Café-style pork bone grill lunch in Sinbu-dong, Cheonan: Sinbu Garden

Today I went for lunch at Sinbu Garden, a grilled pork bone place in Sinbu-dong! I go to Sinbu-dong a lot, so I know plenty of good spots there. I stopped by Sinbu-dong in Cheonan looking for a tasty lunch and suddenly had a craving for pork bones.

Sinbu Garden is in the Sinbu-dong food alley. Pork bones usually make you think of a gamjatang (pork bone stew) place, but Sinbu Garden serves stylish grilled pork bones in a clean, café-like setting, which really impressed me.

Where is Sinbu Garden in Cheonan, and where do you park?

Sinbu Garden, a pork bone lunch spot in Cheonan

Sinbu Garden is on the 2nd floor of a building in the Sinbu-dong food alley in Cheonan. Park at a nearby public parking lot and walk over, and it's an easy visit.

There are menu boards at the entrance too. We headed straight up to the 2nd floor.

Sinbu Garden's vibe: street-pub-style terrace and a clean interior

Up on the 2nd floor there's a separate outdoor area with a street-pub vibe. The weather has warmed up a lot, so plenty of people were eating outside.

We went inside, and everything from the exterior to the interior is kept very clean. Sinbu Garden is near the bus terminal, so it's easy to get to, and it's a perfect route for heading to a nearby café after your meal.

Further in there were even bigger spaces, and we sat in one of them and ordered.

What we ordered for lunch at Sinbu Garden

We ordered the set menu: 2 servings of grilled pork bones that comes with a rice ball and steamed egg. You can adjust the spice level too, so keep that in mind! As soon as we sat down, we saw instructions on how to enjoy Sinbu Garden best.

After we ordered, only onions and simple kkakdugi (cubed radish kimchi) came out, and that was the end of the side dishes! The onions were crunchy and tasty.

Rice balls first, plus a review-event freebie

And the rice ball came out first! It's drizzled with mayonnaise and has finely chopped pickled radish, so the texture was nicely chewy.

The bread and vegetables I got from the review event, haha. It tasted exactly like the "Keyonnaise" (mayo-dressed) vegetables I ate as a kid.

How do Sinbu Garden's grilled pork bones taste?

The strong smoky flavor hit me the moment the pork bones came out. The red seasoning was spread evenly and the bones were fire-grilled, and just looking at them made my mouth water. Eating them with the chili peppers on top made them spicier, and we ordered mild-spicy. The hottest level must be really hot, right?

The biggest worry with pork bones is meat that won't come off the bone, but at Sinbu Garden the meat was really tender. Just a light poke with chopsticks and big chunks of meat fell off along the grain. In your mouth it was moist and melting, not dry at all.

Stone-pot steamed egg to cool down the spice

The steamed egg in the set is the top helper for softly cooling down the spicy seasoning. It comes packed in a stone pot (ttukbaegi), so it stays warm to the end. And there was really a lot of egg, wasn't there?

How to make the DIY rice balls taste best

Shape the rice ball round and dunk it in the pork bone sauce, or put a piece of meat on top and eat it like sushi, and you'll feel pure carb happiness.

Sinbu Garden in Sinbu-dong, Cheonan: price and would I go back?

Sinbu Garden in Sinbu-dong catches two birds with one stone: it's clean and it's tasty. It breaks the prejudice that bone dishes are rustic, so I think it would make a satisfying meal whoever you go with.

At Sinbu Garden a meal came to about ₩30,000 range, which is really good value. It's a place students can eat at without worrying about the bill, and I enjoyed it a lot. I polished off a whole serving in no time, enough that I'd happily go back.