{Korea} Must Visit in Seoul – Noryangjin Fish Market

“It’s moving!” screamed our 2 year old while pointing at the chopped up octopus tentacles on the plate. Jeremy then proceeded to pick up a small piece, dipped it in sauce, put it in his mouth and started chewing! Everyone around the table chuckles.

A few of us then took turns eating the still moving tentacles. I have to say, it’s actually quite tasty (with the sauce) and not as bad as I expected.

See video here…

Freshly chopped up, still wriggling octopus tentacles. Can’t get any fresher than this!

Fresh octopus at the market

This scene took place inside a restaurant within the Noryangjin Fish Market. One of the unique experience here is that you can purchase fresh seafood here at the market and proceed to hand it over to a restaurant operator within the market who will then cook the seafood for you to eat right there and then!

Here’s our experience…

Dizzying array of seafood

When we went in 2015, there was only the old market. Now, a newer expanded section has been opened. We heard it’s cleaner and that both the old and new sections are open.

Entrance to the market.

Dizzying array of seafood for you to choose from.

1 – Walk around and survey

We recommend you first walk around the various stalls and see all the seafood that’s available to you. Ask for price but do not bargain unless you are ready to purchase. (Tip: Most of them know basic english and mandarin, so you can ask for price in those languages if you don’t know Korean. When in doubt, we would bring out a pen and paper and write down the numbers to make sure we’re not misunderstanding the cost).

First, walk around the stalls and check out all that is available. Ask for price but don’t bargain unless you are ready to purchase.

2 – Bargain

Once you know what you’d like, ask for the price and then bargain. We were able to get at least 10% off the originally asked price. If you’re a great negotiator, you might get even more!

 

 

A bit too big for our taste!

We bought this!

More octopus for sale!

We weren’t quite sure what fish these were.

The OCD in me enjoyed seeing all the nicely arranged seafood!

 

Jeremy put his hand next to the prawns for size comparison

We bought fish and was given a good discount from this lady.

More nicely arranged seafood!

There were also various fish roe and kimchee for sale.

3 – Bring the seafood to a restaurant

Some stalls have restaurant “reps” waiting and can be asked to take you to their restaurant so they can cook the seafood you bought.

What we did instead was purchase a bunch of different seafood from various stalls and go to a restaurant in the market ourselves. We chose this specific restaurant because our family were here before and the chefs at this restaurant spoke fluent mandarin and food was deliciously prepared.

To get to the restaurant we went to, look for this sign in one of the corners of the market.

Follow the sign and go down the stairs.

This is the restaurant we went to.

We gave the lady all the bags of seafood we bought and she’d tell us her recommended method of cooking.

4 – Enjoy your meal

We probably bought at least a dozen kinds of seafood. The restaurant chefs made sure we tried various methods of cooking for all the seafood. Majority was simple steaming of the seafood though. Our favorite were the raw wriggling tentacles and the steamed king crab!

We actually ate so quickly that we forgot to take a picture of all the dishes!

We probably bought at least a dozen kinds of seafood. The king crab is one of our favorite!

More info…

The market is open 24/7 and is located at 674 Nodeul-ro, Dongjak-gu, 서울특별시 South Korea.

Have you been to Noryangjin Seafood Market? What was your experience?

Hope this helps for those who have yet to try it!