Suwon barley rice buffet with radish bibim and sungnyung: Boriook

Boriook Main Branch basics

Boriook Main Branch (보리옥 본점) is an all-you-can-eat barley rice buffet at 99 Yeongtong-ro 200beon-gil, 1st floor, Yeongtong-gu, Suwon, Gyeonggi, South Korea. It is open 10:00-21:00, with a break from 15:00 to 16:30. Group seating and takeout are available, and there's Wi-Fi, reservations, high chairs, separate men's and women's restrooms and a waiting area.

I had the day off for a health checkup, so I finally visited Boriook Main Branch, a famous local spot. It's an all-you-can-eat barley rice place in Suwon, and whenever I pass by on a weekend the parking situation is terrible... I'd always been curious, and today I made it.

Is parking easy at Boriook Main Branch?

There's a parking area in front of the building. It looks like it fits 7 to 8 cars, but weekends are tough, so if you can walk there, I'd recommend it.

Weekday lunch atmosphere at Boriook Main Branch

When I arrived around 12:30 on a weekday, it was almost full. I couldn't take photos of the dining room, but it seats roughly 50 to 60 people and there are no separate rooms.

Above the kiosk there's a detailed guide on how to eat here, and they give you neobiani (sliced marinated beef patty) if you leave a Naver receipt review, so it seems worth doing.

Boriook Main Branch menu and prices

The set meals are the barley rice set at ₩13,000 per person and the mackerel set (half a fish) at ₩15,000 per person.

• Barley rice set: ₩13,000 per person
• Mackerel set (half fish): ₩15,000 per person
• Grilled soy pork set: ₩16,000 per person
• Grilled gochujang pork set: ₩16,000 per person
• Children ages 6 to 12: ₩5,000

A la carte dishes include mackerel, pork, doenjang stew (fermented soybean stew), barley shrimp and chive pancake and more, so if you want any, just order them alongside.

We ordered two barley rice sets. Note that even the ₩13,000 barley rice set comes with doenjang stew!

Every table has sesame oil and gochujang (red chili paste). The nutty smell of the sesame oil made me even hungrier! Off to the self-bar, quick~

What side dishes are at the Boriook Main Branch self-bar?

The self-bar has namul (seasoned vegetables) to mix into your barley rice, kimchi, wrap vegetables, braised tofu, japchae (glass noodle stir-fry), vegetable fritters, and even nurungji (scorched rice tea). The moment I got there, the food was lined up looking so good. And the variety of namul for the barley rice was seriously huge!!

There's mushroom namul, zucchini namul and seasoned bellflower root, and three kinds of kimchi: radish kimchi (mu-saengchae), napa cabbage kimchi and young radish kimchi.

There's also acorn jelly to go with your barley rice, plus a wrap vegetable corner with steamed cabbage, perilla leaves and chili peppers.

Seasoned bean sprouts, seaweed stems, seasoned winter-grown cabbage, and a dried namul whose name I don't know but which was so nutty and good!

I was already full just from the namul, and then next to it I spotted braised tofu being kept warm, and

japchae loaded with wood ear mushrooms, carrots and chives.

There are fritters of lotus root, oyster mushrooms, sweet potato and kabocha squash. The fritters look so clean.

Boriook Main Branch is a place where you can even finish your barley rice with nurungji.

Two barley rice sets, mixed with radish kimchi instead of gochujang

With the barley rice set at Boriook Main Branch, barley rice and doenjang stew come to your table by default, and you top the rice with namul from the self-bar and mix it all together. When we got to our seats, the barley rice and doenjang stew were already waiting.

I took one shot of everything we brought back and it's a huge spread. I saw that other people use the barley rice bowl to carry their namul back, but since we were sharing, we used plates.

Put as much namul as you like on top of the barley rice, drizzle a round of nutty sesame oil, and mix it up. Pure heaven. I added the radish kimchi and young radish kimchi to the rice, so I didn't use any gochujang. Personally, I liked it even better with the radish kimchi and no gochujang.

How was the fritter quality for an all-you-can-eat place?

The vegetable fritters at Boriook Main Branch are really clean and crisp! When I hear barley rice buffet or all-you-can-eat, I think of low-quality fritters, but these were vegetable fritters so they felt light, and maybe because they turn over fast, they were warm and clean-tasting.

Take the wrap vegetables you brought, pile on barley rice and namul, and eat it in one bite. Heaven. Eating so many vegetables made me happy. (Would someone please make me namul side dishes every day?)

Dessert and coffee at Boriook Main Branch

For dessert, Boriook Main Branch has puffed grain snacks, stick-shaped rice grain snacks, and a coffee and tea machine. And the even crazier part!! There are dessert puffed grain snacks and rice grain snacks... The puffed grain on the left was nutty and the rice stick on the right was sweet.

Next to them is a machine for americano, instant mix coffee, Job's tears tea, plum tea and peach tea, and there's an ice maker under the plum and peach tea, so you can have yours iced however you like.

After the meal there's a space to enjoy puffed grain snacks and coffee to your taste. For families, dessert and coffee are all covered, which is perfect. If you're looking for an all-you-can-eat barley rice buffet near Mangpo Station in Suwon, Boriook Main Branch is worth a visit.