Paju Garam-maeul BBQ at weekend opening: selected pork neck, Tannae

This time it's another spot I keep going back to. I visited once before and it was so good that it kept coming to mind, so I went back. And going back means it's genuinely delicious! This is Tannae, a charcoal-grilled pork restaurant in Garam-maeul.

Tannae Paju Main Branch hours, parking and payment

Tannae Paju Main Branch is open weekdays 17:00–23:00, and weekends and holidays 16:00–23:00.

• ✔️ Parking available
• ✔️ Paju Pay accepted
• ✔️ Free corkage

Tannae Paju Main Branch

Weekend opening time vs. the late-night outdoor grilling crowd

The Tannae Paju Main Branch space is really clean. The tables aren't sticky at all, they're spotless and 100% tidy. I visited right at weekend opening time, and sure enough, being a popular spot, there were already some customers there.

Since this is on a BBQ restaurant street, they keep the doors open, and once night falls the outdoor grilling atmosphere really picks up. If you like that noisy, lively outdoor grilling vibe, come at night; if you prefer something a bit quieter, I'd recommend opening hours.

Tannae menu prices and this order: 2 selected pork neck, 1 selected pork belly

Marinated grilled pork is ₩17,900 for 300g, and pork belly, neck, and jowl run in the ₩15,000–16,000 range — a fair price given the quality. On my last visit I ordered the selected pork belly and jowl, so this time I went with something different: 2 servings of selected pork neck and 1 of selected pork belly. (Their pork belly is so much my style, I couldn't not order it.)

What side dishes and sauces come with the meat

Once you order, basic seasoned dishes, side dishes, and sauces come out. If you finish them, you can grab more from the self-bar! There's lettuce and perilla leaf salad, pickled onion, pickled scallion, boiled cabbage, corn salad, salt, ssamjang (dipping sauce), myeolchi-jeot, honey-garlic sauce, and shiitake wasabi sauce. In particular, the shiitake wasabi, honey-garlic sauce, and myeolchi-jeot are sauces you don't see elsewhere, so it's fun trying each one.

The self-bar is labeled like this—

Lettuce, wraps, pickled onion, scallion kimchi, shiitake wasabi, and more. There was even sesame oil and a small metal dish so you could make your own sesame-oil garlic sauce.

How the charcoal pre-grilling works at Tannae

Right in the middle of the Tannae space, there's a station where staff grill the meat, and since it's a charcoal specialist, you can see charcoal briquettes laid out on the floor.

They pre-grill the meat here first before bringing it to the table, and since the charcoal grilling happens over high heat, the juices stay locked in, plus it cuts down on the time you'd spend grilling it yourself — very convenient.

It's selected white pork, so the flavor is clean and the texture is chewy — once you've had pork at Tannae, you honestly can't be satisfied anywhere else...

Selected pork neck, selected pork belly

How does the selected pork neck taste? Thick but not tough

Once the first pre-grilling is done, you grill the meat the rest of the way yourself at the table — can you see how thick it is...? They cut the pork neck into pieces big enough to fill your mouth, since that's when it tastes best, and that charcoal smokiness combined with the chewy texture just explodes on your palate. Even at that size, it's not tough at all!!!

There's a reason the menu isn't just called 'pork neck' but 'selected pork neck.'

Especially when you dip it in the honey-garlic sauce and myeolchi-jeot, it just melts away in your mouth the moment it goes in. (Plus the shiitake wasabi is a nice kick too.)

Even the smaller bits of meat served alongside the pork neck were so tasty — bite into them and savory fat just pours out🤤🤤 Every single piece felt precious.

The free stew: kimchi jjigae or doenjang jjigae

As you eat, Tannae provides a stew as a free service, and this time we ordered kimchi jjigae (kimchi stew)! I've tried both the doenjang and kimchi versions, and honestly, both are delicious. No need to overthink it — just order whichever stew fits your mood that day. It's such a good stew that one spoonful of the broth and you'll be ordering extra rice right away.

After finishing the pork neck, we grilled up the selected pork belly, and it was genuinely just as good the second time around. We immediately put in an order for more pork belly.

Ending with the 6,000-won dessert naengmyeon

Tannae's dessert naengmyeon (cold noodles) comes with fine ice shavings floating in it, and eating it washes down all the meat you just had, letting you leave feeling great — highly recommend it. And at ₩6,000, it's a total bargain...

If you've visited Unjeong Lake Park, Starfield Unjeong, Paju Lotte Outlet, or Paju Book City and start craving pork, I highly recommend Tannae, a charcoal-grilled pork specialist. Personally, I think it's genuinely delicious enough to be worth traveling from far away...