Jongno sushi on a freezing day: two sets, crab nigiri, Choe Uyeong

Why is Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch a sushi place people queue for?

Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch (최우영스시야 종로점) is a Jongno sushi restaurant known for nigiri topped with thickly sliced fish. I wondered why people line up for it, so I went, and the thickness of the fish, the taste and the value were all great.

Many sushi places use thin, long slices, but Choe Uyeong Sushiya is known for thick-cut fish. You feel the chew and flavor from a single piece, so I'd recommend it to anyone looking for good sushi in Jongno.

Location and hours of Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch

The restaurant is a 1-minute drive or 2-minute walk from Jonggak Station. Being so close to the station, it is popular with office workers too.

• Hours: daily 11:00–21:30
• Break time: 15:00–17:00
• Last order: 21:00

Where do you park at Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch?

Use the Tower 8 car park in the same building. If you eat at the restaurant, parking is free for 2 hours.

Inside the restaurant, seating and how to eat the sushi

The seating is split into spots for solo diners and spots for groups. The owner and staff said to just sit wherever you like, with none of that "sit here, sit there" pushiness.

The last photo is a guide to the order in which to eat the sushi for the best taste: sauce, wasabi, tuna cuts, how to eat it and so on. Have a look if you're interested.

Menu at Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch

This is the menu of Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch. You can also order sushi one piece at a time.

Besides sushi, they serve kaisendon (raw fish rice bowl), fried tofu pouch udon, sashimi, spicy fish stew (maeuntang), tempura, sea urchin roe and monkfish liver.

The spread I ordered that day and the prices

• Premium set ₩33,000
• Choice set ₩27,000
• Uni nigiri ₩3,000
• Monkfish liver gunkan ₩1,500
• Egg nigiri ₩1,000
• Shrimp tempura udon ₩6,000
• Fried glutinous rice mochi ₩1,500

Premium set vs. choice set: where does the ₩6,000 difference go?

The premium set (₩33,000) is 17 pieces of top-grade ingredients, and the choice set (₩27,000) is 16 pieces of high-grade ingredients. It's one piece of difference but ₩6,000 in price, and after eating them I could see why.

Tasting the sushi one piece at a time

Monkfish liver cuttlefish nigiri ₩2,000

Chewy cuttlefish topped with monkfish liver (ankimo), rich and melting and full of oily flavor.

Sea bream nigiri ₩2,000

The sea bream mixes white and red flesh, so it's chewy yet clean-tasting. Add a little wasabi on top.

Tuna belly nigiri ₩3,000

Tuna belly is reddish, fatty and an expensive cut that you only get a little of. One bite brings up a deep taste of the sea. Good tuna doesn't taste of blood, and Choe Uyeong Sushiya handles this well.

Uni nigiri ₩3,000

Sea urchin roe is called uni in Japanese, so this is also known as uni sushi. You get the slight bitterness of the roe meeting its sweetness. I heard the fresher the uni, the less of it is used, and the seaweed wrapped around it and the rice soaked in sweet vinegar make the uni stand out.

Flounder fin nigiri ₩2,500

My favorite sushi is flounder fin. White fish rarely gets oily, but flounder fin is crunchy and oily at the same time, so even though you only get a few pieces I love this cut most. Choe Uyeong Sushiya puts two pieces of fin on, so you get the fun texture twice.

Crab stick nigiri ₩2,000

Crab stick nigiri, also called imitation crab sushi. Honestly, it's what I naturally skip at sushi places, because it's always cured in either sugar or salt and tastes like "that's just crab stick." But the crab nigiri here was mild and the flesh broke apart in strands, so I could tell the seasoning was kept to a minimum.

Egg nigiri ₩1,000

The egg nigiri made me wonder whether the owner went to Japan to learn it himself. It looks like the authentic egg sushi you'd get in Japan, with the egg cooked over a flame, but it isn't the sweet kind I had in Japan. The texture is fluffy, almost like eating castella cake, and it suited my taste perfectly.

Bigeye tuna nigiri ₩1,000

Bigeye tuna is a grade below bluefin. Unlike the cloying tuna belly, it's lighter and cleaner, with almost no oiliness.

Scallop nigiri ₩2,000

It feels slightly poached, and a torch gives it a smoky aroma like the smell when you go out for grilled shellfish. The texture is almost like eating meat, yet it's very light.

Steamed abalone nigiri ₩3,000

I've never had steamed abalone nigiri anywhere else. The abalone is chewy with real bite but steamed so it isn't tough, and dipping it in soy sauce lets you feel the texture most accurately.

Salmon nigiri ₩2,000

Salmon is my second favorite after flounder. It may not have been the belly cut, so it wasn't super oily or heavy, but with tartar sauce and onion it tasted clean. It balanced out the oily fish before it (?)

Freshwater eel nigiri ₩2,000

Salty soy sauce and a blast of the torch bring out the clean taste of the eel as much as possible.

Red shrimp and uni nigiri ₩3,000

The difference between the premium and choice sets is the shrimp. The premium set comes with red shrimp roe nigiri, and the choice set comes with red shrimp nigiri. It's sweet, and the roe seems like uni but rich and tasty.

If you're looking for a good sushi place near Jongno and Gwanghwamun, where lots of offices are, this is a lineup anyone would like. Having eaten it, I think it's worth recommending for Gwanghwamun too.

Extra orders: egg nigiri, monkfish liver gunkan and uni nigiri

The extra egg nigiri, monkfish liver gunkan and uni nigiri were, by my standards, the tastiest after the flounder and salmon. Uni is also sold as a set. If you're wondering where you can eat just sea urchin roe, search for Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch.

Shrimp tempura udon and fried mochi that warmed me up on a cold snap day

The shrimp tempura udon is ₩6,000, udon topped with crispy shrimp tempura. It wasn't the cheap shrimp tempura udon you get at a snack bar like Gimbap Cheonguk; the tempura had just been fried and tasted of fresh oil. The cold snap hit that day, and this udon, full of crab meat too, thawed my frozen body.

The fried glutinous rice mochi is ₩1,500. I thought it would be like the fried snacks you eat on a trip to the Philippines, but it's really soft... it's rice cake fried from glutinous rice, so why is it so mild?

Overall verdict on Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch

Choe Uyeong Sushiya Jongno Branch was good on the thickness and freshness of the fish and on value. If I crave sushi near Jonggak Station, I want to come back.

It's also a good place to eat after a trip to Deoksugung Palace, so I'd recommend it for that too. Come enjoy sushi at Choe Uyeong Sushiya, which uses good ingredients from the seasoning up and takes how to eat it seriously 😆