Yongsan bunsik restaurant with chewy wheat rice cakes: Hyeonseonine

After a big lunch in Yongsan, we went looking for a tteokbokki (spicy rice cake) place to have an early dinner at — Hyeonseonine Yongsan Main Branch.

I'd heard the name for ages since it's such a famous tteokbokki spot in Yongsan, and I finally got to eat there myself this time. It's easy to get to near Sinyongsan Station, and besides tteokbokki, they have sundae (Korean blood sausage), fritters, mini gimbap and even draft beer, so it's a great spot for a casual drink too!

Where is Hyeonseonine Yongsan Main Branch, and what are the hours?

Hyeonseonine Yongsan Main Branch is a short walk from Exits 5 or 6 of Sinyongsan Station, so it's easy to reach by public transit. It's also walkable from Yongsan Station, so it seemed like a good stop while wandering around Yongridan-gil. You can spot the chimney from far away, haha..!

• Hours 11:00–24:00
• Last order 22:40
• Monday break time 14:30–16:30

There's no dedicated parking, so public transit is the easiest way to get there, and ordering inside is done by kiosk. There's group seating too, plus takeout and delivery, so it works whether you're eating solo or grabbing a snack with friends.

Overall it's less a fancy restaurant and more a casual spot that's just right for enjoying bunsik (Korean street food) comfortably. There was no wait when we arrived, but by the time we left a line had formed..! CatchTable waitlist is available, just so you know!

Hyeonseonine menu and set prices

Hyeonseonine has a wide range of bunsik items beyond basic tteokbokki — instant tteokbokki, sundae, fritters, mini gimbap, fish cake and more. Tteokbokki is ₩6,000, assorted fritters (5 pcs) ₩6,000, mini gimbap (4 pcs) ₩5,000, handmade sundae ₩6,500, handmade fish cake ₩4,000, and instant tteokbokki is ₩11,000 per person, ordered for 2 or more.

There are also set menus, so if you want to try a bit of everything, ordering a set is the easy way to go.

• Sunny Set ₩18,000 (tteokbokki, fritters, sundae)
• Hyeonseoni Set ₩23,000 (tteokbokki, fritters, sundae + mini gimbap)
• Hyeonseoni Combo Set ₩26,000 (tteokbokki, fritters, sundae, mini gimbap + 3 fish cake skewers)

Another plus: you can choose the spice level for the tteokbokki, so it works whether you can't handle spicy food or you love it hot. The Hyeonseoni Combo Set in particular comes with tteokbokki, sundae, mini gimbap, fritters and 3 skewers of curly fish cake, so it's perfect if you want to try several things at once.

The self-serve bar has fried batter crumbs and pickled radish you can help yourself to as much as you want..! Adding that fried batter crumbs to the fish cake broth or the tteokbokki is seriously a game changer!

The 26,000 won Hyeonseoni Combo Set for three

After some back and forth, we went with the Hyeonseoni Combo Set for ₩26,000. It came with tteokbokki + sundae + mini gimbap + fritters + 3 skewers of curly fish cake!

We ate as a group of three, and it was a pretty solid spread if you want to try a bit of everything. Ordering just tteokbokki alone can feel like something's missing, but with sundae, gimbap, fritters and fish cake all coming together, it felt like we got basically everything you'd want from a bunsik place, haha. Totally stuffed. Having 3 skewers of curly fish cake in particular made it easy to split three ways. Just one set filled the whole table..!! It was also way easier to pick this than ordering a bunch of separate items.

Medium-spice tteokbokki: wheat rice cakes that never go mushy

We started with the main event, the medium-spice tteokbokki, and the sauce was sweet and spicy in a familiar way that kept us reaching for more. I've had some bad luck with 'nostalgic' school-front or griddle-style tteokbokki places before... but here the rice cakes didn't go mushy at all and it was genuinely delicious!!!

The rice cakes are chewy wheat tteok that soak up the sauce well, and rather than a straight-up spicy hit of capsaicin, the sweetness of the tteokbokki itself comes through first. I like dipping gimbap or fritters into the sauce when eating tteokbokki, and sure enough, that combo was the best.

Mini gimbap at Hyeonseonine

The mini gimbap (seaweed rice roll) was also more substantial than I expected. Rather than being mostly rice with barely any filling, it had a good balance of rice and fillings, plus sesame oil and seeds for a nutty flavor. Finished-style gimbap made by cutting the seaweed sheet in half..! It's great on its own, but eating it with the fish cake broth is the best..!

Handmade sundae and fritters

The sundae (blood sausage) was chewy without much of a gamey smell, and it was good on its own, but dipping it into the tteokbokki sauce gave it a whole different flavor. I also liked that you could choose to add innards along with the sundae.

And personally, the fritters were a quietly satisfying part of the set. There was a mix of kimmari (seaweed noodle rolls), vegetable fritters, mandu (dumplings) and sweet potato fritters, so it was fun picking through the variety, and the crispy batter worked well dipped in the tteokbokki sauce. The sweet potato fritter in particular was a great match with the sweet-spicy sauce.

Curly fish cake skewers and the broth

Last up was the curly fish cake, which had a nicely chewy texture without falling apart. The fish cake broth had a peppery kick and good depth of flavor, so it was nice to take a sip in between bites of tteokbokki.

Going to Hyeonseonine just for the tteokbokki is fine too, but if it's your first visit, I'd recommend ordering the Hyeonseoni Combo Set like I did, to try the tteokbokki, gimbap, sundae, fritters and fish cake all at once!

Next time: cook-at-the-table tteokbokki

When you want a simple bunsik meal in Yongsan without agonizing over the menu, ordering one set feels like it just solves everything! It's a great place to stop by when you're near Sinyongsan or Yongsan Station looking for something to eat and craving sweet-spicy tteokbokki.

Next time I want to try the instant tteokbokki instead of the regular kind I had this time. With instant tteokbokki you can add extras like jjolmyeon noodles or ramyeon, which sounds like a whole different kind of fun. As a tteokbokki place that's been loved in Yongsan for a long time, it's a great spot to visit for a light bunsik meal or to share several dishes with friends.