[Busan] The Premium 삼환축산 남포점 Samhwan Livestock Nampo Branch

This was a random find near our hotel and we went there twice for dinner! Friendly staff, and reasonably priced BBQ.

shopfront

menu with pricing

We were seated fairly quickly in the bustling restaurant. 

grill ready

There's a minimum order as per any other BBQ restaurants where the first meat cut must be of minimally 500gms and subsequent ones can be at less. For 4 of us, there's no issue in polishing off 500gms. I noticed that they will serve the portions that are less than 500 gms first.

side dishes (self-serve)

The shop has a section where the side dishes, BBQ condiments, and leafy greens and diners could just help themselves with those.

boneless galbi

gently placed on grill

let it cook

On our first visit, the boss would come to our table and to grill the meats for us. On Day 2, they did come by to observe but left the grilling to ourselves. Maybe our grilling skills had met their expected standards? Hahaha!

The shop seemed to be managed by a couple (or siblings, not sure) and both are friendly.

I liked it when the ordered meats don't come all at once. We would finish grilling the served cut and then the next one would appear.

thin skirt

let's eat!

I think we ate about 250 gms of meat per pax on each of our visit.

beef

pork belly

change of grill

After grilling the beef cuts, the staff came over to change our grill top before the pork belly arrives.

pair the meats with copious amount of vege

let's cut it up

getting there

pork belly, bite size

Second visit

The second time was just the next day, haha! Not sure if the boss recognized us but I would like to think that she did.

beef

pork neck

On second visit, we were only in a group of 3 as one of our buddy had stomach problems. Nevertheless, we still did at least 700 gms in total.

pork

enjoy~

The meats were well presented, natural tasting and the shop provides all sorts of condiments for us to enjoy with the meats. My favourite item to take from the refrigerated area (ban chan section) was the peach or orange. It was our dessert. Keke.

Enjoyable and definitely deserves to be recommended if you have cravings for BBQ. Go for the premium cuts as the price was reasonable.

Thank you to the bosses for coming to chat with us on our first visit. She even gave me a small Kelly beer glass as farewell gift. 감사합니다!

삼환축산 남포점 Samhwan Livestock Nampo Branch

Address: 7-1 Nampo-dong 3(sam)-ga, Jung-gu, Busan, South Korea

Contact: +82512487583

Business Hours:

Daily: 12–11 pm

[Jeju] Beef BBQ Dinner at Don Tung Ji 돈둥지 Seogwipo

We felt like having some beef for dinner tonight, so Ivan started Googling / Navering and found one that's pretty near our location that night. I didn't even know the name of the shop when we just casually walked over with Ivan in the lead.

dinner destination

  

restaurant's interior

We were greeted by the shop owner, as we entered the place and he asked if we were here for 돼지고기 (pork) or 소고기 (beef). I answered "소고기".

The boss spoke Korean and we tried to respond accordingly with our limited capability. Hahaa! But he was kind and helped us with our order by just bringing us the appropriate amount of meat for the 4 of us.

table setting

ready to start

Side dishes were brought out accordingly and the grill was lined up with egg and lots of cheese. Once this was almost ready, the boss would urge us to scoop the cooked jiggly eggs out cleanly and quickly (before it starts burning) and then poured us some more of those liquid eggs, and more cheese. Wow, like a mini buffet for the 계란 .

The meat was served with a bowl of marinade (sauce) and we were supposed to dip the meat into the sauce briefly before placing them onto the grill.

beef

let's cook!

The meat was easy to grill as it was cut like smaller strips. Not sure about the amount of meat that was served to us but it looked to be about 400 gms. 

can't wait to dig in!

The marinade was good and the meat was flavourful, tender with a nice chew. The side dishes include kimchi and quail's eggs. And plenty of the egg with cheese. Like, alot! Hahaa!

let's have some beer

cheers!

We had one more serving of meat but we felt like having some soup. Saw that the other diners would have a pot of noodles or soup to finish their meal, so we wanted to do the same. Enquired from the boss if we could order a bowl of doenjang jigae 된장찌개. He went into the kitchen and we were informed shortly that they seemed to have run out of that.

Oh, ok... not an issue so we just finished up our meal of the second serving of the beef. 15 minutes later, when we were about to leave, the boss brought out a bowl of soup and set it ontop of our grill (after the meats were long gone).

tofu beanpaste soup

Ooh, that definitely made our day, though we were a bit confused. The soup was piping hot and bubbling since the charcoal was still hot. It was tasty and a nice finish to our meal. So satisfying!

taste makers

We paid ₩52000 for the entire meal including drinks. We enjoyed our meal, and was treated kindly by the owners. 잘 먹었습니다 Thank you!

Don Tung Ji 돈둥지

Address: 14, 279-1 Jungang-ro 72beon-gil, Seogwi-dong, Seogwipo-si, Jeju-do, South Korea

Business Hours: 

Daily: 11am to 930pm

[Jeju] Jeju Black Pig BBQ Dinner at Jeju dot @ Seogwipo

 Jeju dot specializes in Jeju black pig Korean BBQ. We drove to the place from our hotel and it was a good 40 minutes ride. When we reached the end of our navigation, the place looked like a private residential area except there were plenty of cars parked in its compound.

Jeju dot carpark

The place was full when we reached at 6.43pm. Informed the staff that we would like to dine there without reservation and she indicated that we could leave our name and contact in the waiting list. Oh boy, but I do not have any local phone number though, so ended up just indicating the surname and number of pax. Hehe.

Went back outside to admire the sunset and watched other people's kids playing at the huge compound while we wait for the staff to call us.

evening in Jeju

And 10 minutes later, we got a table.

table all set

menu and kitchen

Oooh, the menu is all in hangul and so, it was time for Google Translate. The manager came to our table and asked us in Korean, for our order. I asked for his recommendation and then, he took out his mobile phone and typed something on it and showed it to us. Ahh, he is using Papago to say that he recommends the pork neck and pork belly. Each order is minimally 200gm and so for the 4 of us, to start with those. We agreed.

He also said that the meat will be pre-cooked before served to our table.

Jeju Hallasan 17 Soju

pork neck

will be ready in a jiffy

Ahhh, so the grill on our table was just to brown the meat slightly and then we could enjoy it. The manager just tossed the cut-up meat a little bit on the table grill and then informed us to start eating. And so we did!

The pork neck looked like little chunk of firm fat but it's not fatty. The texture was firm and tasted good.

pork neck

dip it slightly in salt

The meat was gone in no time and the next cut was served. Ok, the pork belly was certainly more greasy and the meat still has that skin layer on it. This version is chewy.

pork belly

yums

let's drink some beer~

Yes, we made somaek and enjoyed it with the meats. Hmm, we finished up both the pork neck and pork belly and might just as well order the last cut of the 3 available. Added 200gm of pork ribs to our order.

pork ribs

The sauce on the grill was intriguing and very flavourful, so I asked the manager what it was. He said it is anchovies sauce. It was that good and I found myself using this dip more than the other sauces.

so flavourful

We finished the dinner rather quickly in just one hour. Overall, my favourite cut is the pork neck for its unique texture. It is ok if you do not speak Korean as the manager at this place is adept at using translation app to communicate with customers.

Staff were courteous and I felt welcomed. We spent ₩134,000 for dinner.

Jeju dot 제주돗

Address: 34 Josu 2-gil, Hangyeong-myeon, Cheju, Jeju-do, South Korea

Contact: +82 64-772-0505

Business Hours:

Closed: Tue

Wed to Mon: 4pm to 10pm

[Tasting] BULGOGI SYO @ Bugis Junction

It has been a long long while since I last dined at Bugis Junction. And when Hence kindly extended an invite to try Bulgogi Syo, it was a chance to get reacquainted with the mall once more. 

Bulgogi Syo is  the brainchild of Chef Chul Park, the founder of SEORAE. 

From the name of the restaurant, one could expect fire, meat and with these two combined, an interesting table-side dining experience as part of the show (syo). It boasts of an unprecedented 3-Step Hotstone grilling process; Sear, Torch and Flambé.

The restaurant is located at Level 2, along with a cluster of other restaurants. It is the first one you'll encounter after crossing the short bridge to the restaurants cluster.

Visited on a Saturday and the place was super busy from the weekend lunch crowd. We opted for a late lunch at 2pm. 

glimpse of weekday lunch specials

Have observed that when there's a queue formed outside of the restaurant, the staff will be proactively interacting with diners, giving out the order chit in advance in order to shorten the process of ordering later on.

As I was waiting for my dining companions, spotted Gong Yoo's advertisement for Terra. Weather is perfect for a glass of cold beer. Drink responsibly as always.

Soon, we were all seated in the restaurant and is ready to order. Simply indicate your order in the order chit and pass it back to the staff.

order up!

We got ourselves these mains; Spicy Baby Octopus (@$25.90), Oyster Blade Bulgogi (@$27.90) and LA Galbi (@$39.90). For sides, we had the Cheesy Tteokbooki with Kimari (@$17.90)  , Bacon Kongnamul Pancake (@$15.90), Cheesy Gyeran Jjim (@$10.90) and Seafood Sundubu Jjigae (@$18.90).

While waiting for the mains, diners could self-service at the Banchan Bar where on the day of visit, there were 4 options available; kimchi, tomatoes, macaroni and yellow pickled radish. The macaroni and pickled radish were evidently sweet, so suggest to go easy on those.

macaroni (front), pickled radish (back)

tomatoes (front), kimchi (back)

We could see some cooking action at the open kitchen where some of the dishes were cooked on the hot grill and torched prior to it being served at the table-side.

When the LA Galbi was served, we were warned to keep all the paper napkins, handphones away from the table before the 'show' begins.

The fire will surely elicit some 'oohs and aahs' from the table. 

flambe action

Oh, when ordering rice, staff recommended the seaweed rice which I found to be flavourful and lovely to eat with the mains.

yummy seaweed rice

galbi on rice

 

The galbi was tender as expected. The food at Bulgogi Syo is generally strong flavoured with majority of the food leaning towards the sweeter side.

The other dish that was torched at the table-side was the Cheesy Tteokbooki with Kimari.

torching the cheese

The cut-up fried seaweed roll (kimari) that came with the tteokpokki made it an interesting texture and flavour with the familiar taste of the tteokpokki. The rice cake was not chewy and easy to eat. The sauce was not spicy.

kimari that looked like meatballs

Currently, there's a 1-for-1 Terra beer promo for its 330ml bottle. Cheers to that!

Terra 330ml @$6.90 (Usual Price)

The cheesy steamed egg made a good interlude amidst all the heavier tasting foods. Top layer was laden with cheese and one might even get to see a cheese pull out of it!

Cheesy Gyeran Jjim

One thing to note about the kimchi on the hotplate, was that it tasted more sour than the ones from the Banchan Bar. The bulgogi that we had that day, tasted too beefy/gamey to my liking.

Oyster Blade Bulgogi

I was amused by the smoking hot appearance of the nakji bokkeum (Spicy Baby Octopus). Smoke everywhere and fogging up our cameras and spectacles. Hahaa!

Spicy Baby Octopus

The onions and sauce from this hotplate made a nice gravy for the seaweed rice. Added oomph! The baby octopus was of a tender chewy kind, so I enjoyed it.

First time trying beansprouts pancake with bacon. The pancake here had a crisp exterior with soft doughy interior. Bacon provided the salty relish that most people liked hence, no sauce was really needed although it was provided. The amount of beansprouts in the pancake was minimal to just give it that slightly 'raw' sprouts taste profile. It kinda jolted me to remind again, that hey, I was eating beansprouts pancake and not just bacon pancake!

Bacon Kongnamul Pancake

Seafood Sundubu Jjigae

peeking at the seafood

One of the dishes that I enjoyed at Bulgogi Syo would be the seafood tofu stew (Seafood Sundubu Jigae). Don't be frightened by the redness of the stew as it turned out to be way less spicy than it looked. In comparison with the rest of the food that we ordered, the stew would be the most 'spicy'. In terms of a spicy scale of 10, I would say this was a level 1 for me.

All in all, the staff at Bugis Junction are kind and efficient. Thank you Hence for the invite and special thanks to Bulgogi Syo Bugis Junction's crew who attended to us that day.

BULGOGI SYO 

Address: Bugis Junction: 200 Victoria Street, #02-49 Bugis Junction, 188021

Website: https://www.bulgogisyo.com/

Contact: 9880 9719

Business Hours: 

Daily: 11:30 am–10 pm