Incheon all-you-can-eat eel with Shin Ramyeon: Jangsodam A Set

At some point, all-you-can-eat eel became a whole thing, didn't it? There used to be no eel buffets in my neighborhood, and then they started popping up one by one — now there are like 3-4 in Cheongna alone? Among them, Jangsodam Eel and Beef Buffet (장소담) sits in the busiest part of Cheongna, an all-you-can-eat eel buffet in Cheongna, Incheon. Today I'm sharing my review of that visit. 👍

How to choose a set at Jangsodam Cheongna: the 39,000-won A Set

Jangsodam Cheongna Main Branch is an eel buffet, but you can choose from Sets A through D, so if you can't eat eel, you can go for the C Set which includes beef, or the D Set which includes pork! 😘 The price for the A Set — the one that includes everything — is ₩39,000 per adult, and if you tackle the eel properly, you'll come out way ahead.

How Jangsodam Cheongna works and what the 120-minute limit covers

There's a 120-minute time limit (for the eel set), but honestly... 120 minutes is enough time for our family to go through rounds one through three. During this very generous 120 minutes, we were burning with the will to conquer everything 🔥

What's unlimited at the Jangsodam self-bar besides the meat

What sets Jangsodam Cheongna Main Branch apart from other eel buffets is the wide range of options you can eat beyond eel and meat, as shown below. 🎶

Pork and chicken are placed at the self-bar so you can grab them easily (beef and eel come right away if you order via kiosk), and beyond that there were vegetables and fries that everyone loves, and — my personal weakness — snack bar items like sundae (blood sausage) and tteokbokki (spicy rice cakes), which I loved.

We were hungry so there was a lot we wanted to eat, but since our goal was eel and beef, we only piled our plates high with things we really wanted. Ah... if only my stomach were sturdier...

The main event: grilled eel and beef at Jangsodam Cheongna

What's the main event...? Eel, of course 🎉🔥😆 They say they use domestic Japonica freshwater eel, and oh — the eel is pretty plump and hearty.

Compared to other eel, this one has more meat on it, so it's deliberately sliced thin for easy cooking... even sliced that thin, one bite filled my whole mouth. Truly big, hearty eel 👍👍👍

As soon as it's grilled, we dig in eagerly 💕 Eating it plain, and also dipping it endlessly in my favorite ginger-pickled soy sauce 🥳

Next up, beef time. On the first order they bring out a heaping plate of eel and beef together, so as soon as we finished off the eel, we started grilling the beef. The beef comes with various cuts too, from yukhoe (beef tartare) onward. We're not big yukhoe fans, so we grilled all of it 🔥🔥

We dipped this in various things too, like onion sauce and salt... We went in expecting the eel, but the beef turned out surprisingly good, so our chopsticks went into full battle mode.

Yeonpyeong crab and Han River-style ramyeon to finish — then one more half eel

With our A Set, you can order the soy or spicy kkotgejang (marinated crab) once, free of charge. (Additional orders are ₩4,000, so it's still a good deal.) We ordered ours when we were about halfway full, since once you're too full you can't enjoy the crab. Maybe because it uses Yeonpyeong crab, but it was better than expected 😊 Not quite as good as a specialty crab restaurant, but better than the crab you get as a side at a regular galbi place. We honestly don't know much about crab flavor, so we ate it thinking, 'this is pretty good, right?' haha.

I thought we'd wrap up around here, but oh my... our little one's appetite went wild. She used to only eat cup ramyeon, but now she's onto cooked packet ramyeon too...?

She asked for Shin Ramyeon to be cooked, and even though her stomach was already completely full, she pushed it all in anyway... Amazing. Growing kids are truly amazing.

But that's not the end either... this meal wasn't meant to wrap up that simply. Something still felt missing, so we ordered extra grilled seasoned pork ribs and half an eel! 💃🕺 (And that's how our stomachs exploded, apparently.)

A day of filling up completely on eel plus a variety of meats and self-bar dishes 🎉🥳✨ (Of course, by the next day it'll all be gone via... you know 😭) Highly recommend it whenever you want to eat your absolute fill of eel, or want a no-pressure meal out with growing kids.