Gwangju donkkaseu spot with self-serve lettuce, kimchi nabe, curry

Location and hours at Jinsim Wang Donkkaseu Cheomdan

Here's my review of Jinsim Wang Donkkaseu Cheomdan, a donkkaseu (pork cutlet) specialist that's a real Cheomdan favorite!

• ⭐️It's located near Cheomdan Lotte Mart, at 6 Cheomdangangbyeon-ro 87beon-gil, Gwangsan-gu, Gwangju, South Korea, 1st floor
• ⭐️There's no dedicated parking lot, but there's plenty of space to park in the nearby alleys
• ⭐️It's open daily 11am–9pm with no days off, but note there's a break time from 14:30 to 16:30!

Cheomdan favorite Jinsim Wang Donkkaseu Cheomdan is also popular for takeout and delivery in the area! The store is huge and has plenty of great-value menu items, so when I visited there were tons of delivery orders and dine-in guests alike.

A wide window-lined dining room for solo diners and groups alike

The place is spacious with big windows, so it never feels stuffy — it has an open, airy interior. Table spacing is wide and the seats are roomy, which makes it great for groups as well as comfortable for solo dining. There are also baby chairs and children's tableware, so it looked like a good spot for families too!

A self-serve bar with lettuce wraps

Basic side dishes aren't provided, but there's a self-serve bar where you help yourself to as much as you like. Lettuce wraps, danmuji (pickled radish) and kimchi are all set out — I found it striking that lettuce wraps are offered as a side for donkkaseu.

Kids' tableware and a self-packing station

Next to the self-serve bar there are kids' tableware and bibs, plus a thoughtfully set up self-packing box station. There's parchment paper and boxes ready so food doesn't leak — because at Cheomdan favorite Jinsim Wang Donkkaseu, a single cutlet is really huge, enough that an adult woman would likely need to take some home. That's probably why there's a dedicated self-packing station! I had almost half left too, so I used it myself, haha.

Soup and broth I had seconds of

Besides the self-serve bar, there's also broth and soup ready to go, with pepper for the soup and green onion for the broth set out separately. The soup was so good I had seconds haha — true to a great donkkaseu restaurant, even the soup was delicious!

Menu lineup and how to order

You order via tablet, and if you take part in the review event they give you a free drink, so definitely join in and enjoy your free drink haha. The menu has everything from plain donkkaseu to spicy donkkaseu, curry donkkaseu, fish cutlet, cheese cutlet, kimchi nabe, sweet potato cheese donkkaseu and more, plus a wide variety of side dishes to pair with your cutlet — tteokbokki (spicy rice cakes), fried shrimp, mandu (dumplings), chicken tenders, jjolmyeon (chewy cold noodles), anchovy kalguksu (noodle soup), fish cake skewer udon, naengmyeon (cold noodles), bibim naengmyeon and kimchi udon.

How did the wang donkkaseu, kimchi nabe and curry donkkaseu taste?

I ordered the basic wang donkkaseu, kimchi nabe and curry donkkaseu. The wang (giant) cutlet was bigger than four palms put together...! The size was just overwhelming.

The tastiest of all was the donkkaseu kimchi nabe! It's a flavor any Korean would love, haha. Plenty of people were also ordering the set menus where noodles come together with the cutlet.

If you ask for the sauce on the side so it doesn't get soggy, they'll bring it separately — worth mentioning ahead of time! Cheomdan favorite Jinsim Wang Donkkaseu apparently uses only fresh pork loin, mixing and frying the batter in-house, so the meat is tender with no gamey smell — crispy outside, soft inside.

The reddish tinge in the cutlet is apparently just a natural color from protein changes in the fresh pork loin, so it's fine to eat. It's made with grade-1 domestic pork, so it was fresh with great meat quality. Plus there are so many menu items both adults and kids can enjoy, making it a great Cheomdan donkkaseu spot to order a variety of dishes and share.

Donkkaseu wraps: a combo I hadn't thought of

You can also wrap the cutlet in the lettuce from the self-serve bar — a combination I hadn't considered before, and it felt refreshing! It even felt like a healthier way to eat donkkaseu haha. If you're looking for a Cheomdan donkkaseu spot, I'd definitely recommend Jinsim Wang Donkkaseu Cheomdan!