Busan sashimi restaurant with a bulgogi hot pot course: Ppong Sashimi

What kind of restaurant is Ppong Sashimi?

Ppong Sashimi is a sashimi restaurant tucked among the buildings near Jungang-dong Station, at 56 Chungjang-daero 5beon-gil in Jung-gu, Busan. Today I visited Ppong Sashimi, a well-known spot in Jungang-dong, Busan, and I was so impressed by the melt-in-your-mouth tuna sashimi and fresh cuts of fish, living up to its reputation. Let me introduce it right away.

• 📍 56 Chungjang-daero 5beon-gil, Jung-gu, Busan
• 🕖 Daily 11:30–22:00 / break time 14:30–17:00 / last order 21:00
• Closed every Sunday
• ✅ Group seating / reservations / takeout available

The name Ppong Sashimi is so unique it really sticks in your memory. I could spot it from far away haha. Right in front of the restaurant there's a menu board posted up, which was nice to check out before going in.

Lunch special hours and the curtained private seats

Jungang-dong, where Ppong Sashimi is located, is a total forest of office buildings, so there are lots of office workers around. That's why they even sell a lunch special (11:30–14:00).

What was surprising and really great about the interior is that you don't need to book a separate room — every seat is individually enclosed, giving off a room-like feel. It's set up like this, and once you close the curtain, it's completely your own space. There was a real mix of guests — couples chatting quietly, all the way to big groups having open-space company dinners.

We had reserved ahead, and when we walked in everything was already set up. Sense level: king ⸜( ◜࿁◝ )⸝

And... I'm a huge baseball fan, so I have to mention that players like Jeon Jun-woo, Kang Min-ho, Kim Won-joong and others have visited, along with real celebrities like actor Lee Byung-hun and actress Tang Wei. Isn't that wild! Proof that this is a real Jungang-dong Japanese restaurant to trust.

What comes in the 60,000-won assorted sashimi course?

Ppong Sashimi's assorted sashimi course is ₩60,000 per person, and we ordered for two. The menu ranged from sushi to full courses to a variety of traditional Japanese liquors.

The side dishes that start the meal

The basic side dishes were salad / rolled egg / seasoned cucumber / seasoned garlic scapes / white kimchi / boiled octopus. That garlic scape side dish was so nicely salty it went great with both the sushi and plain rice, so I asked for a refill. So good ✨

There was also the usual wasabi / pickled ginger / takuan (pickled radish), and soy sauce and chogochujang (vinegar chili sauce) were kept refillable at every table.

Seaweed soup and abalone porridge

Before the main course really got going, seaweed soup and abalone porridge came out first. It was nice to have something warm before the cold seafood started rolling in. The seaweed soup especially was so, so, so, so ••• good.

The seafood platter

The seafood platter — seriously generous. So many different kinds that it was a treat just to look at. It included seasoned shrimp / grilled scallop / wasabi-seasoned octopus / sea squirt / blanched abalone / raw abalone sashimi. Having seafood with such different textures all on one plate made it fun to pick through piece by piece.

Out of all of them, my top pick was the grilled scallop!! It wasn't too heavy, and the scallop's signature soft-yet-springy texture was so delicious.

Four kinds of assorted sashimi

The assorted sashimi really comes out beautifully. So plump and glossy ••• it had salmon / halibut / rockfish / finfish, four types in total. Having different colors of sashimi together on one plate looked so upscale that I thought I should bring my parents here.

They said they only prepare fish caught that same day, and it really showed — so fresh, with that chewy-springy texture through and through. Having more than one type of sashimi was also great since you could pick according to your taste.

Three kinds of sushi

The three sushi pieces were shrimp sushi, halibut sushi, and salmon sushi, and the salmon sushi was really delicious. The salmon was lightly torched and topped with teriyaki sauce — so good 🤍✨

Seasoned raw tuna

Next came the seasoned raw tuna. It's mixed with sesame oil and pear, so the tuna took on the nutty aroma of sesame oil, giving it a completely different flavor from regular sashimi.

Instead of hitting you with a strong oily flavor, it wrapped the tuna's clean taste in a nutty aroma, making it the perfect mid-course dish.

Three cuts of tuna: belly, back and navel

The tuna sashimi came in three cuts: belly, back, and navel. Even though it's the same fish, the texture and fattiness differed by cut, and it was so fresh with zero fishiness — a flavor anyone could enjoy.

The belly was soft with a noticeable fattiness, the back cut was relatively clean and light, and the navel had its distinctive grain clearly visible, making the texture difference the most obvious of the three.

They also gave us seaweed separately, so topping it with radish sprouts and dipping it in sesame oil sauce like this was seriously so good ... ❤️

The warm dishes in the second half of the course

Bulgogi hot pot

Moving into the back half of the course, the warm dishes all showed up at once. The hot pot was also seriously generous — I was so surprised.

Inside the pot were bean sprouts / mushrooms / tofu / ginkgo nuts / beef. Being able to eat the broth and meat together was exactly what I needed for a warm dish in the middle of the course, and the broth was so refreshing I kept spooning it up.

Braised rockfish head

The braised rockfish head was called a