Songpa izakaya beef gopchang hot pot with yuzu soy sauce: Horanggul

This is Airy the FIRE-seeker, back from a Songridan-gil date. Here's my review of the beef gopchang hot pot at Horanggul Bangi Branch, famous for its delicious Japanese-style motsunabe.

What kind of place is Horanggul?

Horanggul is a daechang hot pot spot with annual sales of ₩1.5 billion, and reportedly Korea's very first restaurant specializing in Korean beef daechang dishes. It serves a spicy daechang hot pot motsunabe made from a recipe learned in Japan.

The flagship branch is in Anyang Beomgye. It was listed in the 2023 Blue Ribbon Survey, does ₩1.5 billion a year, and has an average wait of about an hour and a half. Now you can get that same flavor in Jamsil, on Songridan-gil / the Bangi food alley.

It's a Japanese-style izakaya serving beef gopchang / daechang hot pot along with various anju (drinking snacks). The Korean beef daechang hot pot is a special dish you won't find anywhere else near Bangi Station / Songridan-gil in Jamsil-Songpa — only at Horanggul.

Where the name 'Horanggul' (Tiger's Den) comes from

Motsunabe is a dish somewhere between Korean and Japanese cuisine, born from Koreans working hard times in Japan using hormone (offal) parts left over after the beef was sold. Long ago, many Japanese came to Korea to hunt tigers, which didn't exist in Japan. The name 'Horanggul' (Tiger's Den) comes from the imagined scene of a Korean tiger hunter and a Japanese hunter eating this dish together in front of a tiger's den.

Location and hours of Horanggul Bangi Branch

Address: 16 Ogeum-ro 15-gil, 1st floor, Songpa-gu, Seoul. It's about 480 meters from Exit 2 of Songpanaru Station (Line 9), under 8 minutes on foot. Hours are 11:30 AM to 12:00 AM, with a break time from 3:00 PM to 5:00 PM.

Delivery, group dining and Wi-Fi are all available, and restrooms are separated by gender. Parking is available at Songpa-gu Office (8 minutes on foot) or the Seobong Building (1 minute away).

Is there a wait?

It's a famous spot with a wait during meal times. You can reserve or join the waitlist through Table-ing.

Interior straight out of a Japanese izakaya

Both outside and inside, you'll find a Japanese-izakaya-style interior. It genuinely felt like being on a trip to Japan, which put me in a good mood.

Clean wood tones throughout, and with Japanese characters visible here and there, it really felt like stepping into an actual Japanese izakaya.

Menu and how to order

We sat down and looked over the Horanggul menu. The signature dishes are the daechang hot pot and beef gopchang hot pot motsunabe.

You choose between the beef gopchang & daechang hot pot (deep flavor), the gopchang hot pot (clean flavor), or the original daechang hot pot. Then pick your spice level: mild, medium, spicy, or extra spicy. After finishing the toppings, you choose noodles or risotto to finish.

Follow event

If you follow Horanggul, they give you mini garlic scapes. There's even an event going on for dessert taco, so it's worth checking out.

There's even a guide on how to eat the motsunabe most deliciously.

Our beef gopchang hot pot motsunabe experience

We ordered the Korean beef gopchang hot pot motsunabe. Ordering via QR code made things convenient.

The basic side dish was a clean, tasty plate of garlic scapes. We also ordered a drink.

We ordered the gopchang hot pot for two at a spice level around Shin Ramyun-spicy. The motsunabe arrived quickly.

Inside the earthenware pot were tofu, meat, broth, and various vegetables. A timer runs, and once a certain time passes, a staff member comes over to open the lid.

Once the lid opens, you first dip the tofu, yuzu, fish balls, and vegetables in the yuzu soy sauce. After 2-3 more minutes, once the meat, daechang, and gopchang are fully cooked, you eat those.

That yuzu soy sauce was genuinely delicious, so I kept dipping vegetables in it too. The gopchang came in a generous portion, wonderfully chewy and delicious. The broth had real umami depth.

Fresh Korean beef daechang, tender gopchang, and a special sauce learned from Fukuoka went really well together. The pot was also packed with pork neck meat, fish balls, fried tofu, tofu, and other vegetables. It's said to be Korea's very first and only red motsunabe.

Leave some broth if you want noodles or risotto

Since extra broth isn't provided, you need to leave a third of it if you want noodles or risotto. If you want both, leave over half.

We ordered the cheese risotto, which staff prepared for us right at the table and it was delicious. I also joined the follow event and got the house-made garlic scapes, which I took home and ate with ramyun — really tasty.

Horanggul is a Japanese-style spot on Songridan-gil that I keep thinking back to for a date.