Nagoya-style hitsumabushi near Yeoksam Station: Chisot Yeoksam

Today after work I got a craving for the eel rice bowl I never quite got to enjoy in Japan, so when I heard there was a super famous hitsumabushi spot in Yeoksam, I headed straight over!

I actually don't love eel on its own, but I love eel rice bowls so~~ much! I first tried hitsumabushi in Nagoya and the flavor didn't quite come together for me, but Chisot does it Nagoya-style and it was so~ good! Let's get into the review!

Where is Chisot Yeoksam Main Branch, and what are the hours?

• 🚘 Nearby public parking available
• 🕐 Mon-Sat 11am-9:30pm (Sat until 3pm / break time 3-5pm)
• 📍669 Yeoksam-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul

Walk about 5 minutes from Yeoksam Station and you'll find Chisot! The exterior alone already looks very Japanese.

Friday night at Chisot Yeoksam: why reservations are a must

There's bar seating too, so it's great for solo dining! I visited around 6:10pm on a Friday, and every single seat had a reserved sign on it!

Customers kept streaming in the whole time I was eating — reservations are absolutely essential!

Chisot menu: hitsumabushi set and lunch-only unagi bento

I ordered the hitsumabushi set! Since it's an eel rice bowl, the price is a bit on the higher side.

There's also a lunch-only unagi bento menu. When you work around Gangnam or Yeoksam, you tend to look for an easy, no-fuss meal during lunch hour, right? Options like chicken nanban unagi bento, salmon sashimi unagi bento, and char siu unagi bento let you enjoy eel alongside another dish in one meal — that's another nice feature!

Korean japonica freshwater eel and tare aged 72 hours

Finally, my hitsumabushi arrived! "Domestic japonica freshwater eel with 72-hour aged tare sauce" — the eel is the most important part of hitsumabushi!

Chisot says it only uses grade-1 domestic japonica freshwater eel. Hearing "domestic freshwater eel" already builds trust, right?

Three ways to eat hitsumabushi at Chisot

I loved that the eating instructions were laid out in detail — even first-timers can enjoy it properly. Hitsumabushi refers to a Nagoya-style eel rice bowl served in a wooden tub called a 'hitsu,' mixed and eaten. Rather than eating it just one way from a single bowl, you get to enjoy it three different ways.

It starts off with a soft, silky steamed egg custard!

First way: rice and grilled eel on their own

The first way to eat it is simply rice and eel. They coat the eel in a special tare sauce aged for 72 hours with various vegetables and ingredients, then grill it three times over binchotan charcoal!

What impressed me so~~ much was that the care goes beyond the eel itself — from the time spent aging the tare sauce to the charcoal-grilling process. What sets Chisot's hitsumabushi apart is how it lets you enjoy the subtle smoky char from the charcoal alongside the tare's distinctive umami!

Second way: spring onion, wasabi and seaweed flakes

The second method is mixing in chopped green onion, wasabi, and seaweed flakes! The combination of the plump eel and the sharp kick of wasabi was so delicious!

Third way: ochazuke, the best of the three

Next is finishing it off warm by pouring over ochazuke (green tea rice soup). There's also furikake seasoning on the side to add to the ochazuke, and it's absolutely delicious that way! It has that nurungji (scorched-rice) kind of feel we have back home!

This is my favorite way 🤍 The final step is eating it the way you liked best out of the three methods. Naturally, I went with the ochazuke 👍👍

Chisot's review event: one gift per person

And there's a review event too! Instead of one item per table, it's given per person — so~~ generous, right? You have to take part in something like this!

Is Chisot Yeoksam worth a visit?

From the neatly presented Nagoya-style hitsumabushi to the rice bowl menu, this place is full of flavor and care. It would be a great spot for a weekend outing or an after-work date.