Korean Job Discussion Forums

[JongnoGuru]

I�ve got some cousins visiting for about a week, and am not sure where to take them in the evenings. Their days will be spent on the well-trodden downtown museum/palace/temple/shopping circuit. I may send them down to the Korean Polk Billage in Yongin for a day, not sure yet. DMZ? I�ll come up with ideas, and they�ll want to do certain things. Daytime isn�t a problem.

What I need to come up with are two or three staggeringly good evening options, but this comes with a few provisos which are complicating the matter.

SHOULD BE:

Posh.
They're not staying at my house, they've already booked rooms at the Westin. So now, these few evenings are the only opportunity I have to show my hospitality. They visited Japan a few years ago and stayed at some kinda Club Med-calibre privately owned family retreat of a Japanese business associate of theirs. Well fk me, I can't hope to compete with that. But that's what they're used to.

They tell me "just take us to your favourite places", but they're Champagne & Caviar and I'm Mr. Soju & Samgyopsal. I will definitely take them to one of my more down-market haunts, if only as a joke, but that won't do for more than once. And I'm hearing from my family to disregard what my cousins said, understand that they're used to nothing but the absolute best wherever they go, and I'm not to jerk them around with anything below Top 10. You know, I don't have a friggin' clue what Seoul's official Top 10 restaurants/night spots might be!

Korean.
Essentially, the sky's the limit as far as cost goes, but I'll be damned if I'm going to crack open my piggybank for the best foreign food & drink Korea has to offer when these people eat the same stuff (only 50 times better) on a regular basis back home.


SHOULDN'T BE:

Ostentatious or gaudy or vulgar. Or Western.
That's self-explanatory. No "ritzy sleaze-holes" like JJ Mahoney's, no whoring at the million-dollar whoring establishments of Gangnam's whoring districts, and no Western-wannabe nightclubs or restaurants in Hongdae/Itaewon. Oh, and no "put-on-for-the-tourists" suggestions either, please.


I�ve got an endless list of what�s totally out, but my What�s In list is almost blank. Age-wise, they're in between me and my parents, i.e., late 50s, possibly early 60s, married, with grown kids, etc. Were they all under 40, single & male, I wouldn't be posting this plea for help.

Also, not that it particularly matters, but they're not even coming to Korea to see Korea, as it were. They're travelling on the Trans-Siberian Railway, and their flight (terminating in Vladivostok, I presume) just so happens to stop over at ICN. Since I'm here, they decided to extend for a week.

What's really got me worked up is, these aren't your average cousins. They're not my average cousins either. They're the superhuman hyper-overachieving offspring of superhuman hyper-overachieving parents, and it's a clan where everyone basically regards run-of-the-mill overachieving as borderline slacking. I am definitely the black-sheep slacker of the flock. They'll get here and wonder why, after all my years in Korea, I'm not running the GD place by now. *They* would be. arrrrrggghh!

What's the Korean dinner & nightlife equivalent of First-class compartments aboard the Trans-Siberian Railway?

[mindmetoo]

What about that street sort of north east of the palace? SE of the Blue House. Lots of upscale restaurants and then if you continue north you reach that weird little retreat where the big wigs used to go with their ho's.

What about one of those upscale crab joints in Gangnam?

[bassexpander]

My parents like the Noriyangjin fish market.

[mindmetoo]

[JongnoGuru]

[bassexpander]

Just don't go to the Walker Hill salad bar. Boy, were we disappointed.

[ultra]

How about here...

http://www.shilla.net/outside/en/outside_m.jsp

A night cruise on the Han River is nice too.

[Lekker]

Take them to grappa bar. It's in Hongdae in the same building, or right near the same building as dr. fish. You can't miss it. It's really posh, and you can go outside onto the rooftop for a nice view in the night time. You can see the han river from there I think.

Or you could take them for a nice Saturday Evening stroll through Jongno.

[tzechuk]

Millennium Seoul Hilton - many options there... Oak Room, Four Seasons (best French food in town).

Sky Lounge at Coex (or Grand, can't remember which) Intercontinental in Gangnam.

Seoul Finance Centre, basement, has a restaurant called YongSuSan, which is a fusion Korean restaurant. Very clean, nice and definitely posh (bloody expensive, too!).

More hotels.. Grand Hilton has the best buffet in town, and an even more bloody amazing Chinese restaurant with a couple of chefs from Hong Kong, so very authentic.

Ritz Carlton's Italian isn't bad, but nothing to boast about.

Another posh fusion Korean restaurant, called dalgaebi (www.dalgaebi.com). Posh and expensive. But I am not sure if it isn't overpriced. Nice atmosphere, though. They have a terrace garden, may be you can go there since it'll be warm.

This is all I can think of right now.. if I think of more, I will let you know.

---------

Oops... I just read your OP more carefully.. you want only Korean?!

Uh... anyway, I will leave those that you don't want in, in case they want western food one evening cos they can't stomach anymore fermented, rotten cabbage.

[mindmetoo]

[Cerriowen]

You could take the boat tour down the Han River, OR rent your own little Yacht with a captain.

How about taking a boat trip out to Dok-Do?

I know a restaurant south of Jamsil, near Garak Market, that does traditional royalty meals. 20 different courses of traditional food. It's about 20-30K a person I think... I can't remember exactly.

Also up in Pocheon they have a restaurant that *is* technically samgyupsal and ribs... but it's slow cooked in a smoke grill, and really thick. For 3 people, you're looking at about 40-50k.

Also in Pochoen there is a botanical garden with a tea-house, and temple, and tasty vegetarian restaurant.

Sarak Mountain is really beautiful. You don't have to hike very much because of the lift. There are condos nearby, and a temple. Also really amazing water-falls that you can hike up to in about an hour.

[catycat]

You could try Korea House. My folks are coming to visit later this year and I was thinking of taking them there. It's downtown, near Chungmuro, from what I can remember. It's a restaurant in an old traditional house, and had live performances every night. Google it.

[Bibbitybop]

Do you have access to a car? If so, take them to the Italian restaurant at Paljakjeong on top of Bugaksan. It over looks all of Jongno-gu/Jung-gu on one side and Bugak-dong on the other. No buses go there, and a taxi will take you, but won't come pick you up unless you make very specific, trustworthy arrangements.

Also, there is a steak restaurant on another part of the mountain called "The Bear House." That's easier to get to. Look it up in Hanguel for more info.

[Mr. Pink]

Do they like to eat raw fish?

There are a couple all you can eat type raw fish buffet places in the Kangnam area. Last time I went to one it was like 36k a person, but well worth it. Everything was very top notch.

Plus being in the Kangnam area, there are lots of upscale places to grab a drink afterwards.

[JongnoGuru]

Alright, alright, alright... I edited the thread title. Everyone seemed to be answering based on what they want to eat, where they want to go. Lots of great restaurants suggested, places I've been and some I'm dying to try now. But it just isn't what I'm asking here.


Revised, Simplified Criteria:

-- Seoul's finest Korean restaurants NOT located in hotels



What's Out, Out, O-U-T, OUT!!

-- Non-Korean cuisine

-- Fusion cuisine

-- Hotels


I'm only talking about 3 out of 21 meals here. They can eat friggin' pizzas and hamburgers in the Westin cafe the rest of the time for all I care, but these dinners are going to be real Korean, in real Korea. I'm going to drag my cousins, kicking and screaming if need be, out of their GD 5-star deluxe, Englishee-spoken-here, all-major-credit-cards-accepted comfort zone. Gonna get those rats on MY turf. .... just haven't decided where yet.