I recently attended a conference at Ohio State University and imagined I would spend a pleasant evening drinking at a college pub, German Bier Hall or local sports bar near campus.  Instead I discovered that the strip of bars and restaurants bordering the OSU campus was a wasteland of chain and fast casual restaurants, Buffalo Wild Wings anyone? After 45 minutes on foot hunting for anything local, unique or different I finally came across the painfully named Japanese Oriental Restaurant.  JOR is primarily a Korean restaurant with a sushi bar and handful of Japanese dishes on the kitchen menu.  The soon doo boo (spicy tofu stew) was really good with a lot of mushrooms, and seafood and pork, but alas no raw egg to slowly cook in the boiling broth. Finding this place saved my culinary evening and given the limited choices around campus, if you find yourself looking for dinner around OSU head to JOR.

The Dumplings:  JOR sells Crab Rangoon and fried pork dumplings.  The pork dumplings are pretty standard pork and scallion Japanese-style gyoza.  They appear to deep fry their dumplings so that the wrapper is entirely crispy.  The dumplings were solid but not remarkable, the filling was juicy and savory, but a little bland. But where the dumplings excelled was as a delivery vehicle for the superior dipping sauce JOR makes.

The Dipping Sauce:  JOR serves a dipping sauce they make of soy, a little vinegar, sesame oil, sesame seeds and Korean red chili powder.  The dipping sauce was a flavor bomb – salty, sour, spicy and smoky.  The sauce completely elevated the otherwise indifferent dumplings to a great appetizer dish.

The Location: Japanese Oriental Restaurant is just east of the Columbus, Ohio, OSU campus, on North High Street between West Northwood Ave and West Oakland Ave.