Pyeongtaek lamb restaurant with spicy noodle soup: Hwaro Yangmi

Today is my last day in Pyeongtaek 🥲 While deciding what to eat for my final meal, I found a lamb specialty restaurant near home and decided to visit.

Getting to Hwaro Yangmi Pyeongtaek Court Branch and parking

Once again, I drove. If you enter the destination into navigation, it guides you to the alley at the back; follow it and you will find the parking lot right away. The restaurant is not very visible from the back, though, so it may be a little confusing on your first visit.

Hwaro Yangmi Pyeongtaek Court Branch is on the second floor of the Nogeoldae Gamjatang building. Look for the Nogeoldae Gamjatang sign and the brick-colored parking-lot floor, and it is easy to find.

The restaurant entrance is at the front of the building.

This is the inside of Hwaro Yangmi. Most tables seat four to six people, so it looked like a good option for family meals or larger groups, too.

The side dishes were myeongi namul (pickled wild garlic leaves), zha cai, and salted peanuts. The myeongi namul and zha cai were great alongside lamb, while the peanuts were nutty and salty—the kind of thing that would be perfect with beer. Tsingtao immediately came to mind, but sadly I had to drive 🥲

Special set with lamb loin, shoulder rack, and marinated ribs

As you would expect from a lamb specialty restaurant, there were many lamb dishes, as well as a good selection of meal dishes including jisanxian, mala tang, and mapo tofu.

We ordered the two-person special set. It comes with marinated ribs, lamb loin, and shoulder rack all on one platter.

First, the lamb loin and shoulder rack went onto the grill. Hwaro Yangmi says staff grill the meat for you when the restaurant is not busy. We visited at an in-between time in the afternoon and were the only customers, so a staff member practically grilled everything for us exclusively haha. It will probably be busier in the evening, so you may need to grill it yourselves depending on the situation.

They served us the perfectly grilled lamb loin, and maybe because a professional cooked it, the meat was incredibly tender and bursting with juices—insanely delicious haha.

I once had lamb curry at an Indian curry restaurant I love. I was someone who had gone through life without knowing meat could smell gamey, so I ordered the lamb curry without a second thought. I can eat pretty much anything as long as it is not overly rich or greasy, so I ordered it fearlessly, but wow.... That was the first time I understood what it meant for meat to have a smell haha. After one bite, I simply could not make my jaw move again.

That experience put me off everything lamb, even when lamb skewers were trending, so this was only my second attempt at lamb. But Hwaro Yangmi's lamb had no gaminess at all—only the delicious, distinctive aroma of lamb.

The restaurant information says Hwaro Yangmi uses chilled rather than frozen lamb and combines two aging methods, wet aging and dry aging. They also say they use six-month-old lamb, and perhaps that is why it felt completely different from the lamb I had before. It was tender and easy to eat without worrying about the smell, so people looking for lamb ribs in Dongsa-dong but concerned about lamb's distinctive gaminess could give it a try.

Pairing lamb with wasabi and myeongi namul

The table had cumin, lamb-skewer seasoning, and salt. I did not use the salt separately. The cumin and lamb-skewer seasoning were naturally great, but my new discovery of the day was wasabi. I tried it on lamb as you would with beef, and to me, lamb with wasabi tasted so much better than beef with wasabi.

I am usually very sensitive to wasabi's heat and even order sushi without it, but the wasabi here was not too spicy, so it suited me well.

My husband recommended the myeongi namul, saying it went so well with the lamb. So this time, I had it with both myeongi namul and wasabi. I had only eaten myeongi namul with beef and pork before, but it was fantastic with lamb, too. Lamb restaurants should all start serving it as a side dish haha.

The staff member continued to grill everything deliciously for us.

Hold shoulder-rack bones with tissue or a napkin

Because shoulder rack has meat attached to the bone, it is difficult to cook through, but of course the professional had a method! After cutting the meat with scissors and grilling it, it cooked through beautifully. Keep that in mind if you have to grill it yourselves because the staff are busy~! Meat on the bone tastes best when you pick it up and gnaw on it! It looked so delicious that I grabbed the rib bone because I wanted to eat it quickly, but it was so hot I nearly threw it 😂 Bones fresh off the grill are extremely hot, so make sure to hold them with tissue or a napkin! Haha.

Having learned my lesson from the shoulder rack, I held this one with tissue from the start haha. This is the marinated mini rib. It was my first time seeing the rib cut of lamb. The sweet marinade had soaked in without being overpowering, so it had a little more savory depth than the meat we ate earlier.

Generous, lightly spicy warm noodle soup

A carb lover who ordered noodles again today 💛 We added warm noodle soup as a meal dish. The bowl was deep, and it was so generous that it felt like about 1.5 servings. The broth was a vivid red, so I worried it might be spicy, but it was only lightly spicy in a refreshing way and really delicious. There were pieces of lamb throughout, which made it even better with the noodles.

Hwaro Yangmi was also running a Naver receipt-review event. If you participate, you receive one bottle of Tsingtao beer, which goes wonderfully with lamb. I desperately wanted lamb, salted peanuts, and a glass of Tsingtao, but as I said earlier, I had to drive, so I was sooo!! disappointed. Reallyㅠㅠ If I visit again, I definitely want to go without a car and have delicious lamb with Tsingtao.

Overall

• Tender, juicy lamb with no gaminess
• A set that lets you try lamb loin, shoulder rack, and marinated ribs at once
• Great not only with cumin but also with wasabi and myeongi namul
• Generous, lightly spicy warm noodle soup that worked well as a meal