When You Want a Hearty Meal, Recommended Seoul Sotbap Restaurants

A Perfect Meal Complete Only After Eating Rice and Sungnyung!

When having a meal, no one would want to intentionally eat a meager and insufficient dish. Sometimes you might just want a light snack, but usually when dining at a restaurant, you want to enjoy delicious food and feel a satisfying fullness. In such cases, try eating sotbap (rice cooked in a pot). Not just plain rice, but sotbap topped with various ingredients that balance taste, nutrition, and abundance. Here, we introduce Seoul’s best sotbap restaurants.

Hayangok

Hayangok in Magok sells sotbbap set meals with sotttukdeok (pot lid) doenjang jjigae (soybean paste stew). When you order sotbap here, they stir-fry chadolbagi (thinly sliced beef brisket) on the pot lid. Then, they immediately cook doenjang jjigae on it, showcasing a super special(?) recipe.

Photo by Naver Place 'Hayangok'

While enjoying the well-grilled chadolbagi and doenjang jjigae, the sotbap arrives. The popular menu items are the minari myeongran (water parsley and pollock roe) sotbap set and the sambaeche gul (three kinds of oysters) sotbap set. The minari myeongran sotbap with thick pollock roe offers a salty charm, while the sambaeche gul sotbap lets you savor the aroma of the sea. Hayangok provides butter and seasoning sauce together, so mix them all with the sotbap. After finishing the rice, pour dunggullecha (wild tea) water into the pot to enjoy the scorched rice.

Solsot

Solsot is already a well-known sotbap restaurant among those in the know. It’s Solsot, not Sotsot. This place serves sotbap in a set meal style similar to Japanese home cooking. The neat presentation is also a plus. Kimchi, salted seafood, salad, and jang-guk (soybean paste soup) are served together, and the contents of the sotbap should be eaten separately.

Photo by Kim Tae-in

Pour the scorched rice and katsuobushi (dried bonito flakes) broth from the table into the pot, and eat it toward the end of the meal. When you crave a familiar dish, try the steak sotbap; when you want something unusual, try the domigwanja (sea bream scallop) sotbap. The domigwanja sotbap lets you fully enjoy the mildness and savory flavor of sea bream. There are branches in Jeollanam-do, Gyeonggi-do, Seoul, and other areas, so keep that in mind.

Chorisang-gyeong

Located in Seoul Forest, Chorisang-gyeong aims to offer a set meal filled with respect. In addition to basic menus like salmon, abalone jang (marinated abalone), and steak sotbap, they also offer flat bulgogi and galbi sotbap in the style of Eonyang for meat lovers.

Photo by Naver Place 'Chorisang Gyeong'

Each sotbap menu has its own recommended way to enjoy it more deliciously, so refer to that when eating. Side dishes include baek kimchi (white kimchi) and tofu minari salad. If you visit early during meal times, it’s also recommended to try the steak sotbap, which is limited to 20 servings each at lunch and dinner. It contains lemon dill butter, giving it a soft yet refreshing flavor.

After finishing the sotbap, don’t forget one thing: the K-dessert, sungnyung (scorched rice tea)! Isn’t one truly Korean only after finishing the sungnyung? All three introduced restaurants serve savory sungnyung, so don’t miss out on trying it.