When you walk into BeBap, you’re greeted by a giant arch that frames the long and skinny restaurant perfectly. My eyes were drawn first to the neon sign in the back of the restaurant, then to the murals on the wall. Hand-painted in bright blues and reds, these murals of animals and clouds cover most of the restaurant, and the imagery is repeated on the menu. The star of the mural is the same turtle that’s featured in the logo. His name is Hyeonmu and he serves as a protector of the north. It’s a perfect guardian for a restaurant in Minnesota, and on those dark, winter days, it still feels airy and bright inside of BeBap.

The best seats in the house are the booths, with their own individual lights and privacy screens, making these the choice for cozy dates or gossip sessions with friends while K-Pop or Korean rap plays in the background. But anywhere you sit, the restaurant is visually cohesive, where every section (bar, booths, dining bench) feels distinct and integrated at the same time. The theme, the brand, are unmistakable. So is the presence of owner Sammi Loo, who went table to table on one of my visits, asking guests about their meals.

BeBap is a Korean restaurant located in the heart of downtown Rochester. It has a hybrid menu of creative fare, like kimchi arancini or bulgogi nachos, next to classics like bibimbap and kimchi jjigae. Stopping at my table, Loo said, “Korean food is kind of new here. People didn’t know much about it when we opened. It took us three years to build this.” You can feel that in the restaurant. Staff are succinct in describing dishes, but always describe them in ways that make it clear most of their guests are experiencing new-to-them flavors. They do their best to invite you in if you’re a staunch lover of Korean food (raises hand) or want to know what kimchi is (like a table to my left one night).

I ate at BeBap four times, ordering a wide variety of dishes. These are the dishes I’d pick for your first visit and my go-to order next time I go back.

Fried Mushrooms ($14)

Is this a safe space? Probably not, but pretend it is anyway. I was a vegan for a decade, and I would be happy to never eat a mushroom again. I know, RIPPING HOT take, but it’s a dish that I rarely order. I can judge mushrooms, cook mean mushroom dishes, but I never crave them, and unless they’re morels, I often have to be coaxed to order them for review. Most of the time mushrooms are just… fine. So if I am telling you to order the mushrooms, bestie, they’re good mushrooms. Is it the most beautiful dish? No. But it is one of the best tasting on the menu.

The mushrooms at BeBap are deep-fried mushrooms in a sweet, salty, and just-oh-so-slightly sour sauce. They’re flanked by thin cuts of peppers and onions that have been perfectly sweat, then topped with green onions and sesame seeds. My friend and I devoured this dish. My hack is to order this dish with rice for a vegetarian meal, where you can get all the sauce that falls to the bottom of the bowl.

Chicken Wings ($15) or Popcorn Cauliflower ($12)

Yes. I’m telling you to get two appetizers in my go-to order, and I stand by it. Both the chicken wings and popcorn cauliflower come tossed in a slightly spicy gochujang sauce, and just like the mushrooms, they’re topped with sesame seeds and served with scallions. Just writing this now, I’m salivating thinking about both of these dishes, and I literally just ate dinner. The chicken wings have a crust on them that is crackly, and the cauliflower has that perfect mash-up of crunchy outside and soft inside without being overcooked. Somehow, even after being thrown in a fryer and doused in a lot of sauce, the cauliflower still held its bite. I’ve eaten a lot of fried cauliflower in my day, and this is up there with the best.

Both of these dishes are well seasoned, with a super saucy, fermented punch that sets the tone for the rest of your meal. If you’re worried it might be too spicy, don’t–these are on the mild side.

Crispy Rice Bowl AKA Bibimbap ($18+)

When bibimbap comes to your table, it’s important that you put your ear by the bowl. What you’re listening for is a sizzle coming out of the hot bowl that’s been dropped in front of you. There aren’t a ton of restaurants that serve bibimbap in Minnesota, and BeBap is the only restaurant serving it in Rochester. Bibimbap is a rice dish with a protein, egg, and gochujang, and it comes topped with assorted banchan. Never had bibimbap before? The mixing is part of the whole experience. The name literally means “mixed rice.”

You want to take the entire little ramekin of gochujang and drop it on top, crack the egg, and kind of chop it up, then mix everything together. At BeBap, the bowl comes so overflowing with so much banchan that it’s hard to mix the bowl (NOT complaining) to scrape the bottom for the crispy rice, so I put a few chopstick scoops worth of banchan in my mouth before mixing. I’m a classic beef bulgogi girl and so that’s my recommended order, but I had the fried tofu on another dish, and vegheads, let me tell you, it’s a great fried tofu.

Black Sesame Ice Cream ($10)

“The problem with black sesame things,” my friend said with a giant mouthful of ice cream, “Is that they normally do not taste like black sesame. This,” she said pointing to the ice cream, “Tastes like black sesame.” Similarly, my problem with most ice cream in restaurants is that no one seems to know how to Brix test ice cream. A Brix test, in brief, helps you understand how hard an ice cream might freeze. If the number on the refractometer is too high (most common at restaurants), it melts immediately at your table. I’m sure this has happened to you: you order ice cream, and it comes to your table already half-melted, you’re rapidly trying to eat it before it melts, and half of it is ice cream soup. Again, not so at BeBap! This ice cream passes the quality control test and has the consistency of ice cream made at a professional ice cream shop. That’s because it’s a collab with local ice cream shop Flapdoodles, but you can only get it here. Do not skip it.

Rotating Cake ($12)

Similar to the ice cream, Loo gets cakes custom-made for her restaurant by Japanese-French pastry chef Patisserie M. Ordering the rotating cake at BeBap will yield a cake slice big enough for four people, about the size of your head. Four fluffy layers of pandan cake were layered with three layers of coconut whip and one layer of pandan whip on top. It was huge, but light, and reminded me a bit of an icebox cake. Pandan is one of my favorite ingredients in dessert, requiring you to crush or bruise the leaves to release its flavor. Often compared to vanilla, it’s a bit more floral and grassy, with a brightness that makes it a perfect pairing for the fresh, clean taste of coconut. Another dessert I had was a pistachio cheesecake that was chock full of pistachio flavor, not too sweet, and a perfect way to woo the dessert hater in your life, because it’s just that good.