Pork belly restaurant near Kyungsung University, Busan: Donnamu Jip

Craving pork belly on the weekend, and with summer heat still lingering, I went looking for a pork belly place near a subway station in Daeyeon-dong and ended up at a spot called 'Donnamu Jip.'

Where is Donnamu Jip, and how do you get there?

Donnamu Jip is located at 53-1 Yongso-ro 7beon-gil, Nam-gu, Busan, South Korea. By public transit it's about a 3–5 minute walk from Kyungsung University·Pukyong National University Station on Line 2, and there's no dedicated parking lot. It's open Monday–Saturday 17:00–23:00 (last order 22:30) and closed every Sunday.

The location is really close to Exit 1 of Kyungsung Univ.·Pukyong Univ. Station. If you're driving, there's no dedicated lot, so you'll need to use a nearby paid parking lot.

Whether it was because it was the weekend or the start of the semester, the university street was packed with people.

Maybe because it was dinner time, the wait was short and we got a table quickly. There are also some open-air seats, which would be great on a nice day.

Donnamu Jip menu and prices

• Jirisan fresh pork belly: ₩37,000 (full plate, 360g) / ₩19,000 (half plate, 180g)
• Kimchi jjigae: ₩10,000
• Chon doenjang jjigae: ₩6,000
• Special rice (gondre + shiitake): ₩7,500
• Hetbahn (instant rice): ₩1,500

The menu is simply pork belly, stews, and rice (special rice or instant rice), so there was nothing to debate — we ordered a plate of pork belly right away.

What side dishes come with it? Banga leaf wraps and whole onion

The side dishes came basically as lettuce, onion, salted shrimp and ssamjang (dipping sauce), salt, chili peppers, garlic, shredded green onion, and kimchi — a clean, no-frills setup with just what you need.

What was unique here was they also gave us bang-a (perilla leaf-like herb) wraps, a vegetable I don't usually eat much, but I personally enjoyed wrapping it with the meat. The scent is distinctive so it might be a love-it-or-hate-it thing. They said it's refillable, so if it suits your taste, it's worth wrapping with the meat.

They also gave us mostly whole onions, so if you love onion, it's great for wraps.

A full plate of Jirisan pork belly, with kimchi on the grill

A little later the meat came out, along with potato and mushroom. The amount of meat was just right, and the fat ratio was good too. We were hungry so there was no waiting around — straight onto the grill. As soon as we got it, meat, potato, mushroom, garlic, kimchi — everything went on at once.

What I liked here was that the kimchi came cut into big, grillable pieces. Eaten plain it was a bit tangy, but grilled, it went perfectly with the pork belly. Honestly, I found this place after seeing a review about grilling meat and kimchi together.

At first we each had a bite with salt and salted shrimp, then moved on to wraps to each our own taste. I showed my girlfriend a YouTube video of a guy wrapping meat with a whole onion, and she copied him exactly. She went with onion and garlic, I went with chili pepper and garlic. We ate our fill of wraps and both walked home covering our mouths.

Finishing with kimchi jjigae and rice

It's the weekend, so a cold soju and beer are a must, right? We mixed up a somaek right away and had a refreshing drink. My original plan was to finish one plate of meat quickly and order more, but with all the wraps we ate, we filled up faster than expected.

After filling up somewhat on meat and drinks, we went back and forth for a while between gondre-shiitake rice and stew, but decided that after meat, stew is the way to finish. Then we debated between kimchi jjigae and doenjang jjigae for a while and settled on kimchi jjigae. Honestly, I'm still torn between all three.

They gave us a generous amount of meat and tofu in the stew too. My girlfriend and I split a Hetbahn and wrapped things up neatly. It's almost surprising how full one plate of meat can make you.

Is Donnamu Jip worth a second visit?

These days every pork belly place tends to be good, so there aren't many that really stand out, but I liked how this place gave us grillable kimchi and perilla wraps with whole onion for wrapping. And the prices being cheap made it even better.

We promised each other we'd come back once the weather gets nicer and sit at the outdoor tables — and with that, our fun Friday night dinner wrapped up!!

That's it for this pork belly restaurant visit from the piggy couple.