Cheongnyangni Pyongyang Naengmyeon: The Bowl Seoul's Naengmyeon Lovers Keep to Themselves ๐ฅข๐คซ
I need to confess something: I've been quietly keeping this place to myself.
If you've read my Pyongyang naengmyeon guide or my post about how Seoul's great naengmyeon houses are all connected, you know I spend an unreasonable amount of my life thinking about this cold buckwheat noodle soup. I've taken you through the famous lineages. Today I'm taking you somewhere the lineage charts don't reach.
It's in Cheongnyangni, in Seoul's northeast — not a neighborhood any tourist itinerary sends you to. The restaurant's name is, wonderfully, just Pyongyang Naengmyeon. No founder's name, no branch story. Like a bakery called Bread. You have to respect the confidence.
Quick Verdict
- ✨ My favorite under-the-radar Pyongyang naengmyeon in Seoul.
- ๐ Broth — A slightly deeper broth than the famous old houses.
- ๐ธ Price — A ₩13,000 price tag they abandoned years ago.
- ๐ฅ Side — A mung bean pancake you are not allowed to skip.
- ๐ถ♂️ Tip — Come hungry, come on a weekday, and combine it with Gyeongdong Market next door.
Not Michelin. Better: the Living Masters
The famous naengmyeon houses collect Michelin mentions. This place has a different badge on its sign: SBS's "Living Masters" (์ํ์๋ฌ์ธ), a beloved Korean TV show that hunts down ordinary people who have quietly mastered one thing — a dumpling, a haircut, a bowl of noodles. It featured this shop back in 2015, and the shop has been going for over thirty years, simmering its broth for thirteen hours every morning and pressing its own buckwheat noodles.
I'll be honest with you, because that's the deal we have: online, Korean naengmyeon purists argue about this bowl. Too dark, some say. Not orthodox. The ajummas ladling broth do not appear concerned, and neither do the regulars.
I'm one of the regulars.
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| An authentic everyday Korean dining atmosphere |
The bowl
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| This restaurant’s signature Pyongyang naengmyeon |
Every meal here starts the way naengmyeon meals should: with a cup of yuksu, the warm broth, poured while you decide what to order. (You already know what you're ordering.)
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| The broth is generously refilled, a lovely touch that shows their hospitality. |
The mul naengmyeon arrives looking a shade deeper than the pale, austere bowls of the Uijeongbu lineage — and if you've been following this series, you know that broth color is where naengmyeon arguments begin. But here's the thing: it drinks clean. Deep but restrained, meaty but clear-headed, with none of the heaviness the color threatens. A soft poached egg sits on top — this shop's signature touch — and the house-made buckwheat noodles have that proper rough whisper against your lips.
This is, and I say this with full knowledge of what it means, exactly my kind of Pyongyang naengmyeon.
The one with the fermented skate
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| A rare hoeh naengmyeon topped with fermented skate |
Now, the menu item that made me fall for this place: hoe naengmyeon (ํ๋๋ฉด) — the spicy, red cousin of the bowl above, topped here not with the usual fish but with hongeo: fermented skate.
If you've spent any time on the food internet, you've met hongeo as a horror story — the ammonia-scented Korean delicacy that foreign YouTubers eat on camera while their souls leave their bodies. I'd like to offer a different perspective, because I am, unapologetically, a hongeo person. I love the stuff.
Full disclosure: I like my hongeo strong — the kind that makes the back of your nose file a formal complaint — and this bowl lands square in the middle of the scale. Which means if you're new to fermented skate, it will absolutely introduce itself. The cold broth and sweet-spicy seasoning take some of the edge off, but make no mistake: this is the real thing, not a theme-park version.
And that's exactly why I'd still recommend it as your first encounter. You get a genuine taste of why Koreans treasure this fish instead of merely surviving it — with a ₩15,000 bowl of very good noodles as your safety net.
(Hongeo deserves its own post — the culture, the science, where to try it properly. It's coming. This is your warning.)
Do not skip the sides
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| Warm suyuk — seriously good. |
The dwaeji suyuk — boiled pork slices — is remarkable for what it doesn't have: not a trace of the porky smell that ruins lesser suyuk. Just clean, tender meat that disappears alarmingly fast between two people.
But the dish I will physically stop you from skipping is the nokdu jijim (๋ น๋์ง์ง), the mung bean pancake. Shatteringly crisp at the edges, custardy inside — the exact crackle-to-softness ratio that Koreans describe as geot-ba-sok-chok and that I describe as the reason I keep ordering a third one.
And here's the tip that makes this shop genuinely great for solo diners and couples: almost every side dish comes in a half portion for ₩8,000. Half suyuk, half pancake, a full bowl of naengmyeon each — that's the correct order, and it's how locals do it.
The aftermath at my table. I have no regrets.
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| Nothing left. I cleaned it up. |
Make it an afternoon: Gyeongdong Market
Here's why this bowl fits so easily into a Seoul day: it sits next to Gyeongdong Market, one of the city's biggest and most gloriously untouristed traditional markets — mountains of herbs and ginseng, grandmothers negotiating over dried mushrooms, the Seoul that existed long before Instagram. Wander the market first, work up an appetite, then come here and sit down to the coldest reward in the neighborhood.
(Gyeongdong Market is getting its own post soon, too. The list keeps growing.)
Practical Info
Cheongnyangni Pyongyang Naengmyeon (์ฒญ๋๋ฆฌ ํ์๋๋ฉด)
- ๐ Location: 14-3 Hongneung-ro, Dongdaemun-gu, Seoul (Cheongnyangni, near Gyeongdong Market)
- ⏰ Hours: 10:00–21:00, closed Wednesdays ๐️
- ๐ธ Menu: Mul naengmyeon ₩13,000 · Bibim ₩13,000 · Hoe naengmyeon ₩15,000 · Dwaeji suyuk ₩13,000 · Nokdu jijim ₩13,000 · Pyongyang mandu ₩13,000 · Half portions of sides ₩8,000
- ๐ Getting there: Cheongnyangni Station (Line 1 / Gyeongui-Jungang Line / KTX), short walk — also minutes on foot from the big Cheongnyangni bus transfer center
- ๐ก Order this: Mul naengmyeon + half suyuk + half nokdu jijim (add hoe naengmyeon if you're hongeo-curious)
This post is part of my Pyongyang naengmyeon series — start with What Is Pyongyang Naengmyeon? if you're new, or see how Seoul's naengmyeon dynasties are connected. Have you braved hongeo? Tell me in the comments — I'll grade your courage.
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