Fig snow bingsu, 2–3 servings on a Monday: Fruit Forest Paju

I visited Fruit Forest, a café near Simhaksan in Paju that serves fresh fruit bingsu (shaved ice dessert). The place is packed with fresh fruit, so between real fresh fruit, fresh fruit juices, fruit bingsu, and fruit platters, it's a café that fruit lovers would go crazy for.

Location of Fruit Forest Paju Direct Store — inside the Simhaksan food alley

Fruit Forest Paju Direct Store: 144 Dolgotji-gil, 1st, 2nd, 3rd floors, Paju-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea. It's a café located inside the Simhaksan food alley, right next to Tteurak, a famous croaker restaurant, so it's a great spot for dessert after a meal. Chef Im Seong-geun's jjaglagi restaurant is also right across the street.

Hours and last order

Open daily from 10:00 to 21:00, with last order at 20:30. It's open year-round, so it operates normally even on Chuseok holiday. 365 days a year, no break time, so you can visit anytime.

Parking, seating, and dogs

There's a large dedicated parking lot, so anyone driving can park comfortably without worry. Including the terrace, there's seating for up to 100 people. The space is spacious and pleasant with big windows. Dogs aren't allowed indoors, but the terrace is dog-friendly.

What's the Monday afternoon atmosphere like?

Even though I visited on a Monday afternoon, there were quite a few people, so I took photos after everyone left, haha. Since it's a café that makes delicious desserts with good ingredients, it's clearly popular. As expected of a Simhaksan café, good good.

Fruit showcase at the entrance, cut to order

Right as you walk into Fruit Forest, there's a large fruit showcase on display, and they cut fresh fruit as soon as you order. They also sell whole, uncut fresh fruit.

The owner said they go to the first auction at the wholesale market every dawn, personally checking and tasting the fruit to select only the sweetest ones. That's probably why there's such confidence in using top-grade fruit. Sweetness guaranteed fresh fruit, as they said, ha.

While I was ordering, I saw a lady buying mangoes saying they were so delicious, and I thought, 'oh, this is definitely a real fruit spot,' haha. The menu isn't just bingsu — there's a variety of fruit-based desserts like fruit platters and cup fruit too.

Fruit Forest menu and prices

• Injeolmi red bean bingsu: ₩25,000
• Fresh mango snow bingsu: ₩32,000
• Peach snow bingsu: ₩28,000
• Melon snow bingsu: ₩28,000
• Fig snow bingsu: ₩28,000
• 10-fruit assorted bingsu: ₩42,000
• Americano: ₩5,000
• Café latte: ₩6,500
• Caramel macchiato: ₩6,500
• Banana milk 1+1: ₩7,000
• Misugaru (roasted grain drink) / sikhye (sweet rice punch) / iced tea: ₩7,000
• Blueberry milk: ₩7,000
• Jeju matcha latte: ₩7,000
• Fresh mango-packed latte: ₩8,000
• Fresh mango juice 1+1: ₩8,000
• Pineapple juice 1+1: ₩8,000
• Tomato / kiwi / apple-kale juice: ₩8,000
• Watermelon / mulberry juice: ₩8,000

On top of that, the drink menu is really varied too. They also sell bakery items, so if you're craving bread, I'd recommend the croffle, castella, and other bakery desserts.

Fig snow bingsu, ₩28,000, enough for 2–3 people

I ordered the fig bingsu. Price: ₩28,000! They cut fresh fruit as soon as you order and pile it onto the bingsu. Portion-wise, expect enough for 2–3 people. They also gave me two bowls and two spoons. Perfect as an after-meal dessert.

It's snow-flake milk ice topped with a generous amount of figs, blueberries, a honeycomb piece, and syrup. I was torn between peach and mango, but the fig bingsu sounded so unusual that I ordered it — and I'm glad I did.

The taste of fig, blueberry, and fig syrup

There was really a lot of fig, and the fruit itself was fresh and sweet. The few blueberries on top were also big, plump, and full berries. The syrup drizzled on top didn't seem like a regular sweet syrup — it seemed like fig-flavored syrup. It had a slight viscosity, giving it a bit of texture.

Why the unsweetened milk ice was such a good thing

What I liked about Fruit Forest's bingsu was that the milk ice itself wasn't sweet. Personally, with milk fruit bingsu, since the fruit's sweetness plus syrup are already in there, if the milk ice is sweet too it can be a bit much. Fruit Forest's bingsu had a clean milk flavor with the sweetness coming only from the fruit, which I really liked.

The honeycomb was sweet and soft too, and the combination worked really well. I thought it'd be great to come back with family. With fresh fruit juices that are varied and fresh too, Fruit Forest is a Simhaksan café I'd want to visit again.