Korean car manufacturer Hyundai doesn’t want its facility in Singapore to be just a car factory. It wants it to be a hub for Korean culture. To do so, it tapped chef Corey Lee of the three-Michelin-starred Benu in San Francisco to open a Korean restaurant there called Na Oh. Hyundai calls the glass-clad structure in Jurong West the Hyundai Motor Group Innovation Center Singapore. I prefer Dystopian Temple. Look at what our gods have given us, an electric robotaxi! We do not have guides here, we have gurus. This human inside our smart farm has been optimised to pick Swiss chard grown by gargantuan robot arms.
If the vast, antiseptic lobby was the hall to worship our AI overlords, Na Oh was the inner sanctum. The minimalist restaurant is swathed in earth tones and soft lighting. Cold silky tofu, made from locally sourced beancurd and massaged with aged soy sauce, came in a finely textured ceramic bowl shaped by Korean artisans. But the servers float about in pale grey monk robes and are eerily attentive. Were they real people, or were they replicants?
There’s only one menu at Na Oh, a four-course set (S$78++) that remains the same for lunch and dinner. For anyone familiar with Korean cuisine, the dishes are instantly recognisable, only made by a bigwig chef who ferments his own jang (sauces) the traditional way and ages them in large vessels outside the restaurant.
Some of it becomes an aged kimchi (mugunji) and buckwheat pancake, which have leeks pressed into it. You are meant to roll it around the accompanying salad, dip it in soy sauce, and give thanks to the machines for the crisp leaves. Mulhwe, a cold and spicy soup with raw fish, was the inspiration for an icy kimchi broth with white fish and sea cucumber. It was tangy, gently crunchy, and wonderful with a ripe glutinous rice wine called chungmyeongju.
The largest dish was jinjitsang, a main meal surrounded by sides. Lee plans to change the menu according to the seasons, and for summer, he has three options: rice and fish in a pot, chicken soup in a pot, and cold noodles in, you guessed it, a pot. I chose the first and it was a butterfish, gently charred with a rich, delicate flavour. But the Golden Queen rice was the star. A short-grain variety imported from Korea, milled in New York, and used by many respected Korean restaurants in Manhattan, it was chewy and glistening, with the hot iron pot charring the bottom into a semi-firm rice cracker.
The banchan was equally lovely, among them a buttery zucchini omelette (gyeran mari) and tart, watery nabak kimchi with salty ice plant. The moment I finished it, a server materialised and asked, “Would you like more?”
Dessert was a plain makgeolli bingsu, which revealed strawberries after a bit of shovelling. When mixed, it became a refreshing strawberry sorbet, pillowy and a fine contrast against a toasted rice lollipop with seaweed powder. There’re gems from the drinks menu too, which entirely feature Korean beverages. One of them was Gowoon Dar 43, a soju infused with native omija berries and aged in European oak barrels. It tasted like whisky, toasty with tart red berries and raisins.
Na Oh calls itself a destination restaurant, and they’re right: you’re going out to Jurong West to eat in a car factory. But a destination for whom, exactly? Motoring enthusiasts who want to ride in a Hyundai at the facility’s rooftop driving track? Fans of Benu, which advise you to plan for a three-hour meal and changes the menu if you have dined there before? Our lunch lasted for around an hour-and-a-half and the restaurant will only serve new dishes every season. Na Oh has potential, but it needs more than just Lee’s exquisite Korean food to keep people coming back. Maybe a free robotaxi trip might help.
Na Oh restaurant
Taste: 9/10
Ambience: 7/10
Value for money: 8/10
Rating: 8/10
Average cost for two: S$156++
What we liked: Golden Queen rice and butterfish gamasot, buckwheat and mugunji jeon
What we didn’t like: robots taking our jobs
Wednesday – Sunday, 11.30am – 3.30pm, 6pm – 10pm
2 Bulim Link HMGICS, Level 3, 649674
How to get there: Take a car
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(Hero and featured image credit: Hyundai Motor Group)
This article first appeared on Lifestyle Asia Singapore
