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The whole concept of Colombian Korean happened because my
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two favorite foods are Colombian and Korean food and I just
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wanna fuse them together.
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I think the weirdness of it just made people more curious and
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I'm Darian Santana and I'm all about good food and great people
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and the stories that make us proud to be where we're from and
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this is what's good in your hood do it.
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So took in the bees are our win in the Chevy laugh like you.
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The sea was good, man.
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I'm driving through your hood right now.
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I'm not far from Koreatown.
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Please tell me somewhere to have some food.
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I got you go to this spot.
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It's called and when you get there, ask for Chino.
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Tell him you're my friend and he's gonna hook you up.
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What's good everyone.
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I'm in L A in Korea in a restaurant that remixes Colombian food
01:18
and Korean food over hip hop beat.
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First time I heard about Korean Colombian.
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But after coming here and experiencing and feeling the flavors
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and seeing the different combinations, I was impressed,
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things that are mixed between little with rice and beans.
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It's the most amazing food ever love it.
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This is one of the examples of a really diverse and vibrant
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lifestyle in Koreatown, which is one of the reasons I live
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here meets at the intersection of Korea, Colombia and hip
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It's more than just a restaurant.
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Chino has managed to create more than a restaurant.
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There's this feeling that you get in a space that's unique
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It's vibrant and it is so a lot.
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My father was a diplomat in the sixties.
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Him and his partners were the first ones to set foot in Colombia
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from Korea and they set up the Korean Embassy.
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We were always raised knowing what our culture was and knowing
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that we're not from here that we came to this country.
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During the late seventies.
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I think a lot of Korean families were sending their kids to
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Um There was a, the word got out that America had good education
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and, and free education.
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When I got here, they put me in ESL because I couldn't speak
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I only spoke Spanish.
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I couldn't speak Korean well either.
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So I hang in and started hanging out with the Mexican kids.
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The same kids that made fun of me became my best friends.
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And that's why the name Chino stuck automatically.
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I kind of grew into that whole culture.
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So in 12th grade, I ended up at Hollywood high school at a, an
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I recognized my art, put me in like scholarship programs at
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She actually gave me guidance.
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It was really hard to concentrate on the school and I ended
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up dropping that art school after about a year and a half.
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Then I opened a little record store in South Central.
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A lot of people credited for being the first like hip hop shop
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The people that gathered at that shop are an example, like
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from Jurassic Five, you know, Jurassic Five went on to become
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It only lasted two years.
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But that got my name recognized by a lot of the little record
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And I decided I'm gonna move to New York.
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How did you come to wanting to open a restaurant?
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I was living in New York.
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I came to visit L A and my sister says, hey, my friend's bar is
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going out of business and uh he'd like someone to take over
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I was the lucky person.
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He was completely different.
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But I was like, wow, I could do something with this.
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My sister was like, you're always doing parties and you know
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it makes sense that you have a bar.
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So I was like, cool.
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The first thing I thought about was like, wow, I could throw
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my parties again because I was always throwing parties at
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different bars in New York and, and I could invite all my DJ
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But I was like, you know, all my friends are foodies.
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I'm always hanging out with them, going to eat good food and
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and I knew that that's a new trend is the culture, the foodie
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culture, you know, so I connected with Chris Korean American
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chef, really well known wins a lot of TV, food battles and things
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He started my initial menu and it worked no big deal.
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So what put on the map in terms of food?
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What's like everyone's favorite menu item here, the Kimchi
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rice, which is a fusion of the Colombian with uh Korean Kimchi
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I think it's so cool that you have uh Korean short rib and a and
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I don't know how to cook, but I, I can think of things coming
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I'm gonna see how takes and infuse a little bit of Korea in it
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So right now I'm in the pork belly of the beach and they're gonna
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show me how they make their, but of course, they remixed it
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with some Korean flavors.
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And uh we're gonna have my home grown, I'll show you guys how
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Uh Candelaria is also my favorite neighborhood in Bogota
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She's cutting up the, that's gonna go in the fryer with the
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Colombian plantains.
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They're the sweet ones.
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So they're gonna add that nice sweetness to the dish.
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The traditional usually comes with steak and, or the home
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girls adding the Korean short ribs, which is such a fun play
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on what a is as opposed to the regular steak.
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The Korean short ribs are really, really sweet.
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So that's gonna be such a fun thing to add to this.
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Of course, the egg on top candy girl I put in work.
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I'm so hyped right now.
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We just melts in your mouth.
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Now, Chino is truly an OG, he's an artist, a DJ businessman
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and he's also the creator of a neighborhood landmark, a landmark
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that he masterfully created through the most common denominator
06:09
And let me tell you his food hits you in the face with the unexpected
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taste of art, music and street culture in the heart of Koreatown
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is not just a restaurant and also a bar.
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So today's challenge my friends is you need to create a cocktail
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that is a perfect remix of Colombia.
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A little bit of Korea Town and a Sprinkle of hip hop.
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Can you make it happen?
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Yeah, I don't turn down a challenge but I'm not gonna do this
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I'm gonna get some help from my boyfriend Medellin Nelson
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Uh you know, never turned a child.
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I'm here with Medellin's Fines Nelson Nelson.
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What are you gonna do today?
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We're gonna use a little bit of OK.
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One part Colombian age drum, a little bit of spicy mango.
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All the way from Colombia.
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All the way from Colombia.
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And what makes the spicy it chilis, chili give us a little bit
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You know that spicy mango juice.
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I want to make popsicles out of it.
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Of course, like all good drinks and dances.
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You must shake it a little bit of OK.
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You know, let's see if this is really a drink that is worth right
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It's sweet and it's got that little kick because of course
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the spicy mango winner of the challenge, you got it.
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I don't know, we're gonna call it.
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We called it the killer K town.
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I killed it sweet spicy and be careful because this will get
07:52
This 2.7 square mile area located in the center of Los Angeles
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is the most densely populated neighborhood in L A with two
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thirds of his residents being born outside of the US.
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Korea Town isn't just a Korean neighborhood.
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It's also largely Latinos from El Salvador and Oaxaca, Mexico
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Korea Town at one point was the exact opposite.
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It was hit hard from the riots in 1992 Koreatown literally
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burned for six days straight, dozens of businesses burned
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down and Oi Chino witnessed it all firsthand.
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Because Koreatown was literally on fire.
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Uh, you know, hearing about the death, you know, especially
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it always makes it seem like it was a thing between Blacks and
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Do you not think there was a really summarized, generalized
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version of what really happened?
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I mean, most of the damage happened here in Koreatown and it
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wasn't done by blacks from South Central.
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They didn't drive up in caravans to burn down Koreatown.
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Uh But that's what they made it seem like.
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Uh and it wasn't that, you know, Koreatown was looted and burned
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down by, by Korea Town residents really.
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But I personally knew like, you know, Korean armies in the
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neighborhood that looted.
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Uh They probably didn't loot other Korean businesses, but
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it wasn't um a minority thing.
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It wasn't just a black and Latino thing.
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Now, this is the, the immigrant landing spot.
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Your restaurant is very much reflective of that.
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It's super diverse in there.
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So the new generation Koreatown is very open, very diverse
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So it's no longer that closed Korean society.
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I feel like your restaurant is very inclusive, all different
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kinds of people sprinkled in different flavors and your food
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is multi dimensional is the embodiment of.
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He's pretty much the ambassador of Cape Town.
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He brings Colombia and Korea together with an L A twist.
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Something that my grandma will make.
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But to notice that was a metaphor for the immigrant experience
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from turbulent beginnings to settling into new land.
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And then of course, remixing it to something altogether different
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And thank you to like the unofficial mayor of Koreatown.
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I learned so much about the different flavors, all of the different
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hip hop that you infuse into your restaurant.
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No, I'm just the official Koreatown homage.
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And that, what's good in your home, in the next, what's good
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We're heading to Boyle Heights, Los Angeles.
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