Jecheon Chinese restaurant for jjajangmyeon and cream tangsuyuk

Nangman Jjajang in Jecheon with Our Baby

We were traveling to Jecheon with our baby and wondering what to have for lunch, when we picked Nangman Jjajang (낭만짜장), a restaurant on a local Jecheon foodie-recommendation list! Everyone, young and old, loves jjajangmyeon (noodles in black bean sauce), and I heard the pork tenderloin tangsuyuk (sweet-and-sour fried pork) used good ingredients, so it seemed like something we could share with the baby too.

• 2-41 Uirim-daero 48-gil, Jecheon-si, Chungcheongbuk-do, South Korea
• Daily 10:00–19:30
• Parking is available in the space out front!

Care You Can Feel in the Ingredients and Space

Nangman Jjajang started in Nowon-gu, Seoul, then relocated and reopened near Uirimji Reservoir in 2014! A quick search shows just how much philosophy and pride the owner brings to the food.

• Korean ingredients
• Using regional specialties and local food
• Using chilled rather than frozen ingredients
• Reducing white flour

What a wonderful owner...!

You can feel how wonderful the owner is in the wide spacing between tables and the pleasant dining room!

Nangman Jjajang makes its own noodles: they are prepared in the restaurant every morning and cooked once an order comes in. They also use Korean chili powder and Korean beef bone broth! You can see exactly why I felt comfortable sharing it with our baby, right? Food made with so much care!

Even the self-serve bar was spotless! When a restaurant's self-serve bar is messy, it somehow feels unhygienic, but this one was truly clean and thoughtfully stocked with a great variety. The staff kept refilling and wiping it down too!

Ordering Tray Jjajangmyeon and Cream Tangsuyuk

There were, of course, so many menu options! Everything looked delicious, but after some deliberation we ordered the popular tray jjajangmyeon and cream tangsuyuk. The tray jjajangmyeon was described as slightly spicy, but the baby could not eat it anyway, haha—so we went with what we wanted!

We brought back side dishes from the self-serve bar and read about Nangman Jjajang, a Uirimji Reservoir favorite, while we waited; the food came out in no time. The house-made pickles were really delicious too!

Cream Pork Tenderloin Tangsuyuk Without the Heaviness

Cream pork tenderloin tangsuyuk! My husband usually loves pork tenderloin cutlets and I love cream sauce, so we ordered it thinking, oh, this will be good... and then we found the tangsuyuk of our lives.... There was absolutely no porky smell; it was so, so, so moist, crisp outside, and chewy with glutinous rice batter... the best! But the sauce was really not heavy at all—nutty, sweet, a little tangy perhaps, and nutty. The sauce was the real kicker!

The thinly sliced onions, corn, and peas on top were such a kicker too! A gathering of kickers, you could say! It was seriously delicious! This was not the cream sauce you would normally imagine! Our baby does not usually like meat much, but wanted some so badly that I cut off just the inside portion for them. They skipped their rice and just nibbled away at the meat.

Mixing Rice into Lightly Spicy Tray Jjajangmyeon

The tray jjajangmyeon that came out next was amazing too! It was loaded with baby octopus, shrimp, broccoli, and onions.

The tray jjajangmyeon was lightly spicy with a perilla-leaf aroma, and it was a perfect match with the cream pork tenderloin tangsuyuk.

We are a big-eating couple, but the portion was seriously huge. I saw people around us mixing rice into it, and I hugely, hugely recommend doing the same! The noodles were wonderfully springy, and the sauce was so substantial that it was perfect with rice!

It was glistening! I could see why it is famous as a local Jecheon favorite. It tasted like we had found such a life-changing restaurant in Jecheon that we needed to travel back there again....

Our sweet baby sat nicely and happily ate the tangsuyuk meat. You could really taste the quality ingredients, and the portions were generous too! Honestly, I thought it would be difficult to find a life-changing restaurant in a tourist destination, but we found our life-changing Chinese restaurant!!!!! I truly, truly recommend Nangman Jjajang, a Uirimji Reservoir favorite, for babies, families, and couples alike. This two-dish combination is the best!