Korean beef omakase in Gongdeok, Seoul with tilefish course: Usu

I had some errands to run near Gongdeok today, and since I'd been craving a private meal for a while, I went looking for Usu Gongdeok — let me introduce it.

Usu Gongdeok hours, reservations and parking

Usu Gongdeok is open every day of the year from 11:00–20:00, with a break time from 15:00–17:00. Reservations and groups are welcome, baby chairs are available, corkage is free, and parking is possible too.

• ⏰ Hours: Open daily 11:00–20:00 / Break time 15:00–17:00
• Reservations available ⭕️
• Groups welcome ⭕️
• Baby chairs ⭕️
• Free corkage 🍾⭕
• Parking available 🚗⭕️
• Address: Usu, B2, Lotte Castle President, 467 Gongdeok-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul

Reservations can be made through Catch Table and Naver 🙆🏻‍♀️ Same-day reservations are possible!

How to walk to Usu from Gongdeok Station Exit 2

Usu, a Gongdeok favorite, connects directly to the Lotte Castle President building right in front of Exit 2 of Gongdeok Station.

No need to get confused — just walk about 10 steps straight ahead. I walked there today, but there's 3 hours of free parking with no limit on the number of cars 🚗 (₩1,000 per 15 minutes after that).

Take the escalator down and it's right there in front of you. Even first-time visitors shouldn't have any trouble finding it.

Private rooms only, plus the anniversary service

The entrance alone gives off a luxurious vibe. Usu runs an ongoing anniversary event — visit for a birthday or anniversary and you get a celebratory glass of sparkling wine (one per person), an anniversary lettering card, and a Polaroid photo. Just be sure to note it in your reservation memo — it's a great spot for birthdays and anniversaries.

Before even stepping into the room, I was struck again by how upscale the interior felt 👏🏻 The showcase case really stands out haha.

Every seat, from group tables to 2-4 person rooms, is a private room — perfect for a meet-the-parents dinner, family meal, or any important occasion.

Since it was just the two of us today, we were shown to a pre-set room. It was really hot outside, but each room has its own air conditioning, so we could eat in cool comfort. Coat hangers were set up in every room too. Great attention to detail 👍🏻

Usu's menu and free corkage rules

There's an à la carte menu and kids' menu too, plus lunch and dinner courses. I liked that there wasn't just one course option — you can choose based on price point.

There's a wide selection of drinks too. Usu is corkage-free 🍾 with no limit on the number of bottles! Whether it's a birthday, anniversary, or just a regular meal, feel free to bring your own wine. (₩5,000 extra per glass for glass exchange / no glass exchange for parties of 9+)

They also have cold highballs at a reasonable price, which seems like a good option too haha.

The default water is barley tea, and it's so good. My mom and I drank two cups each before the meal even started 💦

Dinner B course: it starts with an ingredient introduction

I ordered the Dinner B course today, and before the courses began, a staff member came in to explain the ingredients we'd be having.

These are the ingredients for my meal, presented in a showcase case. Even at a glance, they looked premium, and I was already excited before the meal even started.

First: woo-gye jinjuk (beef and chicken rice porridge)

The broth used hanwoo beef bone stock and chicken stock, with garnishes of nurungji (crispy scorched rice), scallion crust, shiitake mushroom, asparagus, and white wood ear mushroom. The broth had a deeply steeped flavor, and it paired wonderfully with the various garnishes. Starting with a soft porridge was really easy on the stomach.

Second: three one-bite dishes

The bulgogi sandwich is made with brioche, hanwoo bulgogi, mushroom duxelles, and truffle cream cheese, and it couldn't possibly taste bad given how it looks. One bite of the soft bread with hanwoo bulgogi, mushroom, and truffle cream cheese, and the flavor just bursts.

This is scallop and clam. It's made with brick pastry, grilled scallop, aburaga, clam cream sauce, apple, onion, and gamtae (seaweed) powder. The texture of everything packed inside the brick pastry was excellent, and the apple and onion gave it a fresh finish.

This is the sweet shrimp gimbugak. It's made with roasted seaweed brushed with pollock roe, fried abalone-liver rice, sweet shrimp, and yuzu sauce, and it was unexpectedly the best bite of the whole meal. The savory seaweed and abalone-liver rice were even more delicious the more you knew about them, and the flavor of the sweet shrimp with yuzu sauce was incredible. The soft sweet shrimp was so good I wanted to have it again.

Third: shiitake with shrimp and young zucchini

Shrimp and A-grade shiitake mushrooms, fried. Maybe because it was the best grade of shiitake, the aroma was strong and paired beautifully with the shrimp's clean flavor.

This bite was made of zucchini, tofu, aged kimchi, and golden enoki mushroom, and the aged kimchi gave it great texture — an all-around excellent bite.

You're meant to eat these with peanut tofu sauce and oak oil on the side, and the sweet sauce made it hard to stop reaching for more. I expected it to feel heavy, but the moderate sweetness came through instead and paired well with the bite-sized dishes.

Fourth: yukhoe (beef tartare) with gamtae seaweed

You roll it up from right to left. It's made with house-made aioli sauce, fried nurungji, pickled chojeokjam (Chinese artichoke), and cured egg. The yukhoe was really tender, and with the crispy nurungji, pickles, and fragrant gamtae all added in, it was truly perfect.

Fifth: tilefish, my favorite course of the night

A staff member poured warm neungi mushroom broth over the dish right after it was served. This was personally my number one dish of the whole meal.

The jade thread fin was tender and clean, and paired with barley and chamnamul (aster) rice along with mullet roe, it was absolutely heavenly. Despite being a fish dish, it had no fishy taste at all and was clean, with a distinctly Korean feel — I couldn't help but give it a thumbs up.

The neungi mushroom broth in particular had an incredibly strong, distinctive aroma, and the flavor was so outstanding that it was the one dish I finished completely.

Sixth: tteokgalbi (grilled short rib patty)

It's made with crushed pistachio, celeriac puree, shiitake duxelles, white balsamic sauce, and basil oil. The tender hanwoo tteokgalbi, the nuttiness of the pistachio, and the various sauces cutting through the richness made it a completely different experience from a typical tteokgalbi.

Seventh: abalone with five-color chewy noodles

The garnishes are black sesame radish salad, bracken fern, shiitake mushroom, chamnamul (aster) salad, perilla leaf, and abalone. The sauces are gamtae dressing and mustard-garlic sauce. The noodles are gardenia noodles.

I'd recommend piling a variety of ingredients onto one bite rather than eating each separately. With abalone at the center, along with mushrooms, herbs, and sauce, and finished off with the chewy gardenia noodles, all the ingredients dance together in your mouth.

The main: grilled hanwoo sirloin and a seaweed soup rice spread

The eighth course, the main dish, is hanwoo sirloin and a rice spread. The vegetables come pre-seared, and you grill the meat yourself.

Seeing the rice spread come with seaweed soup made me feel like it was my birthday today haha.

A staff member comes to light the grill for you. I eat pretty slowly, so they switched out the charcoal for me partway through. I liked being able to enjoy it slowly, cooked exactly the way I wanted at my own pace.

The meat, true to 1++ grade hanwoo sirloin, was tender and just melted in my mouth. The beef had an excellent clean flavor, the portion was generous, and the cut was thick, so I ended up really full.

Pairing it with wasabi and especially that mustard leaf kimchi was 👍🏻 The side dishes can be refilled, just ask.

Throughout the meal at Usu, there were so many dishes using mushrooms, and having mushrooms show up even at the end was very satisfying for me since I really love mushrooms.

A spoonful of rice with squid jeotgal (salted fermented squid) — that's the Korean way to eat haha. A flavor I'd been missing.

I love seaweed soup too, and at other omakase places, the seaweed soup served at the end always felt a little skimpy in portion. But at Usu, they set out such a generous spread that it could pass for an actual birthday table, and I finished the meal feeling completely satisfied.

Corn dessert and tea to finish

The final dessert. It's made with corn ice cream, corn cream cheese, apricot, corn crumble, sponge cake, and green tangerine cream sauce.

Using corn in the ice cream made the sweetness feel elevated, and the cream cheese and green tangerine sauce added a refreshing note that made it the perfect dessert. Adding the sponge cake and apricot gave it even more textural variety.

With cold tea prepared as well, it was a perfectly refreshing finish to the meal.

I had brought wine planning to drink it with my mom, but a sudden situation meant we couldn't drink after all — so, a little disappointed, we settled for a toast with tea instead 😂

Usu Gongdeok: which occasions is it best for?

Sitting quietly in a private room with just my mom, chatting and enjoying a beautifully composed course meal, gave me a happy time I hadn't had in a while. You could feel the care put into each course, which only made me look forward to the next one even more.

Beautiful, photogenic dishes that don't disappoint on flavor, plus fully private rooms and free corkage — Usu is a place I can't help but want to visit again. Perfect for a date, an anniversary, a meet-the-parents dinner, or a family gathering — I highly recommend Usu ✨💛