn’t quite compare to the other 2 locations but the atmosphere and service was impeccable. Seafood pancake as an appetizer was on the house and the kimchee soup with ramen noodles was very savory. All in all, it was a great experience for someone who came all the way from OC. Highly recommend Palsaik in Torrance.

Good Legit K Food in South Bay!
No need to get into all the nitty-​gritty of details, theres lots of posts that have already done that.
My recommendation get combo #2 — the premium kimchi is good but not worth the premium price, service is solid. Seating is a bit crowded, but you get to make friends.

Randomly stumbled upon this place for a late dinner one night… oh boy! I had no idea what this place was all about until we actually sat down. All pork belly? What is this madness?
Well it’s darn good pork belly. You can taste the genuine quality of the pork belly. At some (or most…) Korean barbecue restaurants, you can tell that the pork belly has been frozen at some point or that it’s been sitting around for a while because it just doesn’t have much flavor. You rely on the dipping sauce or marinade to give it that flavor, but it doesn’t really taste much like pork or anything. The pork belly here is high quality. You can taste the pork, and it doesn’t seize up or dry out like a frozen pork belly would. It’s not just about the marinades– it’s the quality of the meat, and you can taste it.
Anyway. That’s not all that’s different about the experience. They have a seafood soup on the side and will also make fried rice from the leftovers of said soup when you’re done with it. It’s crazy for a non-​Korean, but it’s also pretty cool and seems very authentic and traditional. You don’t get the million versions of kimchi/​appetizers coming out at the beginning, but you get a very good batch of kimchi and beansprouts which cook on the grill along with the pork bellies. Lovely.
If you’re craving something different, this is definitely worth checking out. It’s fatty because you’re eating pork belly all night, but once in a while is definitely alright.

Came here and the brisket was sold out. Steak was ok but not that tender. Seafood soup was ok but no banchan or side dishes. Not impressed for the price and what you get.

I’m glad I don’t have to fight through K-​Town traffic anymore to get my fill of grilled pork, because we finally have our very own local spot here in Torrance and I hope it stays around!
There are quite a few options to choose from. If you’ve never had this type of Korean BBQ before, Palsaik is known for serving eight flavors of marinated pork that are all labelled for you on a long tray: ginseng, wine, galbi, garlic, herb, curry, soy bean paste and hot pepper. Based off this, there are 3 different combinations to choose from on the menu. If you want to order a specific pork option or side dish à la carte, you can do that also for an additional cost. The entire meal is served with salad, kimchi, soup, and lettuce to wrap your pork with. Once your soup is ¼ finished, they make it into fried rice… so save some of that broth for later!
All in all, the service was excellent from the minute we walked through the door and when we left satisfied customers. If you can find this place in Torrance, I highly recommend you try it!

Located in a quiet non-​bustling shopping center off of Hawthorne Blvd. in Torrance is Palsaik. They specialize in marinated pork belly bbq or in Korean it’s called samgyupsal (pork belly). They offer three combos and all include pork belly for grilling; however, only the Palsaik and Premium combos come with eight healthy sizes of pork belly marinated eight ways. Regardless of your party size, I recommend at the least the Palsaik combo. This way you can experience what sets Palsaik from other Korean BBQs. The eight ways of marination include Ginseng, Wine, Garlic, Herb, Galbi, Curry, Miso, and Spicy. My personal favorites in order of preference were Garlic, Wine, Galbi, Miso, and Ginseng. I wasn’t too excited about the Herb, Curry, and Spicy. Putting the marinade aside, each pork belly was tender and savory.
Every combo comes with Palsaik’s signature seafood soup. It’s very traditional Korean in the sense that the flavor has a deep fermented soybean taste. It’s spicy, but nothing to sweat about. The portion is on the smaller side, but the acceptable amounts of seafood (mussels, shrimp, and octopus) bridge the hunger if you’re not full from the BBQ.
Expect no Korean side dishes (banchan) here rather you’ll have unlimited kimchi and spicy bean sprouts on the grill for all of you veggie fans. Plus, you can munch on fresh lettuce spears to wrap your pork bellies for a healthier BBQ experience.
Our party opted for the Premium combo. Basically, it comes with the eight marinated pork bellies plus beef brisket and premium kimchi. The beef brisket quality was average and lean, thus it wasn’t as tender as what you’ll find at Yellow Cow or Moon. The premium kimchi was definitely premium. Sour, soft, and potent — just the way kimchi should be. I recommend you don’t grill the premium kimchi, rather enjoy it in its raw complex state.
The process here is quite simple. Sit down then order. If you ordered the Premium combo, they’ll grill the brisket first. After the brisket, they’ll grill the eight pork bellies in order from one end of the tray (ginseng) to other end (spicy). While you devour your pork bellies, they’ll restock the kimchi and bean sprouts on the grill. Had enough? Not yet because here comes dessert. They’ll fry some rice with whatever kimchi and bean sprouts are left on the grill with some of the broth from the seafood soup. Bang, now you’re done. Along the way, help yourself to the drawer full of napkins, spoons, and chopsticks.
As some of Unilocalers may know, there are two other locations in So Cal that offer the eight different marinades of pork belly. After speaking with one of the employees at Palsaik, the Torrance location is the only US franchise. Apparently, Palsaik started in Seoul then opened a franchise in Torrance. The other two locations in K-​Town and Buena Park appear to operating with a similar concept, but are not part of the Palsaik franchise.
So far so good, right? One thing that bothers the heck out of me is when Asian restaurants charge for rice. Palsaik charges for rice! $ 1 per bowl. 5 — $ 1 = 4 star review. Regardless, this place is a solid Korean BBQ in the South Bay. Also, we waited less than 10 minutes for a table on a Saturday night. The place is relatively small, so I would imagine wait times can vary. Enjoy!

Normally I’m not one for Korean BBQ, because that’s the only thing Korean that my non-​Korean friends want to eat. But, I chose this place for a recent dinner with friends because I’d heard about the name Palsaik when there was a location in Ktown. I had been wanting to try it for years. I was curious about the Torrance location, and then found out that it is in fact now the only location of Palsaik in California, let alone the US. Palsaik, I learned, is a popular pork belly chain restaurant in South Korea, known for their 8 different flavors of marinade for their pork belly. The 8 flavors are: ginseng, wine, garlic, herb, kalbi, curry, miso, and hot/​spicy.
I went in not knowing what to expect and willing to give it a try, and I left a fan and pleasantly surprised at how much I liked it. I don’t give 5 stars to places easily. In fact, these days, I’ve been sparing with my reviews because of time. But, the food, service, attention to detail, and ambience of our meal was excellent. And I would wholeheartedly recommend this restaurant to others. Even as I’m writing this, I’ve already planned to go there again so my boyfriend can try it.
For our dinner, there was a lot going on. Eight people, 2 combos for the table, each with 2 seafood soups and 8 types of pork. We even got an order of brisket with one of them. It was a lot of food, strategically placed by the staff on our strategically designed table (complete with hidden compartments in the seats to store one’s bag and a drawer in the table to house the spoons, chopsticks, napkins, and cute mini aprons to guard from splatter). We got lettuce replenished. There was ample salad to eat with the crispy, well-​seasoned pork belly. They, in fact, checked on us multiple times to make sure we didn’t need anything, and it was not even a slow night for them.
Being on one’s feet all day, serving, busing, and even cooking the pork belly for us, that’s a lot of premium quality service. They made sure we didn’t eat raw pork and didn’t burn up our pork either. They mixed and cooked the fried rice for us in the leftover seafood broth at the end. It made for an unusually easy Korean BBQ meal, compared to the ones where I’m usually manning the tongs and scissors.
I know most people just want to know if the food is good and that is enough for them. Yes, the food was great. I really enjoyed the different flavors of marinades for the pork belly. I liked the wine one the most (it was so juicy and light), followed by the ginseng (also light). I liked the herb one and the curry one the least because they made the pork belly taste too «American» or Western. I probably would get the unseasoned pork belly to eat traditional style next time as well. The availability of fresh giant red leaf lettuce (sangchu) to wrap the meat in made it feel like homestyle eating.
Now, for me, it goes beyond the food, and I want to know if the service will match the food. At Palsaik, in sleepy little Torrance, located in a non-​descript strip mall with a giant parking lot, you will be satisfied both with food and service. The people who work there, they are just really, really nice, and their food and restaurant shows it.
And the bonus, after your meal, you leave with hardly a whiff of BBQ on you. It was magical. I didn’t even see smoke during our meal. It was all very clean. The only reminders of that great meal you just had? Your well-​stuffed stomach, the undeniable garlic breath that comes with all good Korean food, and the smile from enjoying the whole experience. Go check it out!

Some very, very good pork belly. Listen to the servers, they’ll describe what you’re eating and why a certain sequence is recommended.
Not much in the way of ban chan, but the spicy seafood soup is very good, as is the fried rice made at the end– although the fried rice wasn’t quite up to the standards of the best of their competitors.
Contrary to my previous experiences with eight flavors of pork belly, I actually enjoyed all eight flavors this time. Spicy, miso, wine, garlic, galbi (yes, galbi is a flavor), curry, etc… they were ALL good.

4 stars for food
5 stars for service (I was very impressed)
I’m happy I don’t have to drive all the way to Ktown to satisfy my fatty pork belly needs. Palsaik finally opened in Torrance and the food is just as good and the service is even better! I came in on a Sunday night with my dad and we were seated immediately. The restaurant has plenty of table seating where you can grill your meat. There is plenty of ventilation, so you don’t come out of the restaurant smelling like a cloud of smoke.
FOOD:
For food, we ordered the palsaik combo which comes with 8 different kinds of pork belly flavors, a seafood stew, salad, kimchi, and fried rice at the end of the meal. This is a lot of food… especially for just two people. But the meat is so good that somehow you’ll end up making room for it lol.
The entire setup of the meal takes a lot of space on the table. They present the pork belly in a line, so you can clearly tell the different flavors. You have: ginseng, miso, garlic, herb, wine, hot, curry, and galbi. The servers grill and cut the meat for you with the kimchi and oyster mushrooms grilling as well. If you ask for it, they cook up some garlic and jalapeño peppers too. Everything is so good! Heavy but good.
You gotta cook the pork belly the right amount so it’s perfectly crisp on the outside but still tender and juicy on the inside. The best way to eat pork belly? You get a piece of the pork belly and top it off with some miso paste and the grilled kimchi, garlic, and jalapeño, and wrap it around a piece of lettuce. SO bomb. The textures and flavors are just perfect. My favorite flavors they offered were the miso, garlic, and hot. The not so favorites were the curry and herb.
The seafood stew cooks while all your meat is cooking. You have to wait some time to make sure that the flavors come all together. I couldn’t wait at first, so I took my spoon and tried a bite. No flavors whatsoever. After a while, everything cooked all together, and you could taste the seafood and the heat. There is a lot of seafood and vegetables. It is definitely worth the wait! After you finish eating your stew, the servers cook up the fried rice with the leftover broth. Our fried rice wasn’t so great. It was a bit too salty and I prefer my fried rice a little more charred. I did appreciate them taking the time to perfect it though.
SERVICE:
Amazing. Everyone was so enthusiastic and eager to help. They were so nice to constantly fill up our drinks and check our meat. They cut and cook the pork belly for you! Service could not be beat.

Haven’t been to any other Palsaik’s before, so our visit here has set the bar for us. As you can tell by my rating, we had a great experience!
We called and made a reservation even though there were plenty of tables available. They do take reservations though!
Cool table set up. Their cooking areas literally take up the entire table though. There’s not much need however since they do all the cooking for you while you do all the eating. This is probably good for us since we tend to burn all of our meat when we go out to KBBQ. Especially the pork belly which is what this place specializes in. There’s a drawer on the table as well where they keep extra napkins and utencils. Nifty.
We ordered the Palsaik Combo which comes with seafood soup, salad, and a sample of 8 of their pork bellies. They started with the seafood soup which was bomb! You can add ramen noodles to the soup as well but we opted not to. Afterwards they put rice in the soup along with some of the kimchi that was on the grill. It made for some awesome kimchi fried rice. So good!
On the grill side, they started cooking 4 of the pork bellies while we were drinking and enjoying our soup. They cut it up for us and kept it warm on the grill. We’re not korean so they explained that some people like wrapping the meat in the lettuce there and dipping it into the sauce they provide. It was good any way we at it. High quality pork belly marinated 8 different ways for a few days. My favorite flavor was one labeled HOT, just a good, thick flavor that actually wasn’t that spicy. Wife liked the Miso Paste flavor the best. Seriously, everything was good and the staff was awesome!
So our first experience with the high-​end pork belly joint and we loved it! I think its going to be easy for me to crave this again. Well done!

I couldn’t wait to get home to give this place the stellar review that it so deserves. We got the Premium Combo which consisted of salad, 8 different kinds of pork belly, seafood soup, premium kimchi, lettuce wraps, and fried rice. Every single bite of food that I had was amazing.
The salad dressing was a garlic soy based dressing. So good and so refreshing.
Every single pork belly was excellent. There was ginseng, wine, garlic, herb, galbi, curry, miso, and spicy. I can’t even tell you which was best because all were delicious in its own right. Do yourself a favor and do them all. Don’t just try a couple. You’ll be missing out. If you’re worried about not being able to eat it all if you order all 8, come with more people. 3 of us did the $ 70 combo and it was well worth it.
The seafood soup was so good. It had crab, mussels, shrimp, and seafood, tofu and veggies. You want to save room for the pork, but you can’t stop eating it.
Premium kimchi– seriously? This made me think that there’s a world of kimchi that I haven’t even discovered. I eat loads of Korean food. I’ve been to tons of Korean restaurants. I’ve never had kimchi like this before. It’s so tasty without the ‘bite’ of fermentation. The lay told us to eat it with the pork belly and it was like it was made for it.
The fried rice with cheese at the end was made at the table with the leftover soup. I only wish I had it earlier to eat with every bite of pork. The cheese made me want to slap somebody it was that good.
Aside from the delicious dinner, the service was so good. So friendly, so efficient, and so inviting. The owner gave us hugs on our way out. After that meal, it was perfect because all I wanted to do was hug somebody.
The restaurant was clean. The seats have compartments for you to put your jackets so they don’t smell like kbbq after. The tables had drawers with utensils and napkins. So cute.
Our entire ride home we were planning our next meal there. It will be this week. It would be tomorrow if I could help it. I love this place and I love that I don’t have to drive to K town for an amazing Korean meal.

Thank god I don’t have to drive to Buena Park anymore! Palsaik is here for all your pork belly needs!
Came here for the first time on Christmas Day. It did not disappoint. If you’ve ever been to 8 kbbq in Buena, worry no more, because this place is better… and closer.
The owners said that they weren’t supposed to be open on Christmas but there was so much public outcry, so they opened! Good thing or my family and I wouldn’t be able to continue our Christmas tradition haha!
So let’s get into the important things. The pork belly. There are 3 different combos to choose from and then a la carte options. There are 8 different kinds that come out on a long tray. Marinated with labels so you know which is which. They start you off with salads. If you don’t want the combos you can order the pork belly a la carte but if you want 8 or more it will obviously be more cost effective to do the combos that include the pork belly.
There is also beef options to choose from.
The onion and seafood pancake is my favorite!
After you’re done with your soup, they’ll make into fried rice.
The service is good. They’ll cook for you in the beginning and then let you do it after.
Cool owners and good food. The owners are really nice and really provide good service.

3.5 Stars (If I could)
I actually wanted to give this place 4 stars instead of 3 because the service was really great… but unfortunately I can’t help but to compare this to the Palsaik in K-​Town. It just doesn’t compare and given that they are a part of the same franchise… I will have to base my review on that. We ordered the combination that was about $ 50 and came with 8 flavors of pork, a chiggae (soup) and fried rice after. While it was sufficient for the 3 people I came with, I would suggest ordering a side dish or perhaps some of the other meats individually if you’re a group of 3 guys.
Highlights
— Relatively good quality meats consisting of 8 flavors of pork (my personal favorites are the curry and herb, but I think all of them are worth the try)
— Really good service! I can’t say the employees are as amazing as they are in K-​town because the people in LA really know how to cook their BBQ to perfection, but I can definitely say they do their best.
The reason it was disappointing for me was because they charge for salad and lettuce. I’ve never been to a Korean BBQ place that charges for lettuce and while I understand the price of vegetables and meat is going up, it would be smarter to just raise the prices altogether rather than to charge for a serving of lettuce. totally killed the meal for me. Now if you’re comparing this place to a BBQ place in the South Bay, I would say its not bad. but if you compare it to the places in K-​Town, I think you’re better off going to those.

Between 2 and 3 stars.
This place is new, so it might get better over time. South Bay definitely has room for good Korean food, so I hope they get better.
We’ve been to the LA location several times, and enjoyed it quite a bit. We were looking forward to trying the Torrance location, but we were a bit disappointed.
Décor: Clean and nice. Bright and not too smoky, which is a plus.
Service: A bit spotty. We had at least 3 different people help us at different times, but it felt a little unorganized and chaotic. The biggest problem for me was they kept coming by to flip the meat, and I personally like to flip the meat after it has sizzled on the grill a bit on one side. Meat needs to be seared a bit, right?
Food: This was my biggest problem. First of all, the pork bellies were all seasoned heavily, so it was pretty salty. We had all eight flavors, and the flavors were very strong, whereas the meat quality seemed just ok. Also the kimchi and the seasoned bean sprouts they cook on the grill was not seasoned long enough (they should be marinated for a while, kimchi should be almost «overripe»). With bean sprouts, the seasoning was coming off as it was cooking, and we were literally eating bland, cooked bean sprouts. Seafood stew was very salty, like the meat. So it was either bland or very salty. The fried rice at the end was just ok.
Overall, I wasn’t too satisfied, but I do see the potential. I hope it will be better next time.

First off, please note this is not your traditional KBBQ. Palsaik’s focus is on pork belly.
I was hoping to spend my birthday dinner with a tasty KBBQ, bibimbap and maybe some tofu soup. I was looking forward to it. My mistake was trying this place out without doing any research prior.
The wait was not bad we got seated almost within 10 mins.
SERVICE:
What service? We got seated and didn’t hear a peep from any servers for another 20 mins. Not even for a cup of water. They’ve somehow managed to mess up our entire experience throughout dinner. They brought out dishes without explaining anything. We were left to our own defenses. Not everyone is familiar with this type of cuisine, a little extra care for your new customers would go a long way. Apparently the pork belly is supposed to be cooked by the server. Well this girl placed them on the grill and left… never came back. She told us not to do anything because she was supposed to cook them for us. The pork got burnt. The owner came by and gave us another set.
Another random server lady came to apologize. Actually if I can remember correctly the only two words she said the entire night to us were, «I’m sorry» over and over again.
I could not eat any of the pork because I eat mostly seafood and veggies. I was waiting for their fried rice (which was supposed to come at the end). It was hard to get their attention. Apparently the seafood pot had to be eaten first for the rice to cook in its left over juices. When the seafood pot was nearly finished, I asked the server to bring us rice. She brought us more seafood broth and poured some in. I was starving. We asked another server to bring me fried rice because I couldn’t eat anything. She seemed to understand and empathized. But it took another 20 mins.
When looking at other customers they had servers grilling the meats for them and never left them unattended. We were beginning to think maybe that is because we are not Koreans. Although I’d like to think that I’m wrong.
Towards the end somehow the same apologetic server charged our card for another table’s meal. What good is she??? Why is she there for?
Everything that could have gone wrong… went wrong.
FOOD:
I didn’t eat any of their meats. My boyfriend and my friend ate them and they were disappointed because it was the most bland meat they have ever had. The kimchi was bland. The salad was the only thing that was descent and flavorful. The seafood pot was what kept me going for the lack of rice until the end. The rice had a weird texture and they topped it off with cheese which I thought was odd. But then again I was starving so I ate it.
The only reason why I’m giving them 2 stars instead of 1 is because they actually did tried to make it up to us. But honestly we will not be returning here unless they make major improvements.