Gumi Korean restaurant set with loach soup and pork: Irojeong

Today I’m introducing a great loach soup spot in my lovely hometown of Gumi. It’s a restaurant with its flagship location in Daegu: Irojeong Gumi Geumosan Direct Branch. Along with chueotang (loach soup), you get boiled pork and grilled mackerel—it really is a dream combination. And I ordered the shredded-potato pancake that I absolutely love, too.

There are so many great loach soup places around Gumi, but I like this one because it’s a large restaurant. There was a bit of a wait, but it was delicious enough to be worth it, haha. It’s a great restaurant to visit with parents in Gumi.

Irojeong Gumi Geumosan Direct Branch: location and parking

The restaurant is over by Sangmo, near the birthplace of former President Park Chung-hee. Since there’s a hiking trail up Geumosan nearby, I think that’s why people call it the Gumi Geumosan branch!

Irojeong, this Gumi loach soup favorite, has parking that may be even more perfect than the food, haha. There’s enough wide space along both sides to park a good 50 cars, so no worries!

Inside, from private rooms to a playroom

The entrance stretches back quite a way. There was an enormous cauldron on the left and a waiting area on the right. We visited at around 13:30 on a Saturday and waited 40 minutes before getting in. There were 28 parties ahead of us!! This Gumi Korean restaurant is wildly popular.

There are fully private-room areas, partitioned spaces like in the photo on the left, and the rest is in the main dining hall. It’s perfectly suited to bringing your parents, so do visit this weekend!

I think it would rank among the best restaurants in Gumi to take children, too. There’s a playroom with a TV and game console, so the kids should have fun.

The self-service bar has banchan (Korean side dishes), plus green grapes and watermelon to enjoy after the meal! This kind of thoughtful touch gets 100 points.

Loach soup sets and children’s menu

BEST loach soup set (mackerel + warm boiled pork) Wild ginseng black goat set

The meal comes with bright yellow turmeric rice. I loved how pronounced the turmeric aroma was. You can also order chueotang and black goat soup à la carte.

The reason this is such a good restaurant to visit with kids is the pork cutlet, haha. There’s also Korean beef seaweed soup, so no worries!

Black goat meat is said to be good for middle-aged women! Next time, I should come back with my mother to have black goat, haha.

They also have seafood green-onion pancake with a whole octopus in it, so there are lots of ways to enjoy the menu, haha.

Loach soup set and shredded-potato pancake with my mother

Loach soup set (mackerel + boiled pork) Fried loach, shredded-potato pancake

I visited with my mother and ordered two set meals plus sides at Irojeong, a Gumi loach soup favorite!

Here’s the set meal with the shredded-potato pancake, haha. It had been such a long time since I’d had yellow turmeric rice, but it was still so appealing and delicious!

This moist boiled pork is right up there among my all-time favorite foods. I loved that they gave us a generous portion. The caramelized boiled pork was delicious, and its clean, savory quality was completely charming~

This is fried loach, haha. You hardly see it fried this openly these days, and it brought back memories of catching loaches myself as a child and frying them in a big cauldron. It’s delicious dipped deeply in soy sauce!

The grilled mackerel came out a little late, so I was waiting forever for it, haha. Wow—they grilled it so nicely and lightly. The flesh was tender and it wasn’t overly salty, so it was incredibly good with rice.

A Korean set-meal restaurant would feel incomplete without a potato pancake.. I dipped the crispy pancake and enjoyed it. Here’s hoping it becomes an icon of Geumosan Korean set meals and Gumi loach soup!