Yongsan lunch shabu-shabu course with rice paper wraps: Shabu in Seoul

Seoul Yongsan restaurant Shabu in Seoul Yongsan Main Branch Samgakji Station shabu-shabu recommendation

Between Yongsan Station and Samgakji Station is Yongni-dan-gil, where a lot of great restaurants and cafés cluster together. I visited Shabu in Seoul Yongsan Main Branch, a popular shabu-shabu spot on this street. The course is well put together and even includes dessert, so it's also a great Yongsan date course. Here's my honest review of the menu at Shabu in Seoul, a shabu-shabu restaurant in Yongsan :)

Location and hours of Shabu in Seoul Yongsan Main Branch

• 🏠 Location: 61 Hangang-daero 62-gil, Yongsan-gu, Seoul, South Korea (1st floor)
• ⏰ Hours: 11:00 – 22:00 (closes at 23:00 on Fri, Sat)
• Weekday break time 15:00 – 17:00 / no break time on weekends
• 🚗 Parking: use nearby public parking lots

Shabu in Seoul, a Yongsan restaurant, sits between Sinyongsan Station and Samgakji Station. It's also close to the War Memorial of Korea and Yongsan Children's Garden, so it makes a nice Yongsan date course. There can be a wait during lunch and dinner hours, so I'd recommend booking ahead with Catch Table.

Shabu in Seoul Yongsan Main Branch is the real deal when it comes to premium shabu-shabu. They use quality cuts — Grade 1 black pork, 1++ Korean beef, Prime grade Angus — and have researched the ideal thickness and aging method for each type of meat to bring out the best shabu-shabu flavor. On weekday lunches you can get shabu-shabu at a discounted price, so it's also a great Yongsan lunch spot.

Interior, seating, and group tables

The first thing I noticed inside Shabu in Seoul Yongsan Main Branch was the black wood-themed interior and the spacious layout.

The tables are spaced well apart with partitions, so it's a comfortable setup for dining with your group. They also have group seating, making it suitable for company dinners, or private blind dates and wedding invitation gatherings in a room.

Each table has shabu-shabu sauces and seasonings and a tablet. I liked how clean the tableware was.

Menu board and how to order

Here's how to order at Shabu in Seoul, a Yongsan restaurant.

• 1. Choose your meat
• 2. Choose your broth (the meal menu differs by broth)
• 3. Choose additional menu items to eat as you go
• 4. Order your meal at the end

Here's the menu board at Shabu in Seoul, a Samgakji restaurant.

• Grade 1 black pork belly shabu set ₩23,000
• Grade 1 black pork neck shabu set ₩23,000
• Prime Angus chuck roll shabu set ₩25,000
• Prime Angus flap steak shabu set ₩30,000
• 1++ Korean beef bottom sirloin shabu set ₩30,000
• Black Nine wagyu rib eye shabu set ₩36,000
• Cheongyang perilla oil buckwheat noodles ₩16,000
• Perilla oil buckwheat noodles ₩15,000
• Bibim buckwheat noodles ₩14,000

5 broth options and the finishing meal menu

After choosing your meat, you pick a broth. Shabu in Seoul has 5 broth options in total, and the finishing meal menu differs depending on which broth you pick.

• Clear mushroom – egg porridge
• Spicy mushroom – rosé risotto
• Crab miso – miso rice roll
• Sukiyaki – yakisoba
• Beef tomato – tomato risotto

I ordered the Prime Angus chuck roll shabu set with sukiyaki broth. Sukiyaki is a traditional broth from Japan's Kanto region, made to bring out the deep flavor of bonito flakes and aged soy sauce.

Prime Angus chuck roll shabu set ₩25,000

Prime Angus chuck roll shabu set, ₩25,000

I ordered for two, so two plates of meat came out. You can order extra meat too.

The sukiyaki vegetables came out in a nice variety — burdock root, mushrooms, onion, bean sprouts, glass noodles, napa cabbage, and more.

The meat was cut to the ideal thickness so it was nice and tender to eat. Sukiyaki comes with an egg on the side, which is great for dipping the meat and vegetables into.

How to make shabu-shabu rice paper wraps, and the sauces

Here's how to make the shabu-shabu rice paper wraps. Dip the rice paper briefly in the shabu-shabu broth, then top it with the thoroughly cooked vegetables and meat and eat.

There are 3 sauces total: chili sauce, soy sauce, and mayo sauce. You can mix in the cheongyang chili peppers and garlic provided on the table too.

I put the vegetables into the broth first to cook, then cooked the meat after. The meat is thin so it cooks fast!

There's even a cute panda-shaped bundle of sweet potato starch noodles in there!

Dipping it in the egg or wrapping it in a rice paper wrap gave me a mouthful of great flavor every time. Personally, the sukiyaki broth itself was seasoned fairly strongly, so even just dipping the meat in egg alone was plenty tasty.

Finishing yakisoba and dessert omija tea

The finishing meal for sukiyaki broth is yakisoba. When you order the meal through the tablet, it takes about 10 minutes — staff come by and stir-fry the noodles fresh for you right there.

The yakisoba was more delicious than I expected. The spicy powder they sprinkle on partway through added a sweet-and-spicy kick, so I could eat it happily all the way to the end without getting sick of it.

With the omija tea (five-flavor berry tea) served for dessert, this was a well-rounded, quality shabu-shabu course on Yongni-dan-gil. I'd recommend Shabu in Seoul Yongsan Main Branch as a lunch spot if you're near Yongsan Station or Samgakji Station and want a satisfying shabu-shabu meal :)