Gyeongsan set-meal restaurant with kids' pork cutlet: Bapeul Jitda

Today I want to introduce a place I went to when I wanted something a bit more special than a Korean set meal loaded with the usual endless side dishes — dish by dish, a little more thought-out. I found the perfect family-meal restaurant with a private room after a long while 🤎 Let me introduce Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch!

A Gyeongsan Korean-restaurant favorite that I liked from the exterior alone — Bapeul Jitda's main branch.

From abalone to chilled pork, fried eggplant, beef brisket mushroom hot pot, and hijiki bibimbap, this place used familiar Korean ingredients but put a slightly different spin on how you eat them and what sauces go with them! I'll walk through each course in detail in a bit.

Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch: location, hours and parking

Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch is at 734 Samseonghyeon-ro, 1F, Gyeongsan-si, Gyeongsangbuk-do, and it's open 11:00–21:00 with last order at 20:00. Hours are the same on weekdays and holidays, and there's dedicated parking available. Baby chairs and baby tableware are also provided.

It's on Samseonghyeon-ro, but there's still plenty of parking space right in front of the store, so it was easy to go by car. For anyone looking for somewhere to eat near Daegu Haany University or Iutjip Sudal, this should be pretty accessible too! And honestly, when you're bringing your parents along, if parking is a hassle it kills the mood before you even sit down haha. Here you don't have to worry about that, which makes it a great spot for a Gyeongsan family gathering!!

What the dining room and seating are like

The exterior of Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch is white-toned with gold accents, and the interior uses wooden furniture, giving it a warm yet calm overall vibe. It's not so upscale that it feels intimidating, but it's not a plain everyday restaurant either — the perfect atmosphere for a day when you want to properly treat yourself to a meal!

There's plenty of seating and space for larger groups to eat together, so it looked good for family outings or group gatherings too.

Ordering the autumn table, winter table and kids' pork cutlet

It was also unique that Bapeul Jitda names its signature set tables after the seasons — spring, summer, autumn, winter. When you hear Korean set meal, you tend to picture a bunch of similar side dishes all arriving at once, but here everything from salad to chilled pork, fried dishes, abalone, hot pot, and rice is put together so the flavors and textures keep changing within a single table!

Instead of ordering two of the same menu, we ordered three things: the autumn table, the winter table, and kids' pork cutlet.

Seasonal salad

First, the seasonal salad! It's Grana Padano cheese, egg, bacon, puffed brown rice, and fresh vegetables tossed with Caesar dressing. It felt quite different from the light vegetable salads you usually get at a Korean set-meal restaurant. The cheese and bacon give it a savory flavor, and the puffed brown rice adds crunch throughout — the texture was really nice.

Yuxiang-style fried eggplant

The fried eggplant was also delicious! It's Chinese yuxiang-style eggplant, eaten with a sweet-and-spicy sauce made with pork, carrot, onion, garlic, and chili. The outside was crispy and the eggplant inside was very soft, and with the rich yuxiang sauce added, I think even people who don't like eggplant would enjoy this one!

Having a bit of Chinese-food flavor pop up in the middle of a Korean set meal made the whole table feel less repetitive. I kept reaching for this one 😽

Chilled pork with kkosiraegi (sea string seaweed)

The chilled pork uses Korean pork foreleg, cooked slowly at a low temperature, they say. Maybe because of that, the meat wasn't dry at all and had a soft bite!! It comes with garlic sauce plus a lightly dressed garlic-chive salad.

Rather than eating the meat on its own, it was much tastier with the flavor of the garlic sauce and the aroma of the chives added in.

You don't just eat the kkosiraegi like a regular side dish — you put it on gopchang-gim (thick roasted seaweed) and dip it in the sauce that comes alongside! The chewy kkosiraegi and the savory seaweed went together surprisingly well. Eating a bite of this in between the abalone and meat dishes really refreshed my palate ><

Steamed abalone and geuu-jang barley rice

Personally, the steamed abalone was the most satisfying dish of the whole meal.

The abalone is apparently cooked gently after building up umami with kelp and radish. The abalone itself was plump and tender, but what was really interesting was what came with it. You eat it together with geuu-jang, made from abalone innards, and barley rice!! Geuu is apparently what they call abalone innards in Jeju.

The rich, savory flavor of the abalone innards combined with the popping texture of the barley made it noticeably different from the abalone dishes you usually get. This combination isn't something you easily see elsewhere, so it stuck with me the most 👍🏻

Grilled Hoengseong deodeok root

The grilled deodeok (bellflower root) apparently uses deodeok from Hoengseong, Gangwon-do. It's brushed with a gochujang-based sauce and lightly grilled for a smoky finish! After the soft meat and abalone earlier, the distinct aroma and slight bitterness of the deodeok really brought the balance of the table back up.

I actually like grilled deodeok, and I liked it even more because the sauce wasn't too strong.

Beef brisket and mushroom hot pot

You can't skip a hot dish either 🥹 We also got a beef brisket mushroom hot pot with various mushrooms and vegetables. You simmer it on medium heat for about 5–6 minutes, and if the vegetables on top aren't quite cooked, you just let it simmer a bit longer!

After eating cold dishes like the chilled pork and crispy things like the fried eggplant, having a sip of hot broth was just... ah, this is it 🥹. When you're treating your parents to a meal, having a warm hot pot like this on the table definitely helps.

Hijiki bibimbap with paprika gochujang

The hijiki bibimbap wasn't the usual mix-with-sesame-oil style either. It uses an oil blend of perilla oil and olive oil, and if you want a bit more seasoning, you add paprika gochujang.

The smoky sweetness from the roasted paprika plus tomato acidity gives it a different feel from regular gochujang. The hijiki has a crunchy bite, and overall it's not too strong-flavored, so it paired well with the other dishes. By the way, if you can't eat hijiki, you can switch to saengchae bibimbap instead!

Live abalone porridge

The live abalone porridge isn't just plain white porridge with abalone meat — it also uses the abalone innards, giving it a rich, savory depth. As someone who loves abalone porridge, this was totally my type 💙

What I liked about Bapeul Jitda was that even within one table, they don't just repeat the same ingredient the same way — abalone shows up as steamed abalone, geuu-jang, and porridge, each handled differently.

Adding the kids' pork cutlet: what worked for a family meal with children

At Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch, you can order kids' pork cutlet on top of the set tables. And we didn't stop at just the two tables haha. We ordered the cutlet too! We already had plenty of variety with the autumn and winter tables, but I wanted something crispy on top, so I ordered it haha.

Even as an adult, the kids' pork cutlet at Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch was really tasty.

Having a pork cutlet come in among all the Korean dishes changed the mood of the flavors nicely. Crispy outside, moist meat inside — very easy to eat!

If you're visiting for a Gyeongsan family gathering with kids, it seems totally fine for the adults to eat the set-table dishes while the kids have pork cutlet. Having options even when everyone in the family has different tastes is great!

Why it pays to mix two different season tables

You can order two of the same set, but personally I'd recommend trying one autumn plus one winter. Crispy fried eggplant, tender chilled pork, plump abalone, popping barley, chewy kkosiraegi, warm hot pot, and hijiki bibimbap! The flavors and textures kept changing, so I never got tired of it all the way through the meal.

And if you add a pork cutlet on top like we did… you'll be stuffed, everyone haha. But you get to eat a lot of variety, so no regrets 😽

How Bapeul Jitda differs from other Gyeongsan set-meal restaurants

After finishing a meal at Bapeul Jitda, I could really see why this place is different from other Korean set-meal restaurants. Rather than simply piling on more side dishes, it feels like they put more thought into which ingredients pair with which food.

• Abalone paired with geuu-jang and barley rice
• Chilled pork paired with garlic sauce and garlic chives
• Eggplant paired with yuxiang sauce
• Kkosiraegi paired with roasted seaweed
• Hijiki paired with oil blend and paprika gochujang

These are familiar ingredients, but the way they're eaten is slightly twisted each time, so "modern fusion Korean food" fits better than "traditional Korean set meal" 😋 So I'd recommend this to anyone who wants a different kind of set-meal experience from your typical Gyeongsan Korean restaurant.

Final verdict on Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch

If you're looking for somewhere in Gyeongsan to have a proper Korean meal with family, I'd recommend Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch. The store is clean, parking is generous, and best of all — despite being a Korean set meal, it's not the type where you get a pile of similar side dishes; every dish has its own cooking method and pairing, which I really loved.

Mixing set courses is also a good way to compare a range of Bapeul Jitda's menu at once 💙 Out of everything, the steamed abalone paired with geuu-jang barley rice stuck with me the most.

If you've been looking for a Gyeongsan Korean restaurant favorite for a meal with parents, a family gathering, a group gathering, or a day when you want to treat someone a little more nicely, save this one 📌 I'd love to come back with my parents next time. Recommending Bapeul Jitda Gyeongsan Main Branch, a Gyeongsan Korean-restaurant favorite.