Korean Bakery & Deli

5 out of 5 stars★★★★★

“This is Imbanga Rice Cake Bakery (pronounced EEM-bahng-ah). The name "Korean Bakery & Deli" on Google and Yelp is inaccurate and has caused some confusion, so I submitted edits on both listings, but they have not been accepted. Imbanga offers essentially every type of steamed, pounded, and shaped glutinous or non-glutinous tteok (Korean rice cakes) in similar sized packs for $7.99. Most of the packs offer one type of tteok, but there are also several packs with different combinations of two to three types. They also offer kimbap sold in packs of two rolls for $7.49. Varieties: GARAE-TTEOK (thick, long cylinders made with white or brown rice, which can be enjoyed as is or sliced thinly and diagonally to be used in tteokguk), TTEOKMYEON (also known as tteokbokki-tteok, these rice cake “noodles” are a smaller version of garae-tteok used in tteokbokki), SONGPYEON (half moon rice cakes with various fillings like sweet red bean paste), KKUL-TTEOK (small balls, similar to songpyeon, filled with honey & sesame), JEOLPYEON (flat parallelogram non-glutinous rice cakes), INJEOLMI (tender, chewy steamed rice cakes coated in konggaru or roasted soybean powder), KONG-TTEOK (rice cake made with various beans), MUJIGAE-TTEOK (steamed layered rainbow rice cake used for special occasions), YEONGYANG-CHALTTEOK (healthy sweet rice cake with various beans, legumes, and/or fruits like red beans, black beans, chestnuts, green peas, kabocha, honey, and jujubes), YAKSIK (steamed sweet glutinous rice made with dried fruits, nuts, brown sugar, and honey). There are a few colors you may see in tteok that are typically achieved naturally and will lightly impart its flavor like mugwort (dark green), strawberry powder (light pink), or kabocha (yellow). I personally love the distinctive earthy flavor of mugwort or ssuk and its beautiful dark green hue; it’s found in songpyeon, kkul-tteok, jeolpyeon, and injeolmi, and I usually prefer them over the plain versions. Their tteok is amazing!! It has the most incredible texture that is unbelievably tender and delightfully chewy. I tried a tteok variety pack with songpyeon, kkul-tteok, and yeongyang-chaltteok, and everything was great. I am not a big fan of sweet red bean paste (pat-anggeum), but the filling in their songpyeon was very good. I really wanted to try my favorite tteok, injeolmi, but I visited on a Tuesday at 1:30PM and Thursday at 10AM the same week, and they were sold out both times. I was informed that I could call to reserve or purchase specific tteok in advance, but I plan on making an earlier visit next time. The kimbap had imitation crab, fishcake, egg, carrot, pickled daikon, and seasoned burdock root. The rice was a little mushy, but it was really tender, the roll had a good rice-to-filling ratio, and most importantly, it was delicious. While the rolls are a bit on the smaller side, it’s still a fantastic price. I was assisted by different individuals during my two visits, and they were both very pleasant. The lovely woman, whom I assume is the owner, was so kind and incredibly sweet! FYI: They accept credit cards, however, there was a discount for paying with cash (~7%).”

5 out of 5 stars★★★★★

“떡은 임방아”