Korea wedding trip day 5: Pyeongyang in Dongdaemun

Pin It

After spending the first few nights in our spacious room at Hotel Sunbee Insadong, we decided to check into voco Seoul Myeongdong to be closer to heart of the city. The room was definitely smaller, but now we have a view of Namsan and N Seoul Tower.

After days of traveling everywhere by taxi, we switched to public transport today since there is a bus stop right in front of our hotel entrance. It wasn't long before we got off at the designated stop, with a short walk to our lunch spot.

Pyeongyang Myeonok (평양면옥) is an institution in Seoul, with a history that apparently goes back three generations. The original location is too far south and even the second location in Uijeongbu (의정부) is a little out of the way, so we visited the one in Jangchung-dong (장충동) for the convenience. We didn't get here as early as I wanted to, so we ended up waiting in line for just about 10 minutes.

Fun fact: Pildong Myeonok (필동면옥), which we visited 3 days ago, is run by the sister of the owner of this establishment. This is why the styles are very similar.

The pickles here definitely looked more rustic compared to the ones we had 3 days ago...

The myeonsoo (면수) here has more buckwheat flavor.

We got ourselves a plate of dumplings (접시만두), and I came to the realization that I don't like these rustic Pyeongyang-style mandu (만두)... The filling was pretty loose, and not as tasty as the ones we had 3 days ago.

Naengmyeon (냉면) - the "original"... No sprinkle of gochugaru (고춧가루) here, just the clear beef broth with darker-colored buckwheat noodles. The broth was noticeably more salty compared to the one at Pildong, but the flavors weren't more complex. That was a little disappointing. The sliced beef was nothing to write home about, as expected.

The noodles had darker colors compared to the ones at Pildong, and just as long. I noticed that some tables were provided with scissors to cut them, but not us... which was just as well.

Foursheets' verdict was that she preferred the noodles and broth at Pildong, and I do think Pildong feels more refined and delicate compared to the more rustic feel of this place.

We were just around the corner from Dongdaemun Design Plaza, and I've always wanted to visit this place designed by Zaha Haddid. I finally got the chance to walk through the funky buildings, which reminded me somewhat of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York.

At The Language of an Era exhibition, we saw this Snoopy phone from 1976.

We made our way back to Myeongdong, and headed for Shinsegae Department Store Main Store (신세계백화점 본점) to shop for mom. I was sure their gourmet food hall would have what mom was looking for.

Sure enough, they have a good selection of gulbi (굴비) - those salted yellow croakers that mom loved so much. I had bought a bunch of these back in 2017, but when I didn't freeze them and only kept them in the chilled section of our fridge, they eventually went off. Luckily for us, they were doing a promotion this week and everything was 40% off! So I ended up getting a bargain for a whole bunch of 20 fish...

Time to take our haul - which included jars of premium kimchi and some makgeolli - back to our hotel fridge and get ready for dinner.