Dado: Best abalone porridge in Seogwipo
Dado (다도) is a restaurant we found on Naver Maps during our stay in Jeju Island. Dado was really close to our hotel and also specialize in abalone dishes, so we decided to give it a try.
My fiancé and I may eat abalone more often than some folks because we are Chinese so we do see abalone appear every now and then at fancy Chinese restaurants or Chinese New Years. But generally, we do not like it that much or want to eat it that frequently. However, we did see lots of advertisements and restaurants boasting about their abalone dishes (even BBQ restaurants have grilled abalone), so abalone kinda became a trendy food item we wanted to try while we were in Jeju-do.
Recommended: Read more about my trip to Korea in my travel recap post – including my 3 day itinerary in Jeju Island.
The vibe
The outside is very unassuming – kind of looks like the first floor of an apartment or office. The parking lot was also pretty much empty when we arrived here for our first meal of the day at around 10:30 am. Not a lot of restaurants are open before 10am 🙁.
The inside was spacious and felt kind of indie 😅 (like we are in an indie film). The hard concrete floors looked super clean for some reason and there were large windows so a lot of natural light was coming through. It had a quiet and peaceful vibe and big wooden picnic tables inside for seating.
You order up at the front through a machine so you don’t really need to worry much about speaking Korean with a server. The menu is also translated in English:
Food review
Here is everything we ordered between 2 adults. Prices are converted 1000:1 KRW to CAD and rounded to the nearest dollar for simplicity.
Abalone rice porridge ($16)
So the abalone rice porridge comes and it is actually in a massive bowl 🤩. I was surprised by how large the portion as since it’s only $16 and abalone is supposed to be expensive. Also, they gave me at least 2 abalones! All sliced up, looking pretty and making it very easy to eat.
The porridge has this kind of murky green colour to it but it tasted great and felt very comforting. It was just a nice warm bowl of porridge that sat very well in my stomach. Kelvin will even say that this bowl of abalone porridge was one of the best things he ate during our entire trip (the man has a sensitive stomach).
The porridge also came with 3 side dishes and a small seaweed soup. Side dishes are very common in Korea and are usually free, but I did appreciate that Dado gave me some more unique side dishes. One was regular kimchi, and the other one was like a white bean in some spicy sauce, and a cabbage salad with tomato.
Overall, good value for your money and the side dishes made it a whole set meal.
Abalone bibimbap ($16)
Kelvin orders the abalone bibimbap, which is also $16. Similar to my porridge, he also has 2 abalone sliced thinly and plated on top of the bowl of rice. It also has a fried egg, seaweed, bean sprouts, peppers and other mixed vegetables for him to mix it all together. Again, it is a large bowl 👍!
His side dishes had spicy cucumber, an egg white salad and some jelly radish looking things.
We usually prefer our bibimbap in a stone bowl to make it more crispy so this bibimbap didn’t have that texture, although it tasted light and refreshing.
Grilled fish
We didn’t order this but our server gave it to us along with all our food so maybe it’s just something they give customers for free if you order a certain amount 😆?
The grilled fish was also pretty big and nice to share between 2 people. It gave us a bit more protein as our meals were both quite light (rice and porridge with 2 abalones and veggies).
It can be a little difficult to eat due to all the small fish bones though 😬.
Final thoughts
Loewe’s rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Our brunch at Dado really started off our day on a high note! The calm and pleasant atmosphere along with a very homey and refreshing meal energized us.
I know food in Korea is generally cheaper compared to Vancouver (especially because you don’t need to tip or pay tax), but I would say $16 for either of these set meals is a pretty damn good deal. Portions were large and everything tasted good without it being overpowering or super fatty/rich. They let the ingredients speak for themselves. Kelvin’s stomach wasn’t feeling the best so I think the abalone porridge really did its magic.
The abalone itself, even though sliced, looked really large to me. They certainly are larger than the ones I’ve eaten in Vancouver and the texture wasn’t too chewy or anything like that.
If you are in the Seogwipo area of Jeju-do, I highly recommend this hidden gem!
Sincerely, Loewe