Dasan Station beef BBQ: the order to grill 5 special cuts, Chadolpung

Where is Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch?

Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch (차돌풍) is a beef barbecue restaurant a few minutes' walk from Dasan Station. The Chadolpung sign runs vertically down a white tile wall.

The sign is lit, so it stands out even more at night. I'd heard it's a fairly well-known restaurant in Dasan, Namyangju.

Before you get seated, you end up reading the message on the wall: "Chadolpung's philosophy is sincerity. We will prepare our ingredients with all our sincerity." It feels less like interior decoration and more like a declaration.

What's in the Chadol Hanpan Kkotsal Set, and how much is it?

The Chadol Hanpan Kkotsal Set (차돌한판꽃살세트) at Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch costs ₩44,500 and brings five cuts on one platter: brisket (chadolbaegi), kkotsal, toshisal, anchangsal and buchaesal. You order on a tablet at the table, and the set menu tab shows the whole lineup at a glance. Among beef barbecue places around Dasan, there aren't many where you can try five special cuts at once at this price.

The meat arrived, sorted by cut in stainless steel bowls. A thick-sliced chunk, thin slices rolled up, short chunky pieces. The grain and color differ from cut to cut. Two green chili peppers and one king oyster mushroom sit on top in the middle. No fuss in the presentation.

In what order should you grill the special cuts?

The staff at Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch told us to start with the lean cuts and move on to the fatty ones. So we grilled toshisal and anchangsal first and the brisket last.

First, toshisal and anchangsal

First up are toshisal and anchangsal. Both have a coarse grain and a deep color. Toshisal is a muscle that supports the diaphragm, and only one piece comes from each cow. It's low in fat and has a strong, meaty flavor.

The brisket, Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch's signature item, looked to be in great condition too. It comes thinly sliced and rolled, with marbling spread out like a flower and fat finely threaded through.

On the grill it went. The moment the two pieces hit the grill, they sizzled. There isn't much marbling, so there isn't much smoke. You can already sense how clean-tasting it is just from the grilling.

Anchangsal is named because it looks like a shoe insole (anchang). It's the diaphragm of the cow, a breathing muscle that is always moving. That's why the fibers are thick but not tough. As it grills, the surface contracts and gets plumper. When you chew, the beefy aroma comes through strongly. These two cuts are eaten for the flavor of the meat itself, without greasiness, so they come first in the order.

I flipped them. The outside browns, and juices start to seep from the cut surface. At this point you snip it into bite-size pieces with scissors and eat.

Scallion sauce, sesame salt or pickled scallions: which works best?

For toshisal and anchangsal, I preferred the sesame salt to the soy-based scallion sauce. I started with the scallion sauce, which is finely chopped scallions in soy sauce. It suits the lean cuts well. The meat's own aroma stays intact and gets an extra layer of flavor.

I dipped in salt too. It's salt mixed with sesame seeds. It gets even closer to the pure taste of the meat than the sauce. For toshisal and anchangsal, the salt was better.

You can also eat it with pickled scallions. Put the meat on top of the shredded, seasoned scallions and pick them up together, and it finishes clean without any greasiness. It feels like resetting your mouth before the next cut.

Moving on to the fattier cuts

The next cut cooks fast because the grill is hot. It's heavily marbled, so the sizzle on the grill sounds different from the earlier cuts.

I dipped the fully grilled meat in salt. Add a pinch of salt to rich marbling and the nutty flavor really jumps out.

Brisket last

The last cut we grilled at Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch was the signature brisket (chadolbaegi). It's from the front chest, where fat and muscle are thinly layered. It's called chadolbaegi because the white fat is embedded in the lean meat like flecks of chadol (a flint-like stone). You spread the thin slices wide on the grill.

The brisket cooks quickly. As the fat melts, a rich, nutty aroma fills the whole grill. At this point, you understand why we started with the lean cuts. If we'd grilled the brisket first, it would have drowned out the flavor of everything after it.

Is the kkotsal set at Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch worth trying?

We finished the whole Chadol Hanpan Kkotsal Set platter in no time. After eating the five cuts in order, you realize there was a flow to it. They all came from the same cow, yet each cut is this different. If you're looking for a good beef barbecue place near Dasan Station, it's worth trying in this order at least once. By the time the grill cools down, you're already thinking about the next visit.

• Name: Chadolpung Dasan Station Branch (차돌풍 다산역점)
• Address: 22-74 Dasanjungang-ro 123beon-gil, Namyangju-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea (1st floor)
• Reservations available via Naver