Seodaemun bakery shrimp baguette review: Mandong Jegwa Yeonnam

Mandong Jegwa Yeonnam location and parking

The outside of the shop had such a simple feel! But maybe because I knew it was famous, it somehow had the aura of a seriously good bread spot...!!

It is on a main road, so there is no separate parking and you need to use a nearby lot. Dongjin Parking Lot, Yeonnam 3 Public Parking Lot, and Yeonnam 4 Street Parking Lot are all nearby, and I parked at Yeonnam 3 Public Parking Lot because it was the closest and cheapest! It costs ₩250 per 5 minutes, or ₩3,000 for an hour, so keep that in mind if you are visiting Mandong Jegwa Yeonnam Branch :)

How to reserve bread on weekdays

You can reserve bread on weekdays! You can make a reservation by phone, Instagram DM, or Naver, haha. They recommend reserving by two days before your pickup date. Reserving and quickly picking up your bread on a weekday sounds like a good idea too, haha.

A small interior that is fun to browse

The store itself was smaller than I expected, but once I went inside, there were so many kinds of bread that it was really fun to look around :)

Bread selection at Mandong Jegwa

Isn't the selection absolutely huge...?? Hahaha. I agonized over what to eat times 100. But I love bread so much that even browsing was so much fun. Especially that first bread that looks like a butt—the fact that its name is Butt is so cute too... I want to touch it (?)

The six popular breads at Mandong Jegwa are the garlic baguette, shrimp baguette, onion bagel, cappuccino, ssuk-tteok ssuk-tteok, and cucumber baguette, haha. But all the other breads looked delicious too...

Garlic baguette and shrimp baguette taste

My undisputed number one was the garlic baguette... It was so moist, and the baguette was thoroughly soaked in garlic sauce, so it went down easily even without a drink ㅠㅠ It has that sweet, intensely flavorful garlic-baguette taste!! Honestly, I wanted to buy every single one on the tray. You should not pick up the garlic baguettes yourself—just tell a staff member how many you want and they will pack them for you :)

My second pick was the shrimp baguette, haha. I chose it thinking, if the garlic baguette is good, surely the shrimp baguette will be good too? And it was! Like the garlic baguette, the shrimp baguette was delicious, but they were delicious in different ways, haha. If the garlic baguette is sweet and moist, the shrimp baguette is a tasty bread full of creamy-pasta-like cream plus shrimp flavor and aroma!!

Bread samples I tried again and again

I was looking carefully around the shop, trying to decide which breads to buy, when a staff member cut up some sample bread and gave me pieces to try! Then, while I was still choosing, they kept cutting up more samples and giving them to me, hahaha. It was not just once or twice—I think I tried them about four or five times 🤣

Thanks to that, I could taste different things for myself and choose what I wanted, which was really nice. Respect to the staff member who must have had a lot of work to do, yet cut samples for everyone there...!!

Eating your bread at the Ediya Coffee next door

Mandong Jegwa did not have an eating area inside! Just as I was feeling disappointed, I found out that I could eat the bread at the Ediya Coffee next door! Of course, one coffee per person is essential, but I thought it was really nice to have coffee and bread together, haha.

Final thoughts

I had seen Mandong Jegwa in so many food videos before, so when I finally spotted it while passing by, I got to try it at last! After eating there, I could see why it is famous, haha. The garlic baguette especially was moist and sweet, the kind of thing you keep reaching for without feeling too heavy, while the shrimp baguette was deliciously nutty and savory, with actual shrimp pieces to chew on!

More than anything, it was great that I could try samples several times and choose breads that suited my taste, hahaha. Personally, I think Mandong Jegwa does baguettes especially well! If you love bread and happen to pass Mandong Jegwa Yeonnam Branch in Yeonnam-dong, I think it is well worth stopping by :)