Bucheon Korean BBQ with black pork and doenjang jjigae: Cham

These days when I'm craving pork belly, I don't just look for the nearest place — I look for somewhere with good meat quality and an easy dining experience. Especially when eating out with my wife, it's a plus if we don't have to grill the meat ourselves and can enjoy a variety of side dishes along with it. This time we went to Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch to eat pork belly in Bucheon's Sinjung-dong.

Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch offers a wide range of pork menus, from Boseong nokdon pork belly to Jirisan black pork belly and neck meat. That day we ordered the Jirisan black pork belly and neck meat. To cut to the chase — the meat quality was excellent!

A staff member grilled the meat for us, which made for an easy meal, and the well-grilled meat was full of juice, which was satisfying. Best of all, the combination of wrapping meat in grilled potato slices instead of the usual lettuce wraps was really delicious. Today I'll give an honest rundown of the atmosphere, the taste of the meat, and the side dishes at Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch, based on our visit.

Where is Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch, and how big is it?

Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch is inside the Sinjung-dong Station food alley, and it's a large restaurant with as many as 120 seats. It's set up wide open, so you can also enjoy the open-air terrace vibe.

With the cool weather these days, this is the best time of year to enjoy the rows of open-air terrace seating that line the Sinjung-dong Station food alley. Even though we visited early on a weekend evening, there were already plenty of people enjoying meals and drinks. I'd glimpsed the place in passing before, so it was easy to find.

• Name: Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch
• Main menu: Boseong nokdon pork belly, Jirisan black pork belly and neck, and more
• Ordered: Jirisan black pork belly, Jirisan black pork neck
• Features: staff grill the meat for you, tableside ordering system, spacious and open layout
• Recommended combos: black pork with minari (water dropwort), grilled potato slices with meat

This is a premium pork belly restaurant specializing in domestic grade-1 pork belly, smoked with rice husks for aroma and grilled over charcoal for proper BBQ. Since staff do all the grilling, it's an easy place to have a relaxed meal.

It's corkage-free, so it's also great for bringing your own good drinks to a fun gathering. I wish more restaurants offered corkage-free!

Inside, we could see meat aging on display. At Cham Dwaejitgan, you can choose from various pork belly and neck cuts to suit your taste.

Cham Dwaejitgan prices and how to order

Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch uses a tableside ordering system, so you can check the menu and order directly from the table. The Jirisan black pork belly (오겹살) was ₩19,000 for 160g, and the Jirisan black pork neck was ₩18,000 for 160g. Ordering both belly and neck like we did works well, and the menu seems easy to build around however many people you're with and what you're in the mood for.

Table setup and dining space at Cham Dwaejitgan

As soon as we ordered, they set up the grill plate and side dishes right away. On the wide grill plate, they set up minari (water dropwort), kimchi, and seasoned bean sprouts for grilling alongside the meat. Pork belly with kimchi and bean sprouts is great, but pork belly with minari is just as good!

Along with a few simple side dishes, each person gets an individual sauce plate. At Cham Dwaejitgan, in addition to salt, they serve spicy sauce, real wasabi, and shiitake mushroom wasabi sauce as standard, so you can enjoy a variety of flavors. The shiitake wasabi sauce in particular has a tangy, savory kick that's a real standout — make sure to try it.

Ordering Jirisan black pork belly and pork neck

First, our order of one serving each of Jirisan black pork belly and neck came out. Cham Dwaejitgan has various pork menus including Boseong nokdon pork belly, but this time we chose the Jirisan black pork. Even at a glance, the meat looked fresh and thick, and it looked delicious just from that.

Sliced potatoes come out with the meat too — this is for Cham Dwaejitgan's signature potato wrap combo. Cook the sliced potatoes until crispy and wrap the meat in them, and you'll experience a fresh combination unlike anything you've had before.

Mushrooms and cheongyang peppers are essential too. As soon as everything arrived, the staff member arranged it all neatly on the grill plate. She even showed us how to eat the lightly cooked minari first, taking it off the grill.

Oh, and when we ordered beer... the thoughtful touch of also giving us milk thistle stuck with me, and honestly, any restaurant that uses these hygienic sealed utensil pouches earns automatic respect from me. Hygiene really matters — it's a little unsettling using chopsticks and spoons that who-knows-who has touched.

What is it like having the staff grill the pork?

One thing that's subtly stressful at a pork belly restaurant is the grilling itself. Grill it wrong and it can overcook and get tough, or you lose track of it on the grill while chatting. But at Cham Dwaejitgan, a staff member grilled the meat directly for us, so we could eat comfortably.

Watching her grill the skin side of the pork belly (오겹살) so crispy really made me think — a pro is a pro! It looks delicious just from the visuals alone.

Little by little, the golden pork belly and neck meat came together. Hearing it sizzle away, I found myself reaching for my drink first.

She watched the condition of the meat and grilled it for us, so we could just chat and wait. In particular, pork belly and neck meat can differ in how long to grill and when they're best to eat depending on the cut, so having someone grill it for us made things much easier. I liked that I could enjoy the meal with my wife without worrying about the grilling, and I think anyone who wants a relaxed meal at a pork belly restaurant would welcome this kind of service.

You could tell at a glance the neck meat was thick and full of juice. The Jirisan black pork belly was also grilled beautifully and evenly. The skin crisped up, the fat turned springy, and finally the lean meat was grilled soft while staying full of juice.

How the Jirisan black pork neck tasted

The neck meat finished cooking first, and pieces were placed on our plate one by one. The thickness and nutty flavor unique to black pork neck made your mouth water just looking at it. Dipping it only in salt... the juices just burst in my mouth, again and again. It reminded me of the delicious black pork neck I once had in Jeju.

It also paired well with fresh minari. If pork belly's charm is its nuttiness and abundant juice, the neck meat was a bit cleaner-tasting, with a flavor that came through more the more you chewed. I was glad we'd ordered the neck meat too.

It also went well with fresh wasabi. Neck meat really needs to be grilled this thick, and they grilled it well.

How juicy is the Jirisan black pork belly?

Next up was the pork belly — well, actually black pork oh-gyeopsal (five-layer pork belly). We waited for it.

Wow — the visuals were genuinely gorgeous. Sliced thick and grilled well, it looked even more appetizing. I picked up a piece the staff member had grilled to the perfect point and tried it.

What stood out most on the first bite was the juiciness and nutty flavor. The meat had a moist feel when I chewed it, and pork belly's characteristic nuttiness came through well. Above all, it was satisfying that there was no dry, mealy feel — it was full of juice.

Sometimes when you're eating really good meat, you think it would taste great even without any sauce or side dishes — and that was the case with this black pork belly. It was good with a light dip in salt, and it was plenty delicious just tasting the meat on its own.

Potato wraps and doenjang jjigae at Cham Dwaejitgan

We also tried Cham Dwaejitgan's signature potato wrap the way the staff member showed us. The unexpectedly good match between the crispy potato-chip-like potato slices and the well-grilled pork belly really worked!

Good meat needs some carbs alongside it. We also ordered doenjang jjigae (soybean paste stew), which was savory, a little spicy, and generous. We kept wrapping bites and inhaling them — the two of us barely talking, haha.

Ordering more neck meat was a given — it was even better than the pork belly.

With good timing so the flow didn't break, the extra neck meat was ready — eating it with the shiitake wasabi sauce cut through any richness completely.

We kept wrapping bites in the potato slices too. That flavor had a surprisingly addictive charm. It was definitely different from the usual lettuce or perilla leaf wraps. The potato seems to gently support the meat's flavor while adding its own nuttiness, if that makes sense. There was fun in discovering this new combination while eating meat. I tried it out of curiosity at first, but it was so much better than expected that I wrapped meat in potato slices several more times.

Verdict: Cham Dwaejitgan for two

This time my wife and I ate Jirisan black pork belly and neck meat at Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch. Above all, the meat quality was good, and it was great to taste both the juicy pork belly and the clean-tasting neck meat. I also liked that a staff member grilled the meat for us so we could eat comfortably. The minari, kimchi, and bean sprouts served with the meat also paired well. In particular, the combination of wrapping black pork in grilled potato slices was the most memorable part of this visit.

If you're looking for a place to eat pork belly or neck meat in Bucheon's Sinjung-dong, Cham Dwaejitgan Bucheon Sinjung-dong Branch is worth considering. It seems like a great fit for anyone who wants to eat comfortably in a spacious, open space while enjoying good meat with a variety of sides. We had another delicious meal today.