Saturday lunch at Ttukbangjip, a Sajik-dong pork grill in Cheongju

Today I want to introduce a Korean restaurant in Sajik-dong, Cheongju 🤗 I went to Japan last week! Before leaving, I somehow really wanted proper Korean food, and while searching around I found a place that had opened not long ago — it grills charcoal gochujang pork right after you order, and it looked amazing haha.

It looked delicious just from the photos, and sure enough the smoky charcoal gochujang pork was so good that I properly recharged on Korean food before flying off to Japan 😆 This is my review of Ttukbangjip, a restaurant in Sajik-dong, Cheongju — let's get into it~~ 👏👏

Where is Ttukbangjip, and why is it open only 4 hours for lunch?

Ttukbangjip is located at 435 Musimseo-ro, 1F, Seowon-gu, Cheongju, Chungbuk, and it's only open Tuesday through Sunday from 11:00 to 15:00. Last order is at 14:00, it's closed every Monday, and parking is available.

Here's the exterior of Ttukbangjip! You can park right in front of the restaurant, and there's plenty of street parking nearby too haha. And I don't know if you can see the banner, but this place is only open for 4 hours a day, just for lunch!! If you want to eat here, you have to hurry over at lunchtime 🤭 Honestly, seeing those hours made me think — this must really be a good restaurant lol.

Here's the interior! It was Saturday lunch, but there were even people drinking, probably because the food makes such good "anju" (drinking food) haha. It was delicious just eaten with rice, but with all that smoky gochujang pork, I did find myself thinking about soju too 😆

What's on the self-serve side dish bar at Ttukbangjip?

At Ttukbangjip, you grab extra side dishes yourself from a self-serve bar. Everything served as a basic side is there — lettuce, perilla leaves, napgul kimchi (napa cabbage kimchi), stir-fried fish cake, stir-fried zucchini, radish, and more!

Lettuce, perilla leaves, napa cabbage kimchi, stir-fried fish cake, stir-fried zucchini, radish — everything that comes out as a side is all there!

There are also disposable aprons available, so feel free to use one~

Outside there's a space where they grill the meat the moment you order! You can even see the used-up charcoal haha. Because it's grilled right away, the smoky flavor is insane 🤭

If you write a Naver review, you get a bottle of local Cheongju makgeolli or kimchi-mari guksu (cold noodles in kimchi broth)! The icy kimchi-mari guksu here looked really good too, and getting to try it just for writing a review..!! That seems so great 🤗

Ttukbangjip menu and prices

Here's the menu board! It's a simple menu haha. The main dish is only charcoal gochujang pork 👏👏 You can order it starting from 2 people, and extra meat comes at a slightly cheaper price haha. For meals, there's basically just the kimchi-mari guksu~ Cheonggukjang comes as one free bowl the first time you order meat 😆 For drinks there's soju, beer, and makgeolli, plus other beverages too 🤗

• Charcoal gochujang pork for 2 — ₩28,000
• Rice x2 — ₩2,000

First, they set the table with the basic side dishes haha.

I loved that the water was maybe barley tea? I'm not totally sure it was barley tea, but lol, it had a nice toasty flavor haha.

The basic side dishes are just like what I showed at the self-serve bar earlier — lettuce, perilla leaves, stir-fried fish cake, napa cabbage kimchi, stir-fried zucchini, radish pickles, chili peppers, garlic, and so on~ All the sides were rice-thieves, but especially the sweet and tangy radish pickles went so well with the gochujang pork 😆

How do the charcoal gochujang pork and free cheonggukjang taste?

After a short wait, the charcoal gochujang pork arrived right away!! Wow, even before it reached our table, the smoky charcoal smell was already wafting over lol.

And the amazing part is that a bowl of cheonggukjang comes free with the order!! It arrived still bubbling hot, and the ingredients inside were seriously generous..!! There was meat in it, plus lots of vegetables like tofu and zucchini, making for a rich, savory cheonggukjang haha. Even Geunmong, who doesn't usually eat cheonggukjang, said it was delicious and ate it happily 🤤

When the meat came out, spicy green onion salad came along with it!! They mixed it up for us right there haha.

The green onion salad had more of a spicy kick than a tangy one, but I actually liked that better! The tangy flavor was covered by the radish pickles, so the charcoal gochujang pork paired with that spicy kick was delicious too 🤭

Now for the real charcoal gochujang pork eating~👏👏

Can you see the edges are slightly charred from the fire?! The smoky flavor is really great and it's so glossy and glistening haha.

The charcoal gochujang pork wasn't overly sweet or salty — it felt like just the umami of gochujang was maximized, so it was delicious even just piled on rice by itself, but!

Eating it together with the tangy radish pickles and the spicy green onion salad was also a great combination haha. Especially since the radish pickles were tangy, almost like ssammu (thin pickled radish wraps), my hand kept reaching for them 😆

Geunmong even neatly wrapped it up into a ssam (lettuce wrap) haha lol.

Is Ttukbangjip in Sajik-dong, Cheongju worth a second visit?

I found Ttukbangjip, a restaurant in Sajik-dong, Cheongju, while searching for a proper Korean restaurant before leaving for Japan! At first, seeing that they only do business for 4 hours at lunch made me think — is this really that good a place? Lol. Luckily, our available time happened to line up exactly with their hours, so we visited with no issues, but I think people who can only make it in the evening would be so disappointed... because this charcoal gochujang pork is SO SO SO good!!!

Since it's grilled outdoors on charcoal by the owner personally the moment you order, it comes out piping hot with real, proper smoky charcoal flavor 🤤 It's already delicious with just meat and rice, but eaten together with the tangy radish pickles and spicy green onion salad, the rice just slides right down — it's a total rice-thief 😆 Plus the free cheonggukjang was savory with generous ingredients, so it ended up being a really filling and satisfying lunch haha. I was just sad there's no restaurant like this near my house...

If you want delicious charcoal gochujang pork in Cheongju, or if you want grilled pork loaded with smoky charcoal flavor, I highly recommend Ttukbangjip, a Korean restaurant in Sajik-dong, Cheongju!! 👍👍