The heart and Seoul of Korean dining

JAPAN MAY DOMINATE THE GLOBAL food scene as a revered source of ingredients and culinary craft, but South Korea is fast catching up. Fuelled by the K-culture phenomenon, a growing awareness of the quality of its indigenous produce and the ingenuity of its chefs is such that you may never look at kimchi with a straight face again.

On a recent trip to Seoul in autumn, we chanced upon these gems, which are just a sampling of what the city has to offer.

7th Door

The 7th Door isn’t going to lead to heaven, unless utopia is filled with jars of fermenting mystery fish and other things that form the foundation of many amazing things to eat. In which case, you’ve come to the right place at Kim Dae-chun’s Gangnum eatery, where the Willy Wonka of umami holds fort.

There’s a theatrical element to the one-Michelin-starred 7th Door as you walk through a neon-lit passage that symbolises the first five doors of fundamental tastes: sweet, sour, salty, spicy, bitter. The sixth door manifests as ageing or fermentation, while the seventh door opens up to a whole new world of flavours and culinary craftsmanship.

It’s worth noting that Kim will serve nothing before its time. We’re told it took him three years to open 7th Door, because that’s how long it took for his prized hairtail fish extract to mature. In the meantime, he ran Toc Toc, also in the same building, which is also worth a try for unpretentious Italian-inspired fare. 

Kim himself is an unassuming chef whose humble demeanour belies the complexity of what he does. He makes his own soya sauce and fermented bean paste, among others, and his see-through fermentation chiller hints at many more exotic concoctions. Even if the set-up looks futuristic, the food is happily down to earth, and leans towards traditional cooking but updated in an organic and original manner.

GET BT IN YOUR INBOX DAILY

Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox.

Sign UpVIEW ALL

A comforting mung bean porridge is a welcoming way to line the tummy, followed by too-pretty-to-eat snacks that are recognisably Korean and yet not. Everything is tied to the fermentation or ageing theme, from the four-year-old fermented koji that leavens a springy bread roll, to the homemade jalapeno ssamjang sauce underneath three-day-aged raw fish. The flesh of Korean marinated crab is scraped out and mixed with rice to eat with the chef’s own brand of dried seaweed sheets. He has his own caviar too. And for a bit of fun, a 7-Eleven style paper bag holds an excellent savoury doughnut, Disfrutar-style, stuffed with uni. 

Heaven might be stretching it, but this door does set you on the path to culinary nirvana.

Lunch: 150,000 won. Dinner: 280,000 won. 7thdoor.kr

Ryunique

Ryu Tae-hwan is practically an old hand in the restaurant industry in Seoul, having opened Ryunique – a portmanteau of his family name and the word “unique” – in 2011. Our last visit was before Covid-19 in 2019, where his menu was a tribute to all the artisanal farmers and producers he had made friends with over the years.

Combining locavorism with his own contemporary style of cuisine has been his trademark, but now, in the restaurant’s new location (also in Gangnam), he has streamlined his cooking even more, for simple, clean flavours that showcase the purity of the produce he works with.

The new place is also a nod to his new mindset – stark but space-agey with a dramatic red and white spiral staircase that leads to the second-floor dining room. But the ground floor is where you want to be – there’s a communal table set against a wall of micro herbs growing in tiny little pots, an ageing room filled with fish carcasses, and an open kitchen where Ryu and his team present their dishes almost workshop style. It’s an intimate experience, and the food is a winning combination of solid technique and homespun whimsy. The surroundings are not intended to be super chi-chi or ultra-modern – it’s all about a chef who wears his heart on his sleeve, with a few crazy cooking ideas in his head.

Like the way he uses some hospital-grade centrifuge gadget to distil his onion soup so you get a clear, intense broth with zero sediment. You sip this while eating his version of buckwheat soba bibimbap, draped with ayu carpaccio and Korean melon slices. There’s a playful take on peanut butter and jam, made of syrupy reduced red wine and fresh peanuts with whipped peanut butter and praline bits – and it’s not dessert. And aged mackerel, cooked slowly under a hot lamp till milky in texture, served with buttery green sauce.

It’s food that has no pretensions – it’s the reflection of a chef’s cooking journey, and also his soul.

Lunch: 160,000 won. Dinner: 290,000 won. ryunique.co.kr

Solbam

While Solbam doesn’t have quite as defined a concept as 7th Door or Ryunique, it ticks off all the boxes that you expect of a one-Michelin-starred restaurant. It has the quiet air of understated luxury, suited servers, posh touches such as an array of wooden chopsticks for you to choose from, food that’s meticulously plated and well-executed.

Helming the kitchen is Eom Tae-jun, who hails from Andong city but is clearly influenced by French contemporary cuisine. There is a theme of sustainability but apart from a mission statement nicely printed on craft paper, there doesn’t seem to be a strong narrative from the food, where ingredients are as disparate as abalone from Wando, caviar and quail from France.

But at face value, the food stands on its own. A mushroom on mushroom creation sees finely sliced shiitake shaped into a cigar roll filled with duxelles, in a savoury beef jus and white fungus on the side. Crisp-skinned kinmedai gets more crunch from a dusting of quinoa and comfort from fish broth. A nice touch is a taste of potent mussel extract hapjajang, before it’s used to baste slow cooked abalone that’s finished on a grill at your tableside.

The restaurant is moving to a new location in 2024. With a new chapter ahead, Solbam’s narrative will no doubt evolve too.

Tasting menu: 250,000 won. restaurantsolbam.com

Gweumdwaeji Sikdang ‘Golden Pig’

There’s Korean barbecue, and there’s Korean barbecue. That’s where Gweumdwaeji Sikdang – better known as Golden Pig – comes in. This unassuming pork barbecue restaurant – the owners also run a grilled eel eatery – has its fair share of Korean celebrities (including BTS) as fans, and you know it’s popular when there’s a never-ending line outside (it doesn’t take reservations).

Get ready for a rollicking night out as you polish off plates of pork from pigs specially bred to the specifications of owner Park Sue-kyoung and her husband – who started out with a food delivery business but pivoted to pork belly barbecue because they wanted a restaurant where they could ensure the consistent quality of the meat served. 

The couple work with a farm in Chungcheong province which rears a special breed of pig that is a cross between Landrace, Yorkshire and Duroc, with Duroc being the dominant strain. They also get pure Duroc pork – smaller animals which yield less meat – from another farm, which isn’t always available. But if you’re lucky enough, it’s a must-try as the difference is obvious.

Either way, Golden Pig is hands down the place we’ll go to every chance we get. They cook the meat for you, and it’s sweet, juicy and ever so slightly gamey but delicious. Pork collar and belly are the choice parts, and you dip it in the house sauce or a spicy chilli dip made of fermented hairtail fish innards (funky good).

The Duroc pork belly is so tender and sweet, it doesn’t even need salt. End off with a bowl of kimchi jiggae and leave very happy.

149 Dasan-ro, Jung-gu, Seoul, South Korea

Byeokje Galbi the Cheongdam

While it’s trendy now for Singaporean diners to say they’ve been to the hanwoo temple of Born & Bred, it’s not the be-all and end-all of Korean beef barbecue places. Besides, when a reservation isn’t possible, where else can you get top grade beef in Seoul?

What it lacks in trendy vibe and sheer variety, Byeokje Galbi makes up for in quality and fine dining vibe. Note that there are several branches, but the Cheongdam outlet is the fanciest. It sits off the main road, so you literally walk up a garden path – beautifully landscaped and Zen-like – before you step into the restaurant that reminds you of super fine dining restaurants in China.

You eat in your own private dining room and pick from the a la carte menu or a decent 120,000 won set lunch that’s like a mini omakase with starters and rice in addition to beef. Expect to pay around 70,000 to 90,000 won per 100 grams of beef. Byeokje Galbi is said to use only the top 1 per cent of the top hanwoo in South Korea, and it’s not hard to believe. The meat has superior marbling and is almost wagyu-like while still retaining its trademark beefiness.

The star is, of course, the diamond-cut ribs – with its accordion-like precise cutting and melt-in-the-mouth texture. While we do miss the showmanship of Born & Bred, this place has its own merits.

25 Dosan-daero 81-gil, Cheongdam-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, South Korea