Asan Korean BBQ where staff tend the grill: minari set, Choigojip

Choigojip (최고집), a minari pork belly spot near Onyangoncheon in Asan! It's minari season right now and everyone seems to be eating minari pork belly (minari is water dropwort, a fragrant spring green), so I figured I had to try it too 💜

Where is Choigojip in Yonghwa-dong, Asan, and what's the parking like?

Choigojip is in an alley in Yonghwa-dong packed with restaurants (22 Yonghwa-ro 9beon-gil), so it's easy to find. Parking, though, is pretty rough. You'll need to aim for the public lot or a spot in the alley. I circled around for a while and got lucky.

Choigojip has been recognized in several places, including as an Anshim Restaurant, a Model Restaurant and a signature restaurant of Asan City, so the taste is pretty much guaranteed. It's 10 minutes from Onyangoncheon Station, so access is good too, and it's already well known as a minari pork belly place in Asan 😆

Is Choigojip a good spot for team dinners and family gatherings?

Besides the open hall, Choigojip has private rooms, so it looked great for company dinners and family gatherings. The earthy, rustic interior gives off a real-deal local favorite vibe. Places like this are usually the genuinely good ones, and that's exactly the feeling here. A pork BBQ place in Yonghwa-dong, Asan that I'd recommend for get-togethers!

I also liked that there are drinks like water, coffee and plum tea, so you can finish your meal however you like. And of course they're free 😉

Choigojip menu and set composition

The most famous menu item at Choigojip is the set of minari pork belly + thin-sliced pork (daepa) + gabrisal (pork shoulder-rib meat) + yukhoe (seasoned raw beef). Four kinds of meat, which is great news for meat lovers!

It's peak minari season, and they use fresh domestic minari and domestic high-sulfur-fed pork, so the flavor is rich and savory. The minari is unlimited, which is an absolute bargain 😆 The other meats, like gabrisal, thin-sliced pork and fresh duck, are reportedly all domestic too.

If you visit at lunch, there are lunch specials of pork galbi set meal and spicy stir-fried pork set meal. Other meals include galbitang (short rib soup), yukhoe bibimbap and seonji haejangguk (ox blood hangover soup).

What are the side dishes like at Choigojip?

The side dishes are set out fast as soon as you sit down 🤤 The table is big, yet it was filled right up.

There's a wide variety, from basics to nearly side-dish-level items: unlimited fresh minari, pickled perilla leaves, lettuce, seasoned scallion salad, kimchi, japchae (glass noodle stir-fry), yangnyeom gejang (spicy seasoned crab), cabbage salad and more. Every one of them tasted good, so trying them all kept my hands way too busy lol

A mini seonji haejangguk (ox blood hangover soup) also comes as standard. It has big chunks of congealed ox blood and plenty of other ingredients!

How do the Korean beef yukhoe and sulfur pork taste in the ₩60,000 set?

And here's the yukhoe included in the Choigojip set ✨ All of this for ₩60,000, such an amazing deal ㅠㅠ

Of course it's made with Korean beef (hanwoo), and it's chilled, not frozen. It's cut fairly thick, so the texture really comes through, which was even more my style. Eating beef and pork together feels so luxurious 🤭

The meats, in order, are gabrisal, pork belly and thin-sliced naengsam (daepa). The color of the meat is lovely, there's no smell at all, and the thin-sliced pork is even thick. Sulfur-fed pork is clean without any gamey smell yet keeps the meat's flavor, which apparently makes it taste even better. That's the kind of info that makes you excited before you even take a bite haha

Decorating the minari pork belly grill (bulkku)

The staff puts the bean sprouts and minari straight onto the grill for you.

These days people decorate everything... so I decorate my grill, "bulkku" (grill decorating). Put every kind of meat on! I laid the minari and kimchi on the side where the oil drains so they'd turn golden in the pork fat.

Minari pork belly grill decor with such gorgeous color combos!

I thought the mix of cuts was a bit unusual, but the texture and flavor differ so much from cut to cut that it's actually fun to eat. I cut mine into fairly small pieces (because I wanted them to cook fast...), but I think cutting them bigger would bring out even more texture and flavor.

Does the staff take care of the grill at Choigojip?

The staff at Choigojip always keep an eye on the hall, so when the grill gets messy because you're busy eating, someone appears out of nowhere, swaps the grill and leaves.

Then you can start eating again with a fresh-start feeling haha

How do minari and pork belly go together?

Wrap it all up in a lettuce wrap too. I never used to care about minari pork belly, but maybe my tastes changed as I got older, because eaten with the meat it's such a perfect match. The fragrant minari blends with the meat and the flavor feels brighter? Bigger? Something like that.

The spread was hearty enough that I was full on meat alone, without rice. There were so many side dishes that I mixed and matched, so I never got tired of it and finished every last piece!

Overall verdict on Choigojip in Asan

• ✅ Set menu with unlimited minari + sulfur pork belly + yukhoe
• ✅ Wide variety of side dishes and a generous basic spread
• ✅ Staff manage the grill, so grilling is easy
• ✅ A layout that works well for team dinners and family gatherings

Choigojip is a pork BBQ place in Yonghwa-dong, Asan where you can enjoy a variety of meats and eat as much minari as you like! It's perfect for a day when you want minari pork belly at a good price. I especially liked that you get everything from yukhoe to pork belly in one go, so if you're looking for a filling BBQ place in Asan, you'll likely be satisfied 💜