Salad takeout near Gwanghwamun Station with smoked duck: Wystab Diet

Lots of office workers eat salad for lunch these days, right? I've been reaching for salads and poke bowls a lot lately too, trying to eat healthier!

But if a salad is just a pile of leaves, you get hungry again fast, and with the afternoon workload ahead, getting proper protein really matters haha.

So this time I visited a salad restaurant I'd recommend for lunch near Gwanghwamun Station! It's Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun, where you can choose from various protein toppings and sauces, from rice bowls to poke, depending on your taste. If you're dieting but don't want to give up flavor, I think you'll really like this place haha. Let's get into the review~!

Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun / Mon-Fri 10:00-20:40 / Closed Saturdays and Sundays

How to find Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun from Gwanghwamun or Jonggak Station

Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun is about a 4-minute walk from exits 3 and 4 of Gwanghwamun Station, and about a 3-minute walk from exit 1 of Jonggak Station. It sits right in between the two stations, so it's easy to reach from either one!

It's a great spot for office workers around Gwanghwamun or Jonggak to visit during lunch. I got off at Gwanghwamun Station, picked up my order to go, then walked to Jonggak Station to catch the subway home haha.

If it's your first visit, just look for Lemeilleur Jongno Town — that makes it easy! Walk out of exit 4 at Gwanghwamun Station a little ways and you'll hit a big intersection; the large building on the corner is Lemeilleur Jongno Town! The building looked a bit complicated at first and I wondered, 'Will I be able to find it?'

But once you go inside and take the escalator straight down to the basement, it's not hard to find at all! As soon as you step off, look left and you'll see Wystab's red sign — I found it more easily than expected haha. Being close to both Gwanghwamun and Jonggak stations, this place has pretty good accessibility for office workers looking for lunch near Gwanghwamun Station!

Kiosk ordering and what the Wystab Diet shop looks like

There's a banner outside listing the menu at a glance, and a kiosk right next to it, making ordering easy. You check the menu, order at the kiosk, then head inside — a system that would work well for a quick lunch break.

The interior is decorated in orange and white tones, giving it a bright, clean overall feel. When I visited, it was a bit past lunch hour, but there were still quite a few people eating alone. Takeout and delivery orders kept coming in too!

Since the menu itself is easy to enjoy solo, I thought it would suit people looking for a solo salad meal near Gwanghwamun well! I ordered mine to go so I could eat it at home haha.

How do you choose the base, protein topping and sauce?

Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun isn't just a plain salad place — there were quite a lot of menu options. First you choose a main base: vegetable (light), pasta, oats, tofu noodles, or cauliflower rice, depending on your preference.

Then you choose your protein topping on top. Toppings include chicken, smoked duck, beef, salmon, and mala chicken — you can even get toppings in mala flavor.

Besides salads, there's also a protein rice bowl menu — a high-protein bowl of oat rice topped with soft egg strips and plenty of meat, good for days when you crave rice more than salad. Side dishes like Greek yogurt, soup, and protein cookies are also available to pair with your meal.

🥬 Even the standard salad box is generous 🥬

The basic salad protein box comes with lettuce plus chickpeas, green beans, broccoli, bell peppers, olives, and onion flakes. It's not just a mountain of lettuce — with various vegetables and toppings mixed in, the textures vary and it's fun to eat.

Especially when dieting, salads can start to taste the same and get boring fast, but here you can mix and match base, topping, and sauce, which is great!

The sauce lineup was also more varied than I expected: wasabi mayo / teriyaki / sriracha mayo / spicy teriyaki / honey mustard / oriental / yuzu dressing, so you can pick whatever flavor you like. I chose sriracha mayo this time, thinking it would go well with the smoked duck. Honestly, a salad needs a good sauce to stay enjoyable all the way through haha.

• Chicken Light Protein Box + smoked duck 100g add-on — ₩12,300
• Smoked Duck Light Protein Box — ₩9,900

I eat salad for lunch a lot these days, and personally the thing I care about most in a salad is 'how filling is it.' On that front, Wystab Diet had plenty of protein toppings, so it looked like it could work as a full meal!

The chicken and smoked duck protein box, eaten at home

The packaging was wrapped carefully, so the contents stayed in place and I could bring it home neatly without anything shifting around!

I was so hungry the moment I got home that I opened it up right away haha.

Opening the container, there was a generous bed of fresh lettuce at the bottom, with chicken and smoked duck piled temptingly on one side. On the other side were chickpeas, green beans, broccoli, bell peppers, olives, and onion flakes in colorful array. It looked plenty filling just by sight — 'this should be enough for lunch,' I thought.

Was the steamed chicken breast dry?

The chicken in particular was steamed chicken breast, and it was moister than I expected. It didn't have that typical dry chicken-breast texture — it was soft to chew and seasoned just right, so it was fine to eat even without dipping it in sauce.

The mild chicken flavor paired well with the crisp lettuce texture-wise. And with chickpeas mixed in, it got nuttier the more I chewed, adding to the fullness!

Was the 100g smoked duck add-on worth 12,300 won?

And what I especially enjoyed was the smoked duck! Smoked duck can be a bit much if the distinctive smell is too strong or it's too oily, but this was cleaner than expected, with no gamey smell.

With the first bite, the duck's savory flavor comes through first, and as you chew, that chewy texture holds up nicely alongside the salad. It looked like quite a lot at first — I wondered, 'can I finish all this?' — but I kept reaching for more haha.

Sriracha mayo with smoked duck: how did it taste?

The sriracha mayo sauce paired especially well with the smoked duck. The savory, slightly rich flavor of the duck combined with the spicy kick of sriracha cut through any greasiness and really woke up the appetite!

The sauce wasn't just spicy — it had the soft, nutty flavor of mayonnaise too, which suited the duck quite well 💙. Eating the lettuce together with the sauce and toppings made it feel like a proper meal rather than just 'leaves' 🤗

When I transferred it to a bowl, the portion looked even more generous than I expected — plenty for a full meal!

Is Wystab Diet a good salad lunch near Gwanghwamun Station?

If you've been dieting with salads but keep getting hungry fast, you know the struggle. I'm the same way, so I prefer lunches with proper protein, and Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun really delivered on that front!

Rather than just vegetables, you get protein toppings like chicken or smoked duck, and with bases like oats, tofu noodles, or pasta to choose from, you can pick according to your taste — that's a real strength 👏👏👏

Above all, the menu is easy to enjoy alone, so it should suit office workers looking for a solo salad meal near Gwanghwamun. It'll especially suit people like me who diet but still want a proper lunch 😚

The wide range of options also means you're not eating the same salad every day — you can switch up the combination based on what you're craving that day! Being between Gwanghwamun and Jonggak stations makes it accessible, and the clean interior made eating alone comfortable too!

Especially for office workers with short lunch breaks, eating in the store works well, or you can take it out to eat comfortably at the office or home like I did 🙏 If you're looking for lunch near Gwanghwamun Station and want something relatively light but filling — salad, poke, or a diet rice bowl — put Wystab Diet Gwanghwamun on your list!