Gat kimchi pilaf and gorgonzola pizza at Ravenna, ocean-view Yeosu

A Yeosu pasta restaurant recommendation: Ravenna

If you're traveling in Yeosu, you really should have at least one meal with a view of the sea, right? Today I went to Ravenna in Soho-dong, Yeosu. It's a Western-style restaurant with an ocean view, so it's great for setting the mood while eating during your trip, and the menu ranges from pasta to risotto, pilaf, and pizza, so it was a great spot to visit with a group and order a bit of everything. Above all, the restaurant is quite spacious and clean, and it was busy with people too — I could tell this is a place a lot of people in Yeosu go to. And that day, I properly ate my way through several dishes.

An ocean-view restaurant in Soho-dong, Yeosu, where you eat while looking at the sea

Ravenna is located in Soho-dong and is an ocean-view restaurant with a sea view.

There's a spacious parking lot on the first floor, so parking was easy, and the building has an elevator, so it looked fine for visitors with strollers or anyone who has trouble getting around. The interior is also quite spacious.

The tables weren't packed tightly together — there was room to breathe and the whole place felt clean, so it was good for family visits and also good for a meal during a trip.

And above all, since you can see the sea through the window, it definitely feels more like a trip than just eating a meal. In Yeosu, you really have to see the ocean.

Ravenna's menu — we ordered a bit of everything

We ordered quite a lot that day.

• Gat kimchi pilaf (mustard leaf kimchi pilaf)
• Chicken cream risotto
• Hot seafood ttukbaegi pasta (served in a stone pot)
• Miso bulgogi pasta
• Gorgonzola pizza

And no, this wasn't just the two of us eating.

We visited with a group and ordered a wide variety. Looking at everything we'd ordered, we looked less like people who'd come to a Western restaurant and more like people who'd come to conquer the entire menu. But if you're visiting with several people, splitting a bunch of dishes like this seems like a great idea.

My personal favorite: the gat kimchi pilaf

Let me start with the dish I enjoyed the most — I'd recommend the gat kimchi pilaf. It's said to be Ravenna's signature pilaf dish, stir-fried with pork neck cubes and gat kimchi (mustard leaf kimchi). At first I wondered how well gat kimchi and pilaf would go together, but after trying it, the combination worked surprisingly well.

The savory pork neck cubes paired with the tangy, sharp flavor of the gat kimchi kept the dish from feeling heavy, and I just kept eating. The pork neck cubes had a great meaty bite when chewed, and the gat kimchi really pulled the whole flavor together. Most Western dishes lean heavy with cream or cheese, so having the gat kimchi pilaf in the mix balanced things out nicely. Of everything I ate that day, the gat kimchi pilaf was my favorite. Highly recommend this one.

Chicken cream risotto — soft enough that kids would probably love it too

Next up, the chicken cream risotto. The cream sauce was soft and savory, so it was an easy, mellow dish with no sharp flavors. It had chicken mixed in too, so the texture wasn't boring, and being a cream-sauce-and-rice combo, it seemed like something most people would like.

Especially for families looking for good food in Yeosu with kids, this dish seems worth ordering. If you have kids who can't handle spicy food, the chicken cream risotto was a relatively safe, easy option. Good flavor for anyone who likes cream.

Spicier than expected: the hot seafood ttukbaegi pasta

Then there's the hot seafood ttukbaegi pasta, which sounds spicy just from the name. It's a pasta combining fresh seafood with a rich tomato sauce, and it was spicier than I expected.

I actually liked that. The tomato sauce was rich, and with the spicy kick added on top, it wasn't heavy at all — the kind of dish you just keep eating.

There was a variety of seafood in it, which tasted great with the noodles. Since there are a lot of cream and cheese dishes on the menu, having this kind of spicy tomato pasta as one of your orders felt like a good idea. If you're ordering several dishes, I'd personally recommend making sure to include one spicy option like this.

Miso bulgogi pasta — a different kind of combination

I also tried the miso bulgogi pasta. As the name suggests, it's a dish where you get bulgogi (marinated beef) and pasta together, so it had a somewhat different feel from a typical pasta.

It had that distinctive savory depth of bulgogi, so even though it's a Western dish, the flavor felt familiar. If you're visiting with a group and splitting several dishes, this one is worth ordering too. Having a wide variety of pasta types to choose from to suit your taste also seems to be one of Ravenna's strengths.

And finishing it off properly with gorgonzola pizza

And of course, pizza can't be left out. We also ordered the gorgonzola pizza. It's a solid, no-frills dish where you really taste the savory flavor of the cheese, so it went well alongside the pasta and pilaf.

Especially when eating with a group, adding a pizza makes the meal feel a lot more abundant. You eat some pasta, grab a slice of pizza, eat some pilaf, grab another slice of pizza — and before you know it, the plates are empty.

A recommended meal stop during a Yeosu trip

Overall, after eating through the menu, Ravenna felt like a solid candidate when you're looking for good restaurants in Yeosu. Above all, having a sea view made it great for setting a travel mood, and the spacious, clean interior made it fine for family visits too.

The menu isn't limited to just pasta — with pilaf, risotto and pizza too, it was easy for a group to each order what they were in the mood for. And my top pick of the day was, without question, the gat kimchi pilaf. Gat kimchi is such a Yeosu thing, and putting it into a pilaf worked far better than I expected. With the pork neck cubes added in, the combination of meat and gat kimchi was great, and it also paired well with the other cream-based dishes.

If you're looking for good pasta in Yeosu, I'd recommend ordering one pasta dish along with the gat kimchi pilaf. And if you like spicy food, the hot seafood ttukbaegi pasta is also a good pick. Coming to Yeosu, looking at the sea, eating something delicious, and then heading back out to explore — that's exactly the kind of course this made for. If I come back to Yeosu, I think I'll order the gat kimchi pilaf again. If you want a Western-style meal with an ocean view in Yeosu, I recommend Ravenna. That's all for now.