Sanullim 1992 — Restaurant in Seoul

amazing service, food, drinks and atmosphere! cannot wait to return on my next trip.

1. i'm korean-american, raised in america since I was a tiny little toddler. as a result my korean language skills are very poor; but I do try to speak the language when I am visiting. The waitress helping us was kind and understanding and rather than being impatient like some of the older ajummas in korea are with me, our server here was extremely patient, attentive, and took her time to explain and recommend things.

2. in america, you can really only find "grocery store" makgeolli (with the exception of hana in brooklyn, NY). this stuff uses aspartame and is pasteurized to survive transport and shelf life; as a result the deeper yogurty flavors and natural sweetness of a proper makgeolli is completely eliminated. come try real makgeolli here - unprocessed, no aspartame, not pasteurized and full of good lactobacillus acidophilli; thick in body, naturally subtly sweet and yogurty, and SO, SO good. don't skimp and try the premium makgeollis too. boksoondoga is a good intro/starter, but make sure you also try the "haechang 12" and the "chungmyung takju" - those two were my absolute favorites.

all the food we tried was excellent. the beef sashimi especially stands out, though the tofu kimchee is a tried and true pairing to makgeolli. they also gave us a complimentary dessert - delicious!

i was sad when white-bear in apgujeong closed - but discovering sanulim 1992 has completely healed me.

thank you,...

This place is incredible and the tablet ordering system is beautiful, everything comes out so fast!! The menu is in Korean so we used Google Translate quite frequently, but we were able to order everything we wanted food/makgeolli/soju-wise without issue!

The spicy squid was probably my favorite thing — it is truly very spicy but also incredibly flavorful and tender — just a perfect dish (but make sure to add a “bap” (a bowl of rice to mix into the spicy sauce)). The fried squid ink rings, raw sliced beef, sous vide pork belly, and seafood pancake were all just as amazing, I would order all of them again.

The service was really quite incredible — food and drinks show up promptly after ordering via the provided tablet. The first time we came, the manager came by and suggested different soju —we followed his suggestions and were quite pleased.

This...

• Atmosphere: Bar & restaurant. There are 2 floors with kinda big tables. English music in background.

• Menu: There are menus on booklet and on pad device. Restriction for food ordering here is to order 3 starters or 1 starter and 1 main dish. We didn’t know until the waiter tried to tell us in English. If you only come over for just a drink, bear this in mind.

• Food: We loved the dishes. Beef sashimi came with seasonings on top and 2 types of mentaiko (one spicy and one tasted like mixing with Korean sauce) A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. Cheese & potato pancake is a signature and it was wow! Forget about calories and just enjoy it.

• Drinks: So many selections of soju and wine to choose from. We ordered yuzu wine and it was great. Wish we could have drunk more.

Definitely coming back if we...