The best Korean restaurants in Sydney

So anyone who’s dined at Hansang will tell you this: Get the beef-bone stew. It’s a cream-coloured broth with the texture, aroma and depth of flavour you’d expect from something that’s simmered in a cauldron for 72 hours. It’s seriously one of the best soups in Sydney, but there is so much more Hansang has to offer. The loud, beerhall-like venue has a long menu traversing meaty drinking snacks, hot pots and simple homestyle stews. Then there’s the fact the banchan, all 8 to 10 of them, are some of the best in Sydney. 

Pu Ji Mi is a hidden gem in Eastwood mall with the most loyal local following. When it comes to home-style food, the talk of the town is that Pu Ji Mi does it best. Everything is made in-house and a lot by hand. The showpieces are jok bal and bo ssam, two famously booze-friendly pork dishes (trotters and belly, respectively) served with an arrangement of fresh greens and powerful condiments, both of which you use to make a spicy, punchy, lardy wrap.

Every drinking culture has hangover cures. In Korea, it’s haejanggook, a term that translates to ‘hangover soup’. Ymone Haejanggook is the best place in Sydney to get a decent haejanggook at an actual breakfast hour. But if you’re in at night, even better. You can start the whole cycle over again with a hot pot, a sizzling plate of spicy intestines and a few bottles of soju.

The Mandoo is an authentic hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Think less than twenty seats (all of them fighting for what space they have), a tiny menu of dumplings and noodles, and an oddly serene open kitchen demonstrating the art of shaping dumplings and pulling noodles by hand. The dumplings are massive, silky and filled to the max (often with pork, potentially with kimchi, too) while the noodles are either plunged into ice and topped with kimchi and egg, or served in a delicious beef-bone or seafood broth.

If we’re talking numbers, Time Out’s top pick for the best banchan in Sydney is Myeong Dong. The most we’ve seen is 14, remarkable considering they’re all made in house. We’ve seen soy-marinated perilla leaves, cured octopus, fish cakes, local lotus root, pickled zucchini, chestnut jelly, semi-sweet soy-dressed potatoes and many, many kinds of kimchi. If you’re in for an endless stream of side dishes that make the rest of the menu feel like a side quest, head over to Myeong Dong.

Sydney has a heap of anju restaurants serving Korean bar snacks designed to fortify you for a night on the tiles. Seoul BBQ is the next level up. Expect the same cheese-lathered, spice-smothered dishes you’ll find at other anju joints, but here they shave a few dollars from the price tag. Even better, if you order a drink, almost everything on the menu is less than $15. 

Biwon is our favourite iteration of Sydney’s Korean-Chinese eateries. Like the Korean-Chinese canon generally, Biwon’s charm is its unfussiness – servings are massive, good value and accessible. The restaurant is loud and often crowded, so be prepared to get shafted to the top floor where you need to order through an actual intercom. However you request it, the jajangmyeon (black bean noodle) and tangsuyuk (battered sweet-and-sour pork) both make it well worth visiting this hidden diner. 

The banchan at 678 will land at lightening speed on your table as soon as you take a seat. All the staff in the vast, wood-lined space will rush about faster than you can catch them. When you do, though, order the pork belly and the marinated boneless short rib for your tabletop barbecue. You’ll definitely be visiting 678 again. 

At Danjee, the restaurant is split across two adjoining spaces: one dedicated to Korean barbecue complete with hotplates are built into the tables, and the other to the likes of bo ssam, salads, noodles and rice dishes. If you go straight to barbecue (understandably), do not pass go without ordering the soy-marinated beef intercostals. You’ll get your hotplate, half an onion and a big pair of scissors for snipping the musky, rich meat.

When we visit good Korean fried chicken restaurants in Sydney, we usually leave feeling satisfied. They deliver juicy, crunchy, battered chooks and maybe some decent pickles, too. But that’s about it. Red Pepper is one of the few exceptions. Once you’ve visited, we know you’ll agree with us on this one: the fried chicken is the best of its kind in Sydney. It’s super juicy, generously seasoned with all the spicy, garlicky saucy flavours without being drenched, and coated in a medium-thick batter that hits the spot perfectly. 

Jang Ta Bal was open long before Korean barbecue exploded in Sydney, so its been one of the most popular joints since the very beginning. It offers extremely good-quality meats and has a good-time vibe that’s akin to a well-sauced house party.