Sorabol

I’m originally from Los Angeles and to be honest, I’ve been very spoiled by the amazing selection of Korean restaurants there. After coming to central London and being sorely disappointed by the Korean food here, I decided to finally make the trek to New Malden. Sorabol was such a pleasant surprise! It was New Years Day so I ordered the duk guk, while my family ordered the duk mandoo guk, soondubu jiggae, galbi and dukbokki. The dukbokki was AMAZING — even better than most of the stuff I’ve had back in LA. They cook it on the stove right in front of you, and it was a perfect balance of spicy and sweet, with the duk perfectly chewy. My family was very pleased with their dishes — the galbi was well marinated, the soondubu was very flavourful… My only complaint was that the duk in the duk guk & duk mandoo guk was a bit overcooked and mushy so the soups were a bit overly starchy. Otherwise, it was a wonderful meal and I will be coming back very soon!

Food: We ordered kalbi, kalbi tang, tteok mandoo guk, kimchi bokeum, one rice and one kimchi. Still can’t believe you have to pay for rice and kimchi in London.
Drinks: No drinks, just tea.
Price: 47.30 GBP for two people. Super reasonable for London Korean food.
Ambiance: There’s not much of a vibe here. You go for the food.
Service: Both times we’ve gone to Sorabol the service has been super friendly.
Would I go back? Yes! The food is good and traditional, the service is great and it’s reasonable. This is one of our go-​to spots for Korean food.

Nice place with tasty food — in particular their glass noodle dish was the best I’ve had, and the barbecue meat was delicious, though there wasn’t a great deal of it (and I do find charging £1.50 for lettuce a little extreme).
Bibimbap a little bland compared to others I’ve had, and bibimbap is my weakness, and also I think kimchee should be cheaper or free, in my experience that’s pretty normal… the nibbles just screamed ‘we’re not kimchee’. Hence the three stars. But friendly staff and good value overall.

Love this place. If you do like Korean food New Malden is the place to go. Sorabol has been there for some years now and we have had allways lovely food. Will go again.

I went to New Malden on a Tuesday evening to visit the large Korean supermarkert ‘Korea Food’ to get my fix of Korean cooking sauces, kimchi and snacks but after seeing the various Korean restaurants along the high street my friends and I decided to eat here intead of trying to find somewhere to eat on our long car drive back home. Having never been to New Malden before we asked in the local Seoul Plaza (a small Korean store) what place would be best, we were told to try a restaurant called Haru that was a few doors down but upon getting there it was closed. So we wandered down the street looking at the others until we came to Sorabol. From the outside it looked small but had a good feel to it so we went inside. The décor and seating were clean, comfortable and unfussy and had a cosy feel. We were quickly seated by a friendly waitress and given menus. The choice was very good and after umming and ahhing we decided to go for three potions of the beef bulgogi Korean BBQ, which none of us had tried before and the side dishes to go with it (which was extra, a little annoying as I know they should be free with the BBQ but in England that never seems the case) we also ordered a kimchi jeon (pancake) to share between us and some Korean rice wine that I had always wanted to try after seeing it at another restaurant a long time ago, I can’t remember the name but it came in a large plastic bottle and was milky looking, it tasted very refreshing and light.
The kimchi pancake and various side dishes of vegtables (which were free) were promptly brought out and we tucked in. The jeon wasn’t as crispy as I normally like them to be but it was very tasty. Then came out many more side dished, lettuce leaves, bowls of rice, a pasty red/​orange sauce and some other vegtables then three huge plates of uncooked thinly sliced marinated beef. The waitress lit the tabletop BBQ and cooked it for us with tongs, when it was done she gestured with a friendly smile for us to eat, one of my friends hesitated, unsure just exactly what he was meant to do and before I could begin trying to explain the friendly waitress kindly showed him how to eat the dish: lettuce leaf filled with beef, rice and sauce and eaten with the hands.
The taste was amazing, the meat so tender and tasty that it was great to eat it just on it’s own but together with the other ingredients was just delicious! Completely new flavours to all of us and very moreish. We ended up overeatting not even aware we were doing so. After the meal we were each given two free slices of fresh orange to round off the meal and after waiting a little while until we all felt we could move we paid the bill which came to around £50 which we all felt was a fair price for all the food.
When we got up to leave we were given friendly goodbyes and left feeling full and happy.

Solid performance with high-​quality meats and well presented standards. They charge for kimchee and serve minimal sides with the meals, but the low price of the meat makes up for it. A majority Korean crowd, but they seemed very welcoming to non-​Koreans and communication was not a problem.
We need more places like this closer to central London!