KOREATRAVEL LIST

Hangukjip

한국집

Jeonju's oldest traditional bibimbap house, running since 1952 and now in its third generation, using only its own fermented pastes and hanwoo beef.

Language

A bowl of Jeonju bibimbap served at Hangukjip — vegetables, beef and yellow mung-bean jelly over rice in a stone bowl, with six side dishes

Place information

Korean name
한국집
Address
119 Eojin-gil, Wansan-gu, Jeonju-si, Jeonbuk
Opening hours
not published by the operator
Closed
Not published by the operator

History

According to Jiyeok N Munhwa, the regional-culture portal of the Korean Cultural Center Association, Lee Bun-rye initially sold rice cakes at Hanguk Tteokjip (a rice-cake shop). When the cakes did not sell well, she began running a restaurant alongside the shop at the suggestion of her daughter, Ju Sun-ok. Lee drew on baengbaengdori, a market dish she had eaten before marriage: people mixed several vegetables and chilli paste by turning a spoon round and round in the bowl, and she added vegetables such as flower mushrooms, bellflower root and aster, along with raw beef. Her daughter Ju Sun-ok later took over, followed by Ju's third daughter, Jang Ji-hye.

  1. 1952

    Lee Bun-rye opens Hanguk Tteokjip

  2. 2015

    Jeonju Food Landmark designation

Jiyeok N Munhwa (Korean Cultural Center Association) — 'Hangukjip, Jeonju': how Lee Bun-rye's rice-cake shop came to serve food, the bibimbap drawn from baengbaengdori, the succession to Ju Sun-ok and Jang Ji-hye, and the 2015 Jeonju Food Landmark designation ·

What to eat

A bowl of Jeonju bibimbap served at Hangukjip — vegetables, beef and yellow mung-bean jelly over rice in a stone bowl, with six side dishes

Jeonju bibimbap — the city's rice bowl

Photograph: Jeonju bibimbap at Hangukjip

Seefooddiet (Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0)

Jeonju bibimbap — the city's rice bowl selected

Nearby

A sea of traditional tiled hanok rooftops filling Jeonju Hanok Village

Jeonju Hanok Village

Plan it as a walkable district rather than one attraction, combining one or two heritage sites with food, crafts, or a hanok stay.

Archaeological Site in Wanggung-ri

A site on the Iksan plain spanning the Baekje and Unified Silla periods. Several accounts have been handed down about it — a Mahan capital, King Mu of Baekje moving or duplicating his capital here, Anseung's Bodeokguk, Gyeon Hwon's Later Baekje capital — and excavation reads it as built across at least three periods. UNESCO lists it among the components related to the secondary Sabi capital.

The west stone pagoda at the Mireuksa site at sunset: six tiers of stone roofs narrowing over a broad platform, a dark passage opening at the centre of the first storey, and the sun low on the right across the dry ground of the temple site

Mireuksa Temple Site

The site of a temple founded under King Mu of Baekje. It has a plan found nowhere else: stone pagodas east and west with a wooden one between them, each with its own main hall behind it. The western stone pagoda is the oldest surviving stone pagoda in Korea.

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Where these facts come from