Sinnonhyeon Station tteokbokki with no wait before noon: Deokjane

I was craving tteokbokki (spicy rice cake) near Sinnonhyeon Station, so I headed straight to Deokjane Bangatgan!

It's only 118m from Exit 7 of Sinnonhyeon Station, so the accessibility was seriously great haha. Total subway-adjacent tteokbokki!!!! Like 20 steps from the exit and it's right there on the first floor. Super easy to find.

Location and hours

• Address: 62 Seocho-daero 77-gil, L1F, Seocho-gu, Seoul (118m from Sinnonhyeon Station Exit 7)
• Hours: Daily 11:00–20:30 (break 14:30–16:00, last order 20:00)

Inside, the men's and women's restrooms are separate, takeout and delivery are both available, and there's free Wi-Fi too, so it was comfortable to use. The tables were plentiful and there's a big menu board on the wall, so ordering was easy!!!!

Menu overview

There were so many set menu options, which I loved!! At a Korean snack restaurant, the more dishes you order, the better!!!!

What we ordered 💖

• Tteokbokki ₩6,000
• Bibim mandu ₩9,000
• Ambasa ₩2,000

When is there no wait?

Table turnover inside seemed to move pretty fast. I went around 11:30am and there was no wait, but by the time I left around 12:30pm, there was already a huge line...!!! Aim for the very early weekday morning slot!!!

The signature garaetteok tteokbokki

Deokjane Bangatgan's pride is the tteokbokki made with garaetteok (cylindrical rice cake) they make fresh every day!! The chewy texture of the rice cake was definitely a cut above other places hahaha. It even had a slight cheesy feel to it haha.

The sweet and spicy sauce paired really well with the rice cakes, and the potato salad on top softened the spiciness, making for an unusual yet perfectly matched combination!! It was spicier than expected, so those sensitive to spice might be surprised! Roughly on par with Shin Ramyun spice level!!!

Dipping the rice cake straight into the potato salad let you taste the spicy and sweet at the same time, which was a fun point lol. It went surprisingly well with the tteokbokki sauce!!! The sauce was thicker than I expected, so mixing it a bit with the potato salad made it match even better than I could have imagined....!!!

Daegu-style bibim mandu

Finding Daegu-style bibim mandu (mixed dumplings) here in Seoul is also this place's other signature menu!!! Julienned cabbage, carrot, cucumber, and a generous amount of seaweed flakes are piled on top of a flat fried dumpling, along with a sweet and tangy sauce 💖

The crispiness of the fried dumpling, the crunchy vegetables, and the tangy sauce all came together into a flavor that wasn't greasy at all and kept me reaching for more!! You could totally finish it by yourself haha. There seemed to be over ten dumpling wrappers, and the vegetables were piled up like a mountain, which surprised me a little at first, but it was so tasty lol that I quickly became confident I wasn't going to leave any leftovers.

Pairing this with Ambasa, the nostalgic soda from way back, was a perfect match. I'm team Ambasa over Milkis lol.

Final verdict

If you're looking for a good restaurant near Sinnonhyeon, the garaetteok tteokbokki at Deokjane Bangatgan is a must-try.

The combination of chewy garaetteok tteokbokki and Daegu-style bibim mandu — I don't think it's easy to find tteokbokki this good in Gangnam!!!