Gwangyang city (in Jeon Nam Province) where I live is definitely not a popular tourist destination to foreigners, though we do have some festivals in spring when the plum and cherry blossoms start to appear. They look awesome, but if you want to see them you will be surrounded by thousands of other people looking at them too. 
The part of Gwangyang I live in now is a very industrialized area. I am only 5 minutes away from POSCO, one of the largest steel works companies in the world, and their subsidiary companies. So if you happen to come to Gwangyang that would be for business trip in most cases, since a 5 day tour package doesn’t include this city anyway.
So just in case you might stop by this small but very industrialized city one day, I am going to introduce one fine restaurant that I like. The restaurant is called Neutinamu (zelkova tree in English) and it is famous for Pyongyang style steamed dumplings (Mandu) and knife cut noodles with seafood (Haemul Kalguksu). They do have other menus of course like Shabu-shabu, and other hot pot dishes, but it seemed to me that 90% of the customers eat knife cut noodles and dumplings.
I ordered knife cut noodles for 4 people and a dish of steamed dumplings.
They served this bowl of barley as an appetizer with some steamed vegetables and sauce. The sauce was soy bean paste, but it was a bit thiner than normal soy bean paste. They probably dilute it with some other ingredients. (Michael really liked the bowl of barley, though it used be the symbol of poverty in Korea, up to 20-30 years ago, now it has become popular again because it is known as good healthy food)
They served noodles and dumplings at the same time. While we were waiting for the noodles to cook, we had dumplings. There were 7 of them for a dish. It was really delicious. The best steamed dumplings I ever ate. It just melts in your mouth and very morish too. I wish I could make dumplings like they do.
Finally the noodles are cooked, we started to dig in. It was really good. The broth was refreshing but hot, I nearly burnt my tongue. Unfortunately it only had 4 medium size prawns, and lots of shell fish instead. I am a prawn killer, so having 1 prawn doesn’t satisfy me.
Oh oo, I forgot to mention this. Apparently Michael thinks that their Kimchi tastes the best in Korea. I am sure there are lots of good restaurants that serve nice Kimchi, but this restaurant’s one is quite nice, I say best in the local area at least. (They serve freshly made Kimchi, so called Gutjeory, in a big jar, I think we ate 1/4 of a cabbage worth of kimchi)
Total cost = 25,000 won for 4 people (US $26.30)
- Steamed dumplings: 5,000 won (US $5.30) – Must try item (5 points out of 5)
- Knife cut noodles with seafood: 20,000 won for 4 people (4 points out of 5) – they need to learn more about the beauty of giving away more prawns
Location
1647-5, Jungdong, Gwangyang, JeonNam, South Korea (next to Kookmin Bank)
I am sorry about the quality of the pictures. It was too dim inside and the sun was facing the other direction. Though I was pretty embarrassed enough by just taking some pictures with a chunky SLR continually. I got a fair bit of attention there. 
Yet I am still considering taking my tripod, but then Michael might refuse to eat with me.
Related Posts
Shellfish and Chewy Noodle Soup (Bajirak Kalguksu in Korean)
My Failed Kimchi Dumplings (Kimchi Mandu in Korean) and What I have learnt
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I kove gaesung mondu. I really wish there was more information on North Korean culinary styles.
Kat, Thank you for your kind words.
Cheri, I can understand how you would have felt. Hearing about somewhere you have been to before. I would have felt same way. Was the trip good? I’ve been on the factory tour, it was pretty amazing.
Justin, LOL, Eating out is pretty cheap in Korea, relatively, though you can’t save much money that way. If she is such a bad cook, why don’t you try my recipes yourself?
Simcooks, fortunately my husband doesn’t roll his eyes quite like that. I might consider buying a small tripod if that can cope with the weight of an SLR. I have a small camera too, though I love the SLR so much more.
How about getting a small table tripod? That way you can set a low shutter speed and no need flash? My husband sighs and rolls his eyes whenever I take out my camera in restaurants. So far I use my tiny Canon IXUS IZoom rather than the chunky SLR.
couldn’t sleep and just surfing the net … wut a treat to run into your site … unfortunately, my girlfriend isn’t a good cook so we order out a lot … being from the states, now residing in gwangju (chollado) i noticed how difficult it can be to buy some of the things which i am acustomed to “BOY DO I MISS PUMPKIN PIE” … being a gyopo, i can pretty much eat anything, which is good cause ‘mah girl’ can’t cook … regardless, i will have to introduce this blog to her and maybe for the first time SINCE we met, actually enjoy some of her cooking … PERHAPS…
Oh oh oh. I’m weirdly excited! I’ve actually been to POSCO. How funny is that!
When we lived in Korea for two years, I homeschooled my son. We belonged to a homeschool group that took field trips within driving distance (from Daegu). It isn’t often I get to read other blogs where people mention places I visited in Korea!
these knife cut noodles sounds interesting and delicious! your photos are very good too!