Mapo Station gyukatsu restaurant with Jeju citrus cold soba: Gyudo

I'm Dayam, and since getting married my husband and I have been hunting down good restaurants together. Today we had a fancy date eating gyukatsu (Japanese-style beef cutlet) at a place famous near Mapo Station — and with a name like Premium Gyukatsu Gyudo, I was curious just how premium it would be and what would set it apart.

Where is Premium Gyukatsu Gyudo and what are its hours?

Premium Gyukatsu Gyudo Mapo Gongdeok Main Branch is on the basement floor of the Obelisk commercial building at 33 Mapo-daero, Mapo-gu, Seoul. Hours are 11:30 - 21:00, with a break time from 15:00 - 17:00.

You can walk straight there via the connecting passage between exits 1 and 2 of Mapo Station.

The interior has an upscale Japanese restaurant feel. What surprised me was that as soon as we walked in, staff asked if we had a reservation — clearly a lot of guests come by reservation.

The place is bigger than it looks, and a waiting line formed while we were eating — very fitting for a well-known Mapo Station restaurant.

What the couple ordered at Gyudo and what it cost

• Smoked gyukatsu set — ₩22,000
• Smoked yakiniku set — ₩22,000
• Jeju cheonggyul (green citrus) cold soba — ₩6,000

One reason Premium Gyukatsu Gyudo stands out among Mapo Station restaurants is that each table gets a custom-made brass (bangjja yugi) brazier. I've been to plenty of gyukatsu places, but this was the first time even the brazier itself was different.

There's a drawer under the table!

Usually cutlery just sits loose on the table, but here it comes in a cutlery pouch, so it felt hygienic and upscale — it put me in a good mood before the meal even started.

Gyudo's ochazuke-style pot rice explained

Gyudo has a unique dish that combines Korean sungnyung (scorched rice water) with Japanese ochazuke.

When you order a main set, you get pot rice, and you can scoop some out and pour your choice of broth over it to eat like sungnyung. There's Solomon's seal tea, katsuobushi broth, and tonkotsu broth — I was so curious what each would taste like.

The rice itself is delicious since it's made with Sindongjin rice, and refills are easy at the self-serve bar, so you can really eat your fill. Guys with a big appetite would be happy here haha.

Before the main dishes arrive, they carefully walk you through how to enjoy the meal haha.

Grilling the smoked gyukatsu and yakiniku sets on your own brazier

The gyukatsu set and yakiniku set arrived. They also gave us ice-cold soba, and it looked so refreshing that we drank the broth first before starting.

Since the restaurant's very name is Premium Gyukatsu, I was so curious how the smoked gyukatsu would taste. The portion of meat was generous, and the color alone made it look like it couldn't possibly taste bad.

The breading isn't too thick, and there's clearly a lot of meat!

The color of the meat looked so fresh, with nice marbling, so it looked like it would be super tender if lightly cooked.

My husband and I came only thinking about gyukatsu, but then we saw the yakiniku at the next table and it looked so good.

I'd only ever had yakiniku while traveling in Japan, so I was really looking forward to seeing how good this would be haha.

Before grilling the gyukatsu in earnest, they first scooped out the pot rice and made sungnyung for us — my husband got katsuobushi broth, and I got tonkotsu broth.

So we could each have one of both, they placed two pieces of gyukatsu and two of yakiniku on the brazier to cook together. Gyudo uses an offset smoker for wood smoking, so not just the meat quality but even the grilling method itself was distinctive.

We ate the quick-cooking yakiniku first, and then it was the gyukatsu's turn. The brazier didn't burn through the whole meal, and everything seemed to cook evenly.

At first we tried a bite with no seasoning at all, and honestly we were both gasping while eating it... I finally understood why so many foreigners come here too.

I expected the gyukatsu to be good before we even arrived, but the yakiniku I wasn't expecting turned out amazing too! It would've been a disaster if we hadn't ordered it. If you're going as a couple, definitely order one of each set so you both get to try both!!

The staff kindly explained that even the wild garlic wasabi and the radish salad are handmade, and with a dab of wasabi on top, I felt like I could keep eating without getting tired of it haha.

The yakiniku had its own dedicated sauce, and dipping it deep along with the poached egg made it savory and melt-in-your-mouth haha. The man at the table right next to us, who'd come alone and was happily eating his gyukatsu, saw our yakiniku and ended up adding more meat to his order haha.

Jeju cheonggyul cold soba for 6,000 won

About halfway through the meat, the still ice-cold soba caught my eye.

Maybe because it came out so cold, even though we didn't eat it right away, the noodles were still chewy and delicious. The cheonggyul (green citrus) gave it a distinctive aroma — a great value side dish.

Tonkotsu or katsuobushi: which sungnyung tasted better?

Even full, Korean dessert always means carbs — it's the law haha. Time to try this unusual ochazuke-style sungnyung. The tonkotsu broth first was savory and had a slight gukbap (soup with rice) feel to it. It wasn't as strange as I expected, and actually quite tasty.

The katsuobushi sungnyung had a lighter, cleaner flavor that I liked too. Personally, I leaned a bit more toward the tonkotsu haha.

Is Gyudo Mapo Gongdeok Main Branch a good date restaurant?

A gyukatsu restaurant with great accessibility since it connects right to Mapo Station. True to its name, we had a properly premium, upscale date. They said they only run company-owned branches instead of franchising, to keep it exclusive — but I do wish there was one closer to my house haha.