Seosin-dong galbi restaurant in Jeonju: Ubookgeum Saenggalbi

With the holidays coming up, I've been seeing rib gift sets pop up at the grocery store lately. That got me craving LA galbi, the kind we always ate on holidays growing up, and it just so happened there's a restaurant in Seosin-dong, Jeonju where you can get beef saenggalbi (unmarinated short ribs). So I headed over to Ubookgeum Saenggalbi Seosin Branch.

Rather than sticking to just one dish, we ordered a half plate of beef saenggalbi and a half plate of marinated pork galbi to try both. What does unmarinated beef saenggalbi taste like on its own? And how did it compare to the marinated pork? Here's the rundown.

Where is Ubookgeum Saenggalbi Seosin Branch, and where do you park?

Ubookgeum Saenggalbi Seosin Branch sits on the main road in Seosin-dong near the Jeonju Lotte Department Store, so it's easy to find even on your first visit. The big signboard is visible right from the street.

• Category: meat, grilled dishes
• Hours: 11:00 – 23:00
• Address: 970-2 Seosin-dong, Wansan-gu, Jeonju, Jeonbuk, South Korea
• Parking: K Parking Lot, directly across from the restaurant

If you're driving, you can use the K Parking Lot right across the street, which made the usually tricky parking situation in Seosin-dong pretty painless.

Beef and pork galbi menu: half plates available too

The menu has beef saenggalbi and marinated beef galbi, plus pork saenggalbi and marinated pork galbi, each available as a full or half plate. We went with a full plate of beef saenggalbi (₩58,000) and a half plate of marinated pork galbi (₩21,000).

Side dishes that arrive before the meat

Once you order, the side dishes are set on the table before the meat even arrives. Good pairings for the grilled meat show up one by one, so the table looked pretty full even before the actual grilling started.

The basic steamed egg came in a stone bowl, soft-set with a nice color and just the right doneness. Fluffy and soft with every spoonful — why is this so hard to make at home? Haha.

The dongchimi (watery radish kimchi) was sweet and refreshingly cool. Your mouth tends to get heavy while eating meat, so it was great to sip this between bites like a cold drink.

The seasoned bean sprouts came piled high with sauce, spicy and tangy — like the supporting actor that steals the scene in jjolmyeon (chewy cold noodles), you know what I mean? Haha. The crunchy, sauce-coated sprouts went so well with the meat that I kept reaching for them between bites — they were oddly addictive.

Are side dish refills free at Ubookgeum Saenggalbi?

Since the staff were busy grilling meat at every table, I went up to grab more side dishes myself, but they kindly brought extras over anyway. That warmth felt just like the saenggalbi itself — haha.

Among the neatly arranged side dishes, the vivid red green onion kimchi caught my eye the most. It was delicious from the first bite, with the sauce soaked in deeply while the onion's own flavor still came through — a piece of it on top of the meat was truly the move. Haha.

Beef saenggalbi, a 500g plate before grilling

With the side dishes all set, the beef saenggalbi we ordered finally arrived. A full plate is 500g, neatly stacked on a long platter.

Fine marbling ran through the red meat, and you could see the meat still clinging to the bone — it looked appetizing even before hitting the grill.

How the staff debone the beef ribs at the table

At first I assumed they'd just grill it bone-in as-is.

But as the staff member put the meat on the grill, they used scissors to separate the bone from the meat piece by piece. I'd pictured something like LA galbi, holding the bone and gnawing on it, so this process felt pretty unique.

The deboned meat was cut into bite-sized pieces and placed on the grill, while the bones were grilled separately alongside.

I'd been curious about beef saenggalbi just from its look, and now the grilling method was different from what I expected too, which made me even more curious how it would taste once fully cooked. Haha.

How the grilled beef saenggalbi tasted

The finished beef saenggalbi had a golden-browned surface with juices glistening on top — it looked delicious. The staff cut it into bite-sized pieces and set the fully cooked ones onto a side wire rack, one at a time.

Since it wasn't left over the high heat the whole time, there was no worry about it burning or overcooking, and it stayed warm and easy to pick at one piece at a time. When it first arrived on the plate it looked like LA galbi, but once the bones were removed and grilled, it became a completely different experience — a thick, standalone piece of beef.

Taking a bite, I could taste the smoky, savory char of the beef. The outside was browned but the inside stayed juicy, with more flavor coming through the more I chewed. Since it's saenggalbi eaten without marinade, it was a great way to enjoy the clean, unadorned taste of the meat itself.

The marinated pork galbi half plate

After the beef saenggalbi, they moved on to grilling the half plate of marinated pork galbi.

As the marinade browned on the grill, a sweet galbi aroma rose up and got my appetite going again. Taking a bite, the sweet and salty marinade had soaked deeply into the meat.

The flavor direction was totally different from the beef saenggalbi we'd just had, so switching back and forth between the two was part of the fun.

Worth it when you're craving galbi in Seosin-dong, Jeonju?

I originally visited Ubookgeum in Seosin-dong because the holidays had me craving beef saenggalbi, but the tableside deboning method was a fun twist, and getting to enjoy a thick, standalone piece of beef once it was fully grilled gave the meal its own distinct charm. If you're looking for a place to eat beef or ribs in Seosin-dong, give Ubookgeum Saenggalbi Seosin Branch a try. :)