Guui Station Korean BBQ with grilled eggplant and enoki: Ssamchae

Looking for a Korean BBQ place with good meat and plenty of wrap veggies? These days, grilling meat at home means dealing with the smell and the cleanup, so honestly it's just easier to go out. I found a really good spot in Guui and went to check it out. On top of that, a bunch of vegetables were free, and even the side dishes and extras were all delicious. It's been a while since my boyfriend and I both said, multiple times, "let's come back here again" haha. Let me introduce Ssamchae Sotttukkeong Samgyeopsal (쌈채솥뚜껑삼겹살), a Guui Station Korean BBQ spot worth knowing about.

Where is Ssamchae Sotttukkeong Samgyeopsal and when is it open?

Ssamchae Sotttukkeong Samgyeopsal is a short walk from exit 4 of Guui Station. It's on the 1st floor of the Jayang Hanulchae Verre apartment building, and there's a bus stop right outside.

🕑 Hours: Daily 12:00 – 24:00, last order 23:00

What is the inside of the restaurant like?

They apparently do minari shabu kalguksu (noodle soup) for lunch too. Draft beer, soju and beer are all cheap here, so anyone who likes to drink will probably love it haha.

There's one entrance but the inside is split into two sections, each with about 5-6 tables. What I liked right away was how clean it was. It's a BBQ restaurant, but there was no greasy feel at all — everything felt really fresh and comfortable.

Self-serve wrap greens, eggplant and enoki mushroom

Right as you walk in, there's a self-serve zone directly ahead — and the veggies here are insane. Lettuce, cabbage, and perilla leaf are the basics, plus spring cabbage, chicory and more, adding up to about 8 kinds of wrap greens. On top of that there's enoki mushroom, eggplant, and sweet pumpkin, and you can take as much as you want. I love grilling eggplant and my boyfriend loves grilling enoki mushroom, so we were both kind of moved by this haha.

These are the veggies I brought back — look how fresh they are, right?

Menu and how to order at Ssamchae Sotttukkeong Samgyeopsal

The menu is up on the wall in big letters. These days some places only give you 150g of pork belly or pork neck, so 200g at this price doesn't seem expensive at all. At Ssamchae Sotttukkeong Samgyeopsal you can choose between iron-lid or charcoal grill, and if you order 2+ servings you can mix both styles. We decided on the iron-lid since we wanted fried rice later!

My boyfriend was craving beef that day too, so we started with one serving of pork belly and one serving of premium beef short rib. Ordering is done through the tablet at the table.

What side dishes come with the meal?

Once you order, side dishes come out — wild garlic, kkodeuri-bbaegi (bitter greens pickle), baek-kimchi (white kimchi), gungchae jangajji (pickled aster stem), gat-kimchi (mustard leaf kimchi), and seasoned onion, among others. You can also grill bean sprouts, bracken, and kimchi. You can get more of the side dishes from the self-serve zone, and honestly all of them were above average.

How do the iron-lid pork belly and premium beef short rib taste?

And finally, the meat on the iron lid! They oiled the surface with pork fat first, then laid down the thick pork belly and premium beef short rib. Doesn't the meat quality already look good just from this?

They grilled the pork belly for us directly, while my boyfriend grilled the beef short rib on the side. I put eggplant and mushrooms on too, but I got distracted and slightly burned them oops haha. While the pork belly was cooking through perfectly, I quickly ate the beef short rib — the meat quality was so good that even just salt and wasabi tasted great...!!

They also gave us curry powder to dip the pork belly in. We usually eat about 2 servings of meat between the two of us, but the pork belly was so good we ended up adding one more serving haha. We finished off the leftover beef short rib and the extra iron-lid pork belly, and then—

Finishing the meal with fried rice

Of course we ended with fried rice! It had bean sprouts, kimchi, and minari (water celery) mixed in, and even though we were already full, we scraped the pan nearly clean haha. Eating rice wrapped up with the meat was also delicious. While eating, we both said we wished we lived near Guui Station so we could come back for this meat haha.

Is Ssamchae Sotttukkeong Samgyeopsal worth a visit?

Good quality meat, a wide variety of fresh wrap greens and vegetables, and delicious sides and extras — this place had all the things I look for in a Korean BBQ restaurant. I especially loved that there were so many kinds of wrap greens, plus vegetables like eggplant and mushrooms you could grill as much as you wanted. The pork belly was good enough that we added an unplanned extra serving haha. It's been a while since I found a Guui Station restaurant I liked this much. I genuinely enjoyed the meal, so if I ever end up around Seongsu or Konkuk, I think I'll come back again :)