Korean BBQ pork skin and fresh wasabi pork belly in Siheung: Ssosam

Today I went to Ssosam 208, a Korean BBQ restaurant in Baegot — the staff at the Baegot branch grill the meat for you from start to finish, so I just sat back and ate comfortably.

Location & parking for Ssosam 208 in Baegot

Ssosam 208 is on the 1st floor of Dain Royal Palace 4-cha. It's near the Baegot central shopping district so it wasn't hard to find, and it's only about a 5-minute drive from Siheung Premium Outlets, so it's close enough for a date after outlet shopping!

For parking, you can use the building's underground lot. It's free for up to 2 hours and 30 minutes.

That said, I felt the entrance and interior of the underground lot were pretty narrow... If you use the public parking lot instead, they support ₩2,000 of the parking fee, so new drivers, please keep the nearby public lot in mind 😅

Interior and seating

The interior was bigger than I expected. It had full glass windows so it felt open, and the tables weren't crammed together uncomfortably. There's an 8-person table too, so it looked good for visiting with a group. Especially since staff grill the meat for you, it seems convenient for hanging out with friends or company dinners.

If you leave a Naver receipt review or join their Instagram event, you can get a drink or a discount, so if you visit, be sure to check out the events!

Menu and prices at Ssosam 208

The menu overall wasn't complicated and felt clean. There were sets good for 2-3 people as well as à la carte options, plus makchang (beef intestines), pork skin, and pork ribs. There were also meal-type dishes like kimchi jjim and stews, so it seemed like a good spot to come for a hearty meal, not just meat. We ordered the set that comes with both pork belly and pork neck.

• Marble pork belly set 49,000
• Marble pork belly 16,000
• Pork skin 8,000
• Cheese kimchi fried rice 5,000
• Flying fish roe steamed egg 4,500
• Doenjang stew 3,000

Marble pork belly set (pork belly 400g, pork neck 200g)

Ssosam 208 uses Korean pork slaughtered within 5 days, aged for 96 hours, and pre-grilled over charcoal, they say. Then it's grilled again at 208 degrees — maybe that's why the meat cooked so quickly.

The kimchi is from a HACCP-certified source, so I ate as much as I wanted without worry! They grill bean sprouts and kimchi together with the meat, and it was really delicious.

The staff member was grilling it perfectly! We didn't even need to touch the tongs — they watched the state of the meat and grilled it for us, so we could just focus on eating.

The side dish was spicy rice noodle soup! It was my first time seeing rice noodle soup at a pork belly restaurant, but it was nice for whetting the appetite before the meal. You can get one free refill of the noodles.

A grill plate with separate spots for kimchi and bean sprouts

This grill plate was quite impressive! There was a separate space for grilling kimchi and bean sprouts, and the space for placing the finished meat was also pretty spacious.

If you grill meat and kimchi together, the meat ends up covered in kimchi sauce, right...! This grill plate was a revolution, a total revolution. Especially the bean sprouts and kimchi grilled in the meat's fat — eating them together with the meat was really delicious.

For sauces there were garlic wasabi sauce, salted fermented shrimp (melljeot), Maldon salt, cumin seasoning, ssamjang, and more, so we could pick based on our taste.

Flying fish roe steamed egg & doenjang stew

Steamed egg packed full of flying fish roe! The egg itself was soft and slightly sweet, and the roe added a fun popping texture. Eating a bite of meat followed by a spoonful of steamed egg was a great combo.

The doenjang stew had thin-sliced beef brisket (usamgyeop) in it. The broth was rich and savory from the beef fat, good for scooping up in between bites.

Pork belly with fresh wasabi on request

Now it's meat time! We wrapped it in a perilla leaf with meat and grilled onion for one bite.

Being pork belly, it had a nice chewy (kkodeul) texture.

My husband loves wasabi so much that we asked for fresh wasabi separately! Piling it on and dipping the meat in salt — that's the essence of it.

Personally, this was my first time trying wasabi sauce at a Korean BBQ place, and it was so good?!

Ordering extra pork skin — do they grill that too?

After the pork belly, we got curious about the regular samgyeopsal too, so we ordered it along with pork skin as extras. At most BBQ places, staff only grill the meat you order first, but at Ssosam 208, they grilled the extra order for us too.

It had been a while since I had pork skin — dipped in soybean powder, it was savory and chewy, a great way to wrap up the meal. Personally, I liked the pork belly more than the regular samgyeopsal.

Finishing with cheese kimchi fried rice

As a carb lover, I always finish with fried rice.

The amount of cheese in it was so generous I was surprised when I first saw it. It was basically cheese rice haha.

With all that cheese, the savory flavor was great, but for me the seasoning was a little bland. So I added some of the kimchi we'd grilled earlier, and the seasoning was just right 👍

In summary

It was great being able to eat and chat comfortably without worrying about grilling. The restaurant is spacious with plenty of seating for groups, so I'd recommend it for family dinners, gatherings, or company dinners :)