Cheonan gejang restaurant with mild yangnyeom crab: Kkotgeok

I went to a crab restaurant today!!! Since my very first blog post was about crab, and I really really really love crab, I heard there's a soy crab place in Cheonan that's dog-friendly, so I went 😆 Let's start the Kkotgeok review!!

• ⛺️ 204 Yuryang-ro, Building A 1F, Dongnam-gu, Cheonan-si, Chungcheongnam-do, South Korea
• ⏰️ 11:00 ~ 21:00
• 🚗 Parking: lot in front of the restaurant

Kkotgeok Cheonan Yuryang-dong Branch: hanok exterior and parking

Kkotgeok Cheonan Yuryang-dong Branch is a hanok-style crab restaurant with a tiled roof at 204 Yuryang-ro, and you can park right in the lot in front of the restaurant. Here's the exterior — the place is so big I was genuinely surprised 🥹 The tiled roof gives off such strong hanok vibes, it made me feel even more fond of the place hahaha.

Since the restaurant is huge, the parking lot is~ also spacious. Isn't a restaurant with easy parking just the best?!? The parking spots are right in front and there's plenty of room 👏👏👏

What are the interior and the dog-friendly annex like?

The interior of Kkotgeok is spacious, clean, and has a high-end feel, and dogs are allowed in the annex building. The inside is really spacious and has such a clean, tidy feeling!! It gives off a totally different vibe from the exterior — the interior design feels upscale?!? The chandelier hanging from the ceiling seems to make the atmosphere even nicer 😆

This is the restroom. The inside of the restroom was clean too, and they even had mouthwash, so it seemed like a nice touch to rinse with mouthwash before heading out after eating.

This is the annex where dogs are allowed. Doesn't it look totally clean even though dogs are allowed here!!!!! When I actually saw it in person, it was neatly organized and there wasn't any pet hair 👍

Menu and what to order: the Kkotgeok B Set

Kkotgeok's menu has all sorts of options — set menus, full-course meals, à la carte items, and even takeout menus — and we ordered the Kkotgeok B Set (baby-egg crab set for two + sous vide pork belly)!!

There were posters stuck up here and there on the walls, and I noticed one for iced draft beer,,,,, I'm craving it so bad even in the middle of the day ㅠㅠㅠㅠ

There was this paper placed at each seat next to the utensils!! It said they use Yeonpyeong Island crab and age it three times — I'm super excited to see how good it'll taste 👏

Next to the table there were napkins, plastic gloves, paper cups, sesame oil, and a bin for crab shells. They said if you write a Naver review, you get one crispy vegetable pancake as a free service ><

Side dishes and the full table spread

This is how the basic side dishes were set up! There was a good variety of banchan, and it came with rice and seaweed soup too — it wasn't salty, had just the right seasoning, and the seaweed soup went perfectly with the crab hahaha. Since crab tends to be salty on its own, it makes sense that the side dishes should be mild so you don't get sick of it 😆

Took a photo of the whole spread haha. Now let's go taste everything one by one!

Sous vide boiled pork with white kimchi

Alright~ here comes the sous vide pork belly. There was no gamey smell at all, and best of all it was so tender, not chewy, and just really delicious!!! I'm the type who thinks pork belly needs a decent mix of fat rather than being all lean meat, and this had just the right balance — so good ㄷr....☆

The pork belly was great with the vegetables that came alongside it, and it was also a perfect match with the white kimchi!!!! I'd vote for eating it with white kimchi 🤭

Soy crab shell butter rice is the highlight

The long-awaited soy crab makes its appearance. Doesn't it look packed with roe just at a glance...? The crab shell is also perfect for mixing with rice!!!! At a lot of crab places the soy sauce tends to be salty, but this one wasn't too salty, the seasoning was just right, so it was fine to pour in a generous amount of soy sauce ><

The amount of roe and meat is insane....♡ Mix it up~~~

Mixing rice into the crab shell is a must now!!!! They give you a pat of butter at each seat, and when you add butter, sesame oil, and rice into the shell and mix it with the meat, it's absolute heaven~

Eating it like that is seriously, seriously delicious.

You know it's also delicious wrapped in seaweed, right!!! This time I wrapped up the butter, rice, crab meat, and sesame oil in seaweed, and it was also amazing...♡

Is the yangnyeom crab spicy? Not really

Kkotgeok's spicy marinated crab was at a spice level even I, someone who's terrible with spice, could handle haha. At a lot of crab restaurants the seasoning is so spicy that even if you want to eat the spicy crab you can't, but this wasn't spicy at all so I got to eat it with rice to my heart's content ><

The spicy crab was also loaded with meat ㅠㅠ. And of course, mixing it with rice is a must!!! Can you see how completely cleaned out the rice bowl is.....? I added one extra bowl of rice and ate it all up properly hahahaha

On the way out after finishing, there's a self-serve station with pomegranate juice, plum tea, and coffee! I drank both the pomegranate juice and plum tea~~~ I ate so much I was way too full, so I sipped the plum tea to help digest 🤣🤣

Final verdict on Kkotgeok in Yuryang-dong

The crab was so packed with roe and meat that I ate it with real enjoyment, and the interior gave off a proper Korean-style feel — while I was eating I looked around and saw older diners enjoying their meal too, so it seemed like a great place to bring parents 👏 We had the B Set, but a lot of people seemed to be eating the C Set which comes with crab stew too...? The smell of crab stew kept wafting over the whole time I ate, and I almost ended up ordering it too 🤣🤣 If I come back again, I'll be sure to try one of the other sets ❣️