Noryangjin Fish Market: Korean sashimi in Seoul
One of the must-do items on our Korea trip was to visit and eat at a fish market!
How it works: you can visit a fish market and browse different stalls. Fishermen will have their fresh catches and fish in tanks, and you can purchase the fish directly from them and they will prepare it for you to eat at a restaurant on the second floor.
We visited the Noryangjin Fish Market located inย Dongjak-gu, Seoul with 2 of our Korean friends and here was our experience.
Recommended:ย Read about my first few days in Seoul in my travel recap blog post.
The vibe
We arrived at around 10 or 11am to have our first meal of the day at the Noryangjin Fish Market. It wasn’t that busy when we arrived on the Sunday morning.
The new building at the Noryangjin Fish Market is really big. Upon entering, you immediately smell some fishiness since the place is almost like an aquarium (ill joke I suppose since these fish are gonna be eaten ๐…). Unlike some fish markets, all the fish are kept alive and fresh so I would say overall, it is not that fishy.
Tons of booths are organized on the first floor and are usually run by a person wearing a blue or red coloured apron. When we first entered, there were already people trying to entice us to go to their stall by talking to us in Chinese or English (I guess it’s pretty obvious we are tourists ๐ ).
After walking around for awhile, you may notice that the stalls all kind of seem to blend together. Many of them sell similar things for similar prices – plates of assorted sashimi called hoe (pronounced kinda like “hweh”), live octopus, shellfish, crab, etc.
It was honestly a little confusing and intimidating so I was really glad to have our Korean friends with us ๐ฅ. We ended up purchasing our fish from this stall because the man told our friends that he would give it to us for a cheap price:
He recommended us 2 options:
- One big sea bass fish for ~$70 CAD
- 2 fishes – flounder and something else for $70
We went with the sea bass because he said it was a more premium fish and he also told us he would give us some free salmon as a “service”.
We then told him we wanted some live octopus as well and one of his friends (?) made us follow him to another stall where they were selling this. The live octopus are small but they are kind of see through and squiggly!
After making all of our purchases (we paid in cash to the people in the aprons), we were told to follow someone else again upstairs to their restaurant. The second floor has several different restaurants so I think depending on who you buy it from, you may be lead to a different restaurant to sit down.
There were signatures of celebrities and screenshots of celebrities eating here while filming for different shows. I find a lot of restaurants do this actually to promote their restaurants.
Inside, it is mostly wooden tables and chairs and you can fit quite a large group of people at one table. A lot of people were also drinking already even though it was only around lunch time. Our friend says this is because the soju gets rid of some of the fishiness but since I was hungover, I wasn’t about to start drinking soju at 12pm ๐.
There is a seating fee of around $2-4 per person, which isn’t a big deal in my opinion since there is no tipping culture in Korea.
Food and drinks review
Live octopus
Starting off with the raw/live octopus! I was very excited to try this because I actually love eating octopus but have never tried it raw or live before.
Since I first saw it in the tank (they just put it in a plastic bag and it disappeared to be prepared), they had basically chopped it up into much smaller pieces so you are not actually eating a whole small octopus and putting that in your mouth. The little bits were still moving and squirming on the plate though so that was very interesting to see. Even when I place a piece into my mouth, I can feel it slightly kind of sucking the inside of my mouth or tongue (is this review hentai now ๐ I’m sorry).
Taste-wise I would say it didn’t really have much flavour. It really depended on when I decided to dip the octopus in – they provide a red gochujang type of sauce, soy sauce, and a sweet sauce.
Sea bass
Here we have our main plate of food – the sea bass we chose earlier all sliced and prepared in a sashimi style + the free salmon the guy gave us. There were some pickled veggies on the side also.
This was also my first time eating hoe but I love sashimi so I wasn’t too worried. My initial reaction upon eating a slice of the sea bass was that it was much more crunchy than the Japanese sashimi I was used to (maybe some cartilage?). I found the texture to also be a lot more chewy.
Out of the sauces provided, I still liked eating it with soy sauce the most but the red sauce was also kind of nice, and so was the ssamjang, which is made of fermented beans.
The salmon sashimi was pretty good, but didn’t taste like anything you can’t get here in Vancouver. I think we are a little spoiled with the quality of our salmon here.
Fish stew
To end our meal, we added on a fish stew (I’m not sure how much more it costs, but not that much). They use the sea bass leftovers like the head and other parts to make this stew, which is not too spicy.
I found the broth to be quite yummy and a nice way to end the meal (and also helped with my hangover ๐) but you need to be a little careful of some fish bones in some chunks of the meat.
Final thoughts
Loewe’s rating: โญ๏ธโญ๏ธโญ๏ธโญ๏ธ
I think it’s a little hard to rate the fish market because it really depends on what you decide to buy. I would rate it somewhere between 3-4 stars.
The fish is fresh and prepared for you on the spot basically, so that is awesome. However, I still prefer Japanese sashimi over hoe because I wasn’t a big fan of the crunchy texture on some pieces. I found it a little harder to eat.
The live octopus was fun to eat but didn’t taste like much. I still recommend for you to try it though if you never have before!
Above all else, I would say the Noryangjin Fish Market is an experience, and not your regular restaurant. It is quite fun to choose a fish, go upstairs and eat it and get drunk on soju. However, I do think it is a little easier to navigate and shop for your fish if you can speak or understand Korean. I found it quite intimidating to talk to the sellers and decide on a price, and even choose a fish. There is a feeling that they may lowkey scam you or give it to you at a high price.
If you take a visit to the fish market, try to go with someone who can speak Korean! Or choose a stall where the seller can speak your language. If none of these options are available, I would recommend ordering from a stall that has photos and prices labeled on their banners so you understand exactly what you will be getting.
Sincerely, Loewe