Guwol-dong patio seafood spot with self-serve wrap veggies: Veteran

To try fatty fall-season shrimp and get some fresh air, I headed to a patio raw fish restaurant in Guwol-dong 🦐 Veteran General Fish Market.

📍120 Guwolnam-ro, 1st floor, 102-104, Namdong-gu, Incheon, South Korea ⏰ Hours Mon-Thu 11:30 - 00:30 (last order 23:30) Fri-Sat 11:30 - 01:30 (last order 00:30) Sun 11:30 - 01:00 (last order 00:00) ✔️ Reservations, group visits, and takeout available 🅿️ Small basement parking lot in the building Street parking nearby available weekdays 12:00-14:00 and after 18:30, and all day on public holidays (except fire lanes)

Patio seats and parking at Veteran General Fish Market in Guwol-dong

Veteran General Fish Market Incheon City Hall Branch is a raw fish restaurant with patio-style seating set out on the first floor of a building on Guwolnam-ro. There's a basement lot, but it's small, so I parked at a nearby public lot and walked over.

Under a big sign reading "Young-vibe Veteran General Fish Market," the open, breezy patio seating — perfect for this kind of weather — caught my eye right away.

On one side sits a spotless, large fish tank, and seeing the live fish, live squid, and raw shrimp swimming around energetically gave me solid confidence in the freshness 🦑🦐

I hesitated over the breezy patio seats but ended up taking a seat inside since the folding doors there were also wide open. The interior is done up neatly in a cozy wood-tone style.

Ordering 600g of grilled raw shrimp on the table tablet

Ordering is easy — each table has a Caps smart-order tablet where you can browse food photos and tap to order. There was a whole range of seafood on offer, including a plate of live squid and a hearty seafood assortment, and with fall here, the grilled gizzard shad and raw gizzard shad sashimi looked really appetizing too.

But today's mission was purely plump shrimp, so we went straight for 600g of raw shrimp, grilled 🦐

What comes with it: side dishes and the self-serve bar

Once we ordered, the basic side dishes arrived — hot seaweed soup, salad, seaweed, washed aged kimchi (mukeunji), sashimi salad, and fresh wasabi. I was surprised there was this much even though we hadn't ordered any raw sashimi — quite a contrast to a shrimp restaurant I'd visited before that supposedly had great reviews.

You can refill anything you're short on at the self-serve bar set up inside the restaurant. There was a generous pile of wrap vegetables (which are pricey these days), various sauces, and even ramen noodles — a properly generous patio raw fish spot in Guwol-dong.

How does the salt-grilled seasonal raw shrimp taste?

Finally, today's star arrives — grilled raw shrimp 👀 We were told to eat them the moment they turned red.

The lid came off and the savory, sweet smell of grilled shrimp hit us right away 👃🏻 Seasonal grilled shrimp you'd regret skipping in the fall.

Golden brown, well-cooked shrimp.

With the vinegar-chili sauce and soy sauce set out, we were ready to eat. We don't eat the heads, so we skipped the butter-grilled option, but if you want it, they'll do it separately if you set the heads aside and ask!

Plump, meaty shrimp.

Shrimp is love,,🫶🏿

That signature bouncy, chewy texture is truly a work of art.

The more you chew, the more you notice the shrimp's own pleasant sweetness 🦐 Wrapped in aged kimchi, it's a whole different kind of delicious.

It's great dipped in the vinegar-chili sauce for a tangy kick, and just as good with fresh wasabi, which brought out a deep, savory umami flavor.

Is 600g of shrimp enough for two people?

600g of grilled raw shrimp was plenty for two. The shrimp were large and packed with meat from end to end, so the 600g portion was fully satisfying and hearty for two people with nothing left to wish for.

If you're craving plump, in-season grilled shrimp or chewy, fresh gizzard shad sashimi, this patio raw fish restaurant in Guwol-dong — great atmosphere and great value — is well worth a visit 🐟🦐🦑