Hwajeong Station fish restaurant: 6-piece cutlassfish set, Min Cook

Today's post is a real find for lunch near Hwajeong Station — a seasonal grilled fish spot! It's Min Cook Apbadang in Seongsa-dong :) This is the place where you can taste the cooking of a designated Korean culinary master, following Min Cook Miso Yaki and Min Cook Dashima! The signature menu is seasonal grilled fish, so you get a different fish lineup depending on the season! It's also earned three Blue Ribbon awards >< The banchan and the main dish are both genuinely delicious, so let me leave a detailed review today! Let's dive in.

Min Cook Apbadang Seongsa hours and closing days

• Min Cook Apbadang Seongsa
• Hours | Weekdays 10:50–21:00, Weekends 10:50–20:30
• Closed every Monday
• Closed Sep 24–25 for Chuseok holiday
• Break time | 15:00–16:30
• Group seating / Wi-Fi / reservations / parking

Min Cook Apbadang has a clean, tidy exterior and is a lunch grilled-fish favorite near Hwajeong Station! From value-priced lunch sets to a wide variety of fish, it's a place with many long-time regulars!

It's an Ilsan Blue Ribbon spot that's received the award in 2024, 2025, and again this year, 2026! Places that keep earning the Blue Ribbon year after year are always worth a visit ><

Where is it and is there parking? 5 minutes by car from Hwajeong Station

Min Cook Apbadang Seongsa is located in Seongsa-dong! It's about 5 minutes by car from Hwajeong Station, and also close — about 4 minutes by car — from IKEA Goyang.

You can park right in front of the restaurant, and there's a large lot in the back too. There's staff guiding parking, so it's easy and stress-free.

Inside Min Cook Apbadang Seongsa: a grilled fish restaurant with no fishy smell

The inside of Min Cook Apbadang has a cozy, upscale hanjeongsik (traditional Korean set meal) restaurant interior, so it's booked often for lunch and dinner gatherings! Even though it's a grilled fish restaurant, there's not even a hint of fishy smell inside! That's how clean and hygienically managed this place is.

Since this is a banchan (side dish) specialist, you can buy various banchan separately, and the grilled fish is also sold packaged to go. I bought some once before and it was pretty good :)

There's also coffee and sikhye (sweet rice drink) good for after your meal, so this is a great spot near Hwajeong Station to bring your parents or grandparents during Chuseok! Note that it's closed on Sep 24 and 25 for the holiday!

Menu prices and today's seasonal fish

Seasonal? Since the fish changes with the season, today's grilled fish lineup is posted like this! On the day I visited, the weekday lunch special featured cutlassfish, flounder, and wild bottom cod, while the seasonal set menu offers an even wider variety of fish.

The menu was quite varied.

• Silver cutlassfish braised set | ₩27,000
• Silver cutlassfish grilled set | ₩25,000
• Grilled lunch special for two | ₩31,800
• Charcoal bulgogi + seasonal grilled fish for two | ₩46,000

• Assorted braised set for two | ₩44,000
• Grilled mackerel set | ₩20,000
• Braised flounder set | ₩22,000

What we ordered — Silver cutlassfish grilled set for two

Silver cutlassfish grilled set for two: what 6 pieces look like

From the banchan alone, this lunch grilled-fish spot near Hwajeong Station was neat and tidy in every way! The buckwheat cabbage jeon (savory pancake) in particular was special. It was light but the kind of flavor you keep reaching for. Every single banchan was delicious.

If you want more banchan, you can grab it yourself from the self-serve bar :) There's doenjang soup, wasabi, and soy sauce too :)

Our ordered silver cutlassfish grilled set for two arrived! At first glance it was thick, and I was surprised that each piece was HUGE — 6 pieces total! The cuts were 5 belly pieces (with the innards cleaned) and 1 middle-cut piece.

I put tongs next to it to show the scale, and the tongs looked small next to the fish — that's how massive these cutlassfish pieces were! Truly the quality and presentation befitting a Seongsa-dong grilled fish restaurant with three Blue Ribbon awards!

As you can see, it's this thick :) Grilled to a perfect crispy-outside, moist-inside finish with no fishy smell at all, and seasoned just right! Not too salty, not too bland!

Going around trying different restaurants, I've noticed the common thread among genuinely good places is that the rice is delicious! At Min Cook Apbadang, the rice itself tastes different and is cooked perfectly fluffy — good enough that you could pour hot water over the leftovers later and make nurungji (scorched rice) and it'd still be delicious.

It's delicious even with just a light dip in soy sauce, and you could really tell the cutlassfish was so fresh it had zero fishy smell! If you're looking for a lunch grilled fish spot near Hwajeong Station, be sure to stop by Min Cook Apbadang in Seongsa-dong, where you can taste the food of a designated Korean culinary master >< With Chuseok coming up soon, I recommend it as a family gathering spot too :) Your parents will love it ><