Seocho Station Western course restaurant, dinner with mom: Vinovine

I wanted to take my mom out for a special dinner near Seocho Station, and while looking around I found Vinovine✨ Unlike a typical Western restaurant, this place serves a proper course meal — from amuse-bouche all the way to dessert — so I was curious. Let me share the full review, one course at a time🧚

Where is Vinovine? A 5-minute walk from Seocho Station

Vinovine is about a 5-minute walk from Seocho Station, so it wasn't hard to find at all. If you're driving, there's free parking for up to 6 cars right next to the entrance :)

- - - - - - - Hours - - - - - - -

• Weekdays 11:30 - 22:00
• Break time 14:00 - 18:00
• Last order 20:30

Inside Vinovine: every table is a private room

Vinovine runs on a 100%-reservation system. And what I liked most is that every single seat is a private room! Eating in a separate, enclosed space definitely felt private.

It's a great atmosphere for a quiet conversation over a meal, or for something a bit more special like a date or an anniversary😌

What comes in the 65,000-won dinner course?

The dinner course I had was made up of 7 dishes: Starter → Appetizer → Appetizer → Fish → Primi → Steak → Dessert. It's a fine-dining structure divided into detailed courses, so if you like course meals, this will suit your taste haha

There's also a wide wine menu. Useful reference if you want to pair☺️

Starter: chicken liver cocoa choux, abalone and tofu

The very first starter had a pretty unusual combination! I first tried the tart-style finger food made with abalone, tofu and other ingredients — the abalone was chewy with a subtle savory note, whetting my appetite from the start :)

The cocoa choux had sweet fig inside, with the chicken liver's plainness balancing the sweetness, and cocoa lightly grazing the palate here and there — an unusual pairing, but not an unfamiliar taste haha

Appetizer 1: smoked watermelon, stracciatella, tomato water

This appetizer put me in a good mood the moment I saw it — the colors were so bright and pretty♥️ Sweet watermelon with a touch of smoke, eaten together with soft stracciatella — the ingredients matched surprisingly well haha

With tomato water surrounding it, it's super refreshing. It was a fun dish for using watermelon as a savory ingredient rather than a dessert!

Appetizer 2: shrimp, celeriac, brussels sprouts

This is technically an appetizer, but it tasted like a main dish! The sauce here was seriously amazing. Dipping the neatly trimmed shrimp into the deep, rich bisque sauce and the mild celeriac sauce, the flavor in my mouth was...👍

It was a totally different ingredient combination from the previous course, so the meal never felt monotonous. The whole course flowed cleanly, and splitting the appetizer into two rounds felt fresh and gave more variety :)

Midway through, they brought out house-fermented bread. I ate it with butter and Maldon salt, and you could really tell the bread quality is different at a fine-dining restaurant haha

Fish: sea bream with tapenade

The next course was a traditional Italian fish dish. It felt like we'd truly entered the main course, and the visual was so fresh looking haha

It's sea bream topped with tapenade and baked in the oven with various vegetables. The sea bream's cleanness and chewy texture really came through, and the sides supported it well. As the course goes on, the flavors gradually get richer and heavier :)

Primi: genovese spaghetti with pecorino

Sitting like a flower in the center of a big plate, the primi course was genovese ragu pasta with pecorino cheese added.

A pasta course is something you'd miss in Western dining if it were absent, so having it built into the main lineup made the whole course flow feel natural.

Steak: hanwoo (Korean beef) sirloin, black garlic, potato

And then, the highlight — hanwoo (Korean beef) sirloin steak came out :) Centered on the hanwoo sirloin with black garlic and potato on the side, it definitely felt heartier than everything before it.

This place is really good at making sauces. It's not an ordinary flavor — it's novel yet pairs so well with the steak, and the garnish was placed just right, no more no less. Especially when a steak is the main dish in a course meal, overall satisfaction jumps up a lot, and with hanwoo sirloin included in a 65,000-won-per-person dinner course, I thought the price felt pretty reasonable.

Dessert: hojicha ice cream, warabi mochi, brown sugar

For dessert, my favorite — hojicha ice cream — came out🍨 The nutty, subtle flavor unique to hojicha spread smoothly in my mouth, and the warabi mochi added a textural accent, making for a sweet way to finish the meal. From starter to dessert, every part was well put together and satisfying — I really felt like I'd properly enjoyed the meal :)

Is Vinovine worth it for a private course dinner in Seocho?

At Vinovine, you experience the flavors and textures of different ingredients bit by bit, which sparked curiosity from the very first course. The biggest draw was being able to enjoy all 7 courses — starter, two appetizers, fish, pasta, hanwoo steak, and dessert — in a private, all-room setup, and on top of that, it's about 5 minutes from Seocho Station, and the dinner course is 65,000 won per person.

It's a great fit for a day in Seocho-dong when you want a quiet meal with good atmosphere, or a slightly more special meal than your average Western restaurant. If you're looking for a Seocho Station restaurant or a nice-atmosphere Western dining spot in Seocho-dong, I'd recommend Vinovine's course meal✨