Naebang Station weekday date dinner, scallops & ragu: Bistro Chai Plus

A place where you can eat great food and still chat comfortably until the next plate arrives. When it's just the two of us for dinner, I sometimes find myself craving exactly that.

This time I visited Bistro Chai Plus near Naebang Station. It serves course meals in private rooms, and there were so many memorable plates, from juicy seared scallops to lamb chops that arrived sizzling and smelling of butter. Here's the weekday dinner date that made an ordinary evening feel a little special.

Where is Bistro Chai Plus, and what is parking like?

Bistro Chai Plus is on the 2nd floor of a building on Seocho-daero 27-gil, and the 1st floor is the wine shop Winery Tenuta. We arrived at the 5:30 pm weekday dinner opening. It's a tidy building with big glass windows, near a quiet residential area.

There's mechanical parking behind the building. According to the restaurant, large SUVs and EVs park toward the wall beside the 1st-floor shop, and if parking is hard, they'll help with free valet. Depending on your car, it's easiest to ask the staff for guidance.

Can you buy wine at Winery Tenuta downstairs?

Walking into the building, you meet the 1st-floor wine shop, Winery Tenuta, first. The wine selection is huge, so we browsed before going up. According to the shop's introduction, it carries around 1,000 kinds, from everyday wines to premium, non-alcoholic and natural wines.

The part worth noting is that corkage depends on where you buy. If you pick a bottle at retail price downstairs and bring it up to dinner, the corkage burden shrinks. Upstairs, you can also order wine, baekju (Chinese liquor) and other drinks.

Private room atmosphere at Bistro Chai Plus

The 2nd floor is built around an open kitchen, with restrooms on the left and about five rooms on the right. Dark gray tones with white lighting made even the corridor to the rooms feel calm and upscale.

The rooms come in different sizes to suit party size, and ours felt spacious. There were even coat hangers, which was handy for outerwear. We were shown to a 4-person room.

Sitting there as a pair, I thought it would suit anniversary dates, a parent's birthday or an important business dinner. For people looking for a blind-date spot around Seorae Village, it seemed worth widening the search to Naebang Station.

Lunch and dinner courses and à la carte menu

The menu is split into lunch courses, dinner courses, à la carte, and drinks and liquor. You order on the tablet at the table, and there's a paper menu too.

The restaurant builds on seasonal ingredients, Korean food with Western and Chinese elements, so the menu had makguksu (buckwheat noodles), pasta and hyangchae chicken side by side. It's the kind of lineup that catches your eye if you're looking for Western dining in Bangbae-dong with familiar flavors mixed in.

We ordered the DINNER 120 course for 2, ₩240,000 in total at menu prices. They also brought a sheet describing the dishes of the day, which made it nice to go through the plates one by one.

The default main in DINNER 120 is lamb chops. I visited as part of a sponsored experience, and to try two signature dishes I was given one portion each of lamb chops and grilled sablefish. Below, I'll go through them in the order we actually ate.

What order does the DINNER 120 course come in?

Amuse-bouche: bruschetta with a memorable cinnamon aroma

The DINNER 120 course opened with two bite-sized bruschetta: grilled bread topped with sour cream and blueberries, and another with sea urchin roe mousse and caviar.

The bread smells of cinnamon, and surprisingly both toppings went well with it. The sea urchin mousse and caviar in particular had a faint ocean scent that was unusual and delicious. I liked the toasted bread itself so much that I wanted one more piece.

Seasonal soup: smooth pumpkin tarakjuk (milk rice porridge)

The seasonal soup was sweet pumpkin taraktjuk (a milk-based porridge) with chestnut pieces. You can taste the pumpkin clearly, yet it isn't dry or heavy, and the texture was very smooth.

Eaten warm, spoonful by spoonful, it gently settled the stomach before the main meal.

Ricotta salad: a fragrant apple and cinnamon pairing

The ricotta salad is homemade ricotta cheese and fresh apple with a cinnamon dressing. I knew apple and cinnamon go well together, but having them as a salad felt new.

Cinnamon layered over the apple's freshness, plus the sweetness of crushed nuts, made for a good overall harmony. It's a dish I'd like to try making at home.

Seared scallops with asparagus: the standout cooking of the night

The seared scallops with asparagus, served with a sherry vinegar dressing, already looked perfectly cooked. They were springy to bite with a juicy center, exactly the texture I'd hoped for.

I usually love scallops, and to me these were the best seared scallops I've had so far. I'm not a big fan of vinegar dressings, but here the acidity didn't stand out and balanced the scallops well. I enjoyed the grilled asparagus served alongside too.

Pasta: ragu casarecce with cubed meat

The pasta was casarecce with ragu sauce. Unlike the minced-meat ragu you usually picture, the meat came in cubes.

The tomato's freshness blended with the richness of the meat, and to my taste the sauce and meat even had a slight Korean galbijjim (braised short rib) feel. It was the plate that moved us from the lighter dishes toward a deeper flavor.

Hyangchae-dak (herb chicken): thin, crispy batter

Hyangchae chicken, Chai Plus's style of chicken dish, reminded me of yuringi (Chinese-style fried chicken with sauce). The fried chicken came with pickled cucumber and onion, and cabbage.

What I liked most was the very thin, crispy batter. It felt light, like fried rice paper, and also like thinly fried glutinous rice dough. The chicken inside was tender and went well with the pickled cucumber.

Basil sorbet: a fresh palate cleanser before the mains

Before the main came a basil sorbet as a palate cleanser. It wasn't listed in the course lineup on the menu, but I'm told it's normally served during the meal.

The basil aroma spread coolly and tidied up my mouth. After a fried dish, it fit the flow perfectly.

How were the mains, lamb chops and grilled sablefish?

Lamb chops: Isigny butter on a hot stone plate

The lamb chops came on a hot stone plate with Isigny salted butter melting beside them. The aroma rising as the butter sizzled was already wonderful.

They were grilled to about medium rare, so you could cook them a bit more on the stone to your taste or move them straight to your plate. From the first bite, I liked the lamb better than the other main that day.

It had that characteristic lamb aroma while the meat was very tender, and the salted butter made the seasoning just right. I was so satisfied that I ate the meat off the bones at the end.

Grilled sablefish: soft, flaky and melt-in-your-mouth

We ate the grilled sablefish with a squeeze of the grilled lemon served alongside. The flesh flaked softly apart as soon as I split it, and in the mouth it had a melting texture.

If the lamb was memorable for its aroma and butter flavor, the sablefish charmed with its moist, tender flesh. The two mains left such different impressions that it was fun to alternate between them.

Dessert: homemade rare cheesecake and fruit

The DINNER 120 course ended with homemade rare cheesecake served with Shine Muscat grapes and honey-preserved figs. It wasn't too heavy and was pleasantly sweet, a fitting finish to the course.

Tips before visiting Bistro Chai Plus

• Room reservations: You can book via Naver, Catch Table or phone. For days when party size and seating matter, like a meeting-the-parents dinner or family gathering, ask about room size and conditions in advance.
• Choosing a course: Lunch starts at ₩48,000 and dinner at ₩90,000. Korean beef steak is included in LUNCH 78 and DINNER 150, so pick based on the main you want.
• Parking and wine: Free parking is available, and corkage is ₩10,000 per bottle for wine bought at the 1st-floor wine shop. If the mechanical parking is difficult, ask the staff for help.
• Event at the time of my visit: A glass of house wine was offered for writing a Naver receipt review, and 3 people were drawn at the start of each month to receive meal vouchers for uploading a dining review video. Check the conditions and whether it's still running when you visit.

Verdict: a private dinner for two at Bistro Chai Plus

At Bistro Chai Plus it wasn't just the room's atmosphere that stuck with me but the taste of every dish. The plating was pretty, so we enjoyed it with our eyes first, and there was fun in the different flavors and textures of each plate.

I especially liked the ricotta salad with apple and cinnamon, the juicy seared scallops, and the lamb chops with Isigny butter. Eating good food together in our own space made the evening feel even nicer.

If you're looking for a course meal near Naebang Station and care about a private space too, Bistro Chai Plus is a good candidate for an anniversary date or family gathering.