Wood-fired jokbal and radish salad refills in Gangdong: Iseon Hwaduk

Myeongil Station jokbal restaurant Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam Myeongil Branch

It had been a while since I'd craved jokbal (pork trotters) and bossam (boiled pork wraps), so I went looking for a good jokbal spot near Myeongil Station and landed on Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam, whose signature dish is wood-fired jokbal. Unlike regular jokbal, this one is roasted in a wood oven, so it's chewier with a really delicious nutty flavor!

Where is Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam Myeongil Branch?

Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam Myeongil Branch is located at 8 Yangjaedae-ro 147-gil, Gangdong-gu, Seoul, South Korea. It's a 2-minute walk from Myeongil Station Exit 2.

Inside the restaurant: group tables and terrace seats

The wood-tone interior gives off a comfortable yet casual vibe overall!! There's plenty of group seating, so it looks great for work dinners or gatherings, and there's an outdoor terrace on the side of the building that seemed perfect for enjoying an outdoor-dining atmosphere in this weather.

They also had baby chairs on hand :)

This is the jokbal actually being roasted golden-brown inside the wood oven :)

Inside the restaurant you can actually see the wood oven where the jokbal is roasted, and watching it get roasted live made me even more curious about how the wood-fired jokbal would taste ..haha

The self-serve side dish bar and radish salad refills

It was convenient that you could freely grab any extra side dishes you needed from the self-serve bar.

Menu and prices at Iseon Hwaduk

Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam Myeongil Branch's signature menu includes the collagen bomb wood-fired jokbal, along with bossam, spicy jokbal, and cold jokbal. Since you can order a half-and-half combo, and I wanted to have jokbal for sure but also enjoy bossam, I ordered the jokbal + bossam medium, plus rice balls on the side!

Side dishes and the free sundubu jjigae

The lineup of basic side dishes was really solid, but especially .. the radish salad was so good! (I think I refilled it about three times ..lol)

A spicy sundubu jjigae (soft tofu stew) comes included as well. The stew, with beaten egg mixed in, was spicy and refreshing at the same time — great to eat alongside the jokbal and bossam.

How does the wood-fired jokbal and bossam half-and-half taste?

The wood-fired jokbal, roasted golden in the oven, and the tender, juicy bossam looked so appetizing just from the smell that I started drooling right away ..TTT Especially the jokbal fresh off the wood oven — you could really taste the deep roasted flavor and faint smoky aroma.

The skin was chewy yet nutty, with that roasted wood-fired flavor really coming through — delicious. Neither the jokbal nor the bossam had any gamey smell at all, and the jokbal was chewy and nutty with a crisp outside and moist inside .. while the bossam was tender and soft!!

The skin on the wood-fired jokbal was really .. bouncy and chewy, and so good!! Compared to regular jokbal, the wood-fired version clearly has a more intense roasted flavor on the surface, and the more you chew it, the nuttier it tastes — good enough to eat on its own without any dipping sauce.

Pairing it with the various side dishes — chive salad, radish salad, kimchi, salted shrimp — added extra savoriness, so I never got tired of it and enjoyed it all the way through.

Adding rice balls as a side

The rice balls, great as a side to go with the jokbal and bossam, made the meal even more filling — a combo that really can't go wrong :)

The rice balls paired perfectly with the jokbal and bossam, and eating them with the sundubu jjigae was seriously .. delicious!

Is Iseon Hwaduk worth a visit?

Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam let me enjoy wood-fired jokbal with a charm all its own, different from regular jokbal. From the jokbal with its faint smoky aroma and lively chewy, nutty flavor, to the bossam that was moist and soft with no gamey smell at all, ordering the half-and-half made for an even more filling and delicious meal. If you're looking for a good jokbal restaurant near Myeongil Station, I'd recommend giving Iseon Hwaduk Jokbal Bossam a try :)