San Soo Gab San

The location is convenient, and the restaurant was pretty clean. The staff is about average for a KBBQ place. If you speak Korean they’re far nicer than they are if you don’t. A couple of us did speak Korean, so ordering is usually not too difficult but the service is still average and I do wish they weren’t so specific. There is a seating area for more people where you need to take your shoes off, it’s spacious.
The KBBQ is the only thing I would get here. I would say it is overpriced though. Tastes pretty decent on the other hand, and good variety and freshness of meat.
My biggest issue is that the last time I went a couple of friends of mine did not want to eat KBBQ and instead got a fish and a chicken dish. They both ended up with food poisoning. I’m not sure if the meat they don’t use as often isn’t as fresh, but I haven’t been back since.

I’m sorry, I think I’m too «American» for this place. The second they told me they didn’t have any sort of fried rice my entire meal was derailed.
My boyfriend happily settled for the white rice but I just can’t do the Asian style rice with not a grain of salt. I love the stickiness but I need the flavor.
Anyways, there are no pleasantries here. No. «Hi, how are you doing?» Just get straight to your order and hurry up before they rush away.
No explanation of what is on those 20 or so small plates and what you’re supposed to do with the bundle of cabbage they give you. It’s not too hard to figure out but why am I doing all the work here?
Portions are a la carte style with the average price being around $ 22. If you’re simply having a dinner for two, I’d say two entrees is more than enough.
No complaints about the meat. It was tender and flavorful. I also enjoyed the dumplings a lot.
The service is swift and we never had to ask for a new grill or a refill but what it lacked was warmness.

Misheard the order but the food was very good.
Can’t beat the home feel atmosphere.
The banchan game here is so strong.
Definitely good if you go out as family.
Not great spot for date but if you want to smell like KBBQ. Go for it.

Most terrible service! Waitresses are very rude. The food is fine, but they took 17% tips without asking us (we only 4 people).
We will never go there again.

This restaurant opens at 11 not at 10 like Unilocal says. While we showed up early, the staff was very gracious and let us sit inside for a few minutes while they were getting ready to open. They even started their service early to accommodate us which was very nice of them! Excellent service!
Food was great… to do the Korean bbq, you need to order at least two of the bbq dishes. But the bbq is definitely authentic… you even cook your foods over hot coals! Nice! I also ordered the cold noodles (bibim naengmyeon)…it was so good! Some of the best I have had ever!
The sheer number of side dishes (banchan) they give you is amazing! And they were ALL so good! We’ll definitely be back again!

Came here on a Friday night and beat the rush!
We ordered a soup, seafood pancakes, beef tongue, tempura veggies, bulgogi, pork belly, bibimbop, and some other dishes. The seafood pancake was great and the sauce was greater. On the other hand, the tempura veggies and soup were mediocre.
Do NOT order the beef tongue. I LOVE beef tongue but the ones here are super hard to chew. My friend and I took forever trying to chew just one piece of it. Go to gyu-​Kaku for beef tongue if that’s what you’re looking for. The bulgogi was marinated well, though.
Overall, pleasant experience but just avoid the beef tongue.

What details can i give that haven’t already been stated in the + 1K critiques ?? Take all the reviews, put them in a large bowl, mix thoroughly and there in lies my review.
I’d be remiss to not mention one of my favorite parts of going to SSGS and that is the sheer unabashed militant style table service that you receive whenever dining here, reminiscent of yesteryear’s soup Nazi.
This Korean barbie is good but if you don’t like it you can partly blame yourself, ya get me ?
All said, u gotta make this strip mall stop a few times a year at the min.

Granted this place is not all you can eat (like I’m used to when I go to ATL, LA, etc) but the side dishes make up for it. I wasn’t expecting more than a few but tons and tons of banchans came out. The meat quality was good. Kalbi was nice, tender, and well marinaded. Would come here again!

This is as close as I’ve seen so far as to authentic Korean bbq. All the sides are delicious and the kalbi is so flavorful.
This place is my little secret Seoul away from Seoul.
Restaurant is a bit pricey. Wish it stayed within the realms of Korean bbq prices in Korea, but I assume some of the ingredients are hard to come by in the US.
Check it out and be sure to bring your appetite!

I’m half Korean. Visited Seoul several times. The flavors here are a great reflection of native Korean food. My mother who is full Korean is willing to make the drive from the suburbs to Lincoln Square for multiple of their dishes. I recommend this to anyone that grew with Korean food or would like to try the cuisine for the first time.

This place has become a «go-​to» destination over the years. I don’t really remember how it came to be this way. When my family from Seattle was in town, we went here. When my sister from Malaysia was in town, we went here. When a friend was moving overseas and gathered a big group for a ‘last meal’ of sorts, we also went here. My mother specifically requests this place, just for the banchan. Bottom line: come get your Korean BBQ here! I keep coming back without fail.
I present you two scenarios:
What I usually order (*without* Korean friends present):
[A combination of the following]
+Seafood pancake
+Mandoo
+several choice of BBQ meat options (usually marinated kalbi, marinated bulgogi)
+“casserole” (boodae jeongol): spicy stew with spam, bacon, hotdog, noodles, veggies
+chop chae
What I usually order (*with* Korean friends present):
I don’t. I let them do all the ordering :) And everything is fantastic.
About the banchan: This is one of my favorite parts of the «pre-​meal»; it becomes its own standalone course. Your table will be COVERED will about 20 tiny bowls of Korean appetizers, from dried seaweed, coleslaw, kimchi, bean sprouts, potato, cucumber, daikon, mushrooms, squid etc. It feels like Thanksgiving every time. That’s how much food you get, plus the food coma that follows.
The BBQ-​ing part is always fun. They’ll put a bin of charcoals on your table with a grill on top. They do have ventilation, but your clothes will still smell like grilled meats (not necessarily a bad thing). But if I have a nicer jacket or peacoat, I tend to leave it in the car before I walk in. Their Morton Grove location is a little more spacious, ventilated, and newer, but I like this location on Western best. It was the first one, and definitely more homey.
If you order one BBQ meat option, they will cook it in the kitchen for you. So remember if you order 2 or more options, then you will be able to grill yourself. They mention this on their BBQ menu. Overall, you can’t go wrong with Korean BBQ here!
Note: I’ve been here with smaller parties (3 of us) and larger parties, like 15+. Their staff handles everything without… hurting people’s feelings (maybe). Some of the other reviews have noted that the service can be a bit cold, but hey! Every time I’ve been here I ended up being fed and left full and happy. You might have to wave your arms a few more times, crane your neck and try to make laser-​beam eye contact with your server (especially if you don’t speak Korean.) BUT I’ll say their brusque-​ness is part of the experience. A huge generalization here, but just about any Asian hole-​in-​the-​wall, family-​owned restaurant will have servers with some grit. I consider it tough love. And depending who serves you when you dine here, your service might be excellent. In any case, at SSGS, know that you’ll be getting really great food.

I’ve been enjoying this location for a few years and appreciate the most recent remodel.
Service is adequate and accommodating. Not so much on the guiding you through a great meal, but surely put the resources on the menu and have the attentiveness to have one.
The back staff, bus team — Coal fire tenders are notable contributors to a good experience
My meals are usually with about 2 dozen people and it is always fun. Geography has had me eating with 2,4,6+ at the other location… even though this store front space is not as huge as Morton Grove operation.
The flavor is there and the price is right.

Been lamenting about the lack of a good Korean BBQ place ever since I moved to Chicago. SSGS just might be that place. Left the restaurant smelling like a chimney stack, so you know it was an authentic experience.
Restaurant’s a little ways out of the city, but it also means free parking spots, either in the lot or by the streets. Really big seating area, but still had a long wait when I came on a Saturday night.
Service was fast if not the most friendly. They go a little crazy with the ban chan (literally had to stack them to fit), but I always view that as a plus. Didn’t order the BBQ this time, so can’t comment on the quality of the meat, will try it for sure next time.

Friendly staff, clean restaurant with options to bbq at your table if you order two or more entrees and spacious restrooms. Child friendly and they have a changing table outside of the restroom (which means that the dad can change the baby, too!) The staff was patient while we took our time reading over the menu and were playful with my daughter even when she was having tantrums.
The portions were very generous. I ordered the Bulgogi, which came with a bowl of rice and a bowl of soup for each person at the table, and it is large enough to feed 2 – 3 people easily. My friend ordered a Bento Box and she could only eat half of it because the portions were great. They gave us probably twenty or more small portions of different extras with our entrée (I think they do this for every entrée you order because every table had them) and everything was different and delicious!
I recommend parking on the street if you can because the parking lot is very cramped and it took me ten minutes to get out of there without damaging my or anyone else’s property.
I would definitely eat there again and I recommend this place to anyone that loves Korean BBQ.

Came here for a Valentine’s Day dinner and my girlfriend and I really enjoyed it. We were seated in a few mins and we placed an order for 2 different kinds of meat. We got the marinated bulgogi and pork belly, so we got to cook the meat on the grill at the table. You have to order at least 2 kinds of meat to do so, which is easily achieved when you’re eating with another person. Once the order was placed the side dishes came out. I’m talking about a crap ton of side dishes. Most were good but there will be ones you won’t like. Just eat more of the tasty meat! I liked the bulgogi more than the pork belly but both tasted good with lettuce and some gochujang (fermented red pepper paste). We also got a bottle of soju because that’s required when eating Korean food… duh! :)

Pretty good Korean BBQ. The ban chan they brought out was kinda crazy — they brought out so many small plates that the entire table was covered. The kimchi was good and traditional Korean, but what surprised me were random dishes like coleslaw and potato salad — which were awesome too.
We ordered the chop chae (sweet potato noodles) which might’ve been my favorite thing we had. Then the bulgogi, kalbi, and pork belly, which were all just kinda alright. The waitstaff weren’t necessarily rude like others have pointed out, but they kept switching the hot plates every couple of minutes while we were cooking our meats, it just seemed odd /​too much.
The meal was sneakily more expensive than you’d imagine — with a drink each it ran everyone around $ 40. For the price, I’ve enjoyed many other meals significantly more.

When I used to live in Chicago, I would come here every other week. I thought this place was amazing, regardless how rude and crazy the staffs was. After 4 years I finally able to come back here, unfortunately the food is not the same anymore. Very disappointed!

This place is pretty good. You can tell you are eating in a real Korean restaurant because they even use charcoal grills.
We ordered two of the menu items where you grill your own meat and get a ton of small sides to eat with. It also came with a soup. The beef strips were very good and the sides were hit and miss. The soup that came with each dish was good also. Overall it was pretty good but there were things that were not so good.
First we had to order two of the grilling dishes because you can’t just get one and use the grill. Each were $ 28. So this brings me to think why list those separately if you have to get two to order. Sneaky way of pricing a $ 50+ dish. The sides were hit and miss. Some were good and some not so. The short ribs we got were also all bone. Not chopped on the side like normal at a Korean place, these were more bones for a dog with little to no meat on them. So I packed them for my dog to chew on. (Not kidding).
So overall I think some of the other dishes are probably good because the meat was marinated well, but I would not order the grill again because to me at almost $ 60 the ribs should have had lots of meat on them and the sides should have been better.

Before U get excited about 4 stars, lets qualify it. Food ranges from 3.5 to 4.0. The service leaves everything to be desired. Unilocalers complaining about the odor of wood smoke lingering in their clothes need to get a life. SSGS uses real wood charcoal… duh? (Smell your blouse/​shirt the day after you threw a few hot dogs and your s’mores on the charcoal (not propane) grill !) Remind you of the K BBQ scent? No complaints about the real wood charcoal here.
Banchan are plentiful, but maybe sometimes «less is more»? These little dishes are literally «thrown» at you, leaving no space for even your chopsticks. BBQ is the ticket @ SSGS. Always well marinated, perfectly sliced. Some nights, they even change the BBQ grate for the table to eliminate the burnt morsels from clinging to the next batch. Other nights, you gotta beg & plead for a clean grate (or a refill of your water glass). We were last there on a slow Monday night. Servers were ALL sitting in a booth, shooting the shit. Need anything from your server??? …Gotta flag ‘em down.
Few weeks ago I ordered the Heuk Yumso Tang (goat meat soup). Meat was full of gristle. Impossible to chew. Had 2 send it back. Second try was tasty and chewable. That same night we had to send back the Hae Moul Pajun (seafood pancake) because it was burned. Methinks it was a bad night for the kitchen. Bottom line, Stick to the BBQ. If U overcook it, it’s on U !

There is nothing negative to say about San Soo Gab San on Western Avenue in Chicago. Okay, yes, it gets a bit expensive, but so is any AYCE Korean BBQ… meat is expensive folks! And yes, parking is difficult, but that is not SSGS’s fault.
What we love… ALL THE BANCHAN. The most side dishes we ever received in a visit was 28, and the least ever is 22. And they all taste great! What other Korean restaurant in Chicagoland serves that many side dishes?! Sure, we enjoy the variety of meats to barbeque, but the variety of banchan really is a spectacle. We go there strictly for the BBQ, so I have never eaten any regular entrees.
What we have learned… best to go during non-​peak times like late lunch or early dinner. The first time we went was a Friday or Saturday night around 8:00pm. There was quite a line of people waiting, and no formal waiting list. This is where it helps to be Korean or at least know how to get the ahjumma’s attention, otherwise you might get passed over for the next available table.
We have always received good service, and have always had a good time here.
Please do NOT confuse this SSGS with the one in Mt. Prospect. Not sure if they are same owners or not. The Chicago location serves more authentic banchan for the Korean tastes, while the Mt. Prospect location makes the banchan more bland to suit American tastes.