Eel restaurant near Deoksugung: ochazuke with eel kept on top, Tawa

What kind of place is Tawa near Deoksugung?

Tawa (타와) is a Japanese restaurant near City Hall Station in Seoul, famous for its eel rice bowls. The interior is upscale and tidy, so it works for a date or for taking your parents, and plenty of people come to eat alone too.

Where is Tawa, and what about hours and parking?

Tawa is in the basement of Hansan Building, right in front of you when you come out of City Hall Station Exit 10. You can tell from the entrance that it's a clean, neat Japanese restaurant.

• Address: 102, B1F Hansan Building, 115 Seosomun-ro, Jung-gu, Seoul, South Korea
• Hours: 10:00-21:00 (break time 15:00-16:00)
• Closed: Sundays

📍Parking: There's paid parking in Hansan Building, so keep that in mind! One hour is covered.

What are the atmosphere and seating like inside Tawa?

Tawa feels like an upscale Japanese restaurant, with quite a lot of private rooms, so it's good for group meals. There are seats suited to solo diners too, and the soft indirect lighting really gives it a classy mood.

Most seats are 4-person tables, and the clean yet modern interior gives this City Hall restaurant a warm feel.

What's on the menu at Tawa?

Eel rice bowls are the main menu at Tawa, and there are also tuna, kaisendon (sashimi rice bowl), sashimi and other dishes that suit lunch or dinner. There are also menu items around ₩10,000, like Japanese curry, shogayaki (ginger pork) set, umakarabuta (spicy pork) and soft tofu stew, so you can eat here without stress.

They have Asahi draft beer too, just so you know!

The table has a detailed guide to enjoying the eel rice bowl: eat it as is, with condiments, as ochazuke (rice in green tea), and finally however you like.

Hitsumabushi and kaisendon: ordering one of each

• Hitsumabushi ₩30,000
• Kaisendon ₩25,000

We ordered the eel rice bowl (hitsumabushi) and the kaisendon. The food came out neat, like a Japanese home-style meal (gajeong-sik), and looked appetizing. The bottle that comes with the hitsumabushi holds green tea, and pouring it over the rice and topping it with eel is totally delicious 😗😗

What goes on Tawa's kaisendon?

Tawa's kaisendon comes topped with flatfish, salmon, tuna, small squid and anko-kimo (monkfish liver). The anko-kimo in particular added extra savory depth.

You can tell at a glance the aged sashimi is fresh, in big chunks, and so appetizing my mouth was watering.

I piled perilla leaf, anko-kimo, wasabi and tuna on a piece of seaweed, and the different flavors popped in my mouth 😍 This was much better than the kaisendon I had in Japan, a real City Hall winner. Koreans really do seem to do best at places made for Korean tastes.

The tuna was especially good and melted in my mouth. Even a little wasabi is spicy, so careful!!

How did Tawa's hitsumabushi eel taste?

The eel in Tawa's hitsumabushi is grilled with a generous coating of sauce, and my mouth watered from the look of it alone. There's plenty of eel, cut small for easy one-bite eating, so I think it would be good for older people too.

The plump flesh has a great chew, and above all the faint charcoal aroma lifted the savory flavor.

A little wasabi on top keeps it from feeling greasy and makes the savory flavor pop.

Wrapping it in seaweed with perilla leaf and ginger also gave the feeling of eating a ssam (wrap) at an eel restaurant.

Hitsumabushi ochazuke: should the eel go in the tea too?

The green tea ochazuke of Tawa's hitsumabushi is a flavor you must try. My tip: if you put the eel in too, the sauce washes off, so I preferred pouring green tea over just the rice and keeping the eel on top!

Of all the ways to eat it, having it with warm green tea was probably the one that suited me best.

It was so good that I scraped the bowl clean.

Thoughtful details I noticed at Tawa

Tawa even has a certificate of origin for its freshwater eel, so you can eat with confidence.

The owner's thoughtfulness even extends to dental floss by the entrance.

Tawa is good for dates and anniversaries as well as a simple lunch, and I can strongly recommend this tidy, tasty Japanese restaurant near Deoksugung!