도동산방 – DoDong San Bang
Korean Royal Cuisine. At least that’s what the brochure said. And usually when an establishment feels compelled to say how great their place is, I am immediately suspect. In this case, however, every bit of that tag line is deserved. DoDongSanBang is nestled in the mountains near Eonyang. Somewhat secluded and even a little difficult the find. Once there, however, the majesty of the mountains, the exquisite care given to the landscaping and lavish attention paid to guests can...
Read MoreO’Taco: Oh My Gawt! It’s Finally Here!
What started as another “Ulsan Online Facebook Phenomena” the readers of Ulsan Online’s popular facebook page were anxiously waiting the arrival of this establishment. If there was one thing that Ulsan lacked it was a proper mexican restaurant. For years Ulsan people went to Seoul, Busan, Masan and Daegu to get their fix but the wait is now over. O’Taco is here and their menu is bursting with South-of-the-border goodness. That would be the American border in case you...
Read MoreBest of Ulsan – Delivery/Take-out
Pizza and chicken, whether it’s take out or pickup. This is the fastfood category and not to be confused with sit down style restaurants that happens to serve chicken or pizza. In just about every neighborhood in the city there are numerous delivery options. With so many options, it’s no wonder that our readers picked the best Pizza Delivery winners as follows: Dominoes – 23% of our readers chose this as the best. Mr. Pizza and Pizza Etang –...
Read MoreBest of Ulsan – “Middle Earth”
Arabic, Middle Eastern, Indian is where “Middle Earth” cuisines arise. With only a few restaurants in Ulsan of these categories, the tallying was simple and straight-forward. And apparently, according to our readers, so are their choices. For the Indian/Pakistani variety of restaurants the winner is Namaskar – voted the Best in Ulsan with a whopping 84% of the vote. Our readers did not specify, except in a single case, if the Samsandong or Shinae location was their preference. Shalimar...
Read MoreBest of Ulsan – East Asian
Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai cuisines are covered here. In the Chinese category, Chai takes the prize for Best Chinese in Ulsan with 61% of the votes. Not a single other Chinese restaurant got better than single-digit percentage of the votes. Thai restaurants in Ulsan are as rare as hen’s teeth, but our readers seem certain of their choices. Noodle Box, in Mugeodong, came away with 62.5% of the vote. Second place goes to Pataya Noodle with 37.5%. No other restaurants were even voted on. There was a...
Read MoreBest of Ulsan – Occidental Food
The word “western” makes me think of cowboy movies, and doesn’t really encapsulate the variety of cultures involved in this category. Occidental, meaning “from European roots” seems to better encapsulate categories that include buffet, hamburgers, Italian, Mexican, sandwiches, steak, and vegetarian. In alphabetical order, here are the results for Occidental Food: Best Buffet – The buffets here tend to be a mixture of foods from various cultures, but since the style of eating “buffet” is definitely Western, it falls...
Read MoreBest of Ulsan – Coffee and Dessert
What dinner would be complete without a cup of coffee and dessert? Our readers chose the best of the bunch in these categories and the results are both somewhat surprising and somewhat expected. With so many coffee shops around town it wasn’t surprising at all to see the sheer number of coffee shops nominated. With so many to choose from, one can imagine that traveling far from one’s home or business for coffee is simply not done. Favorites therefore,...
Read More놀이터 (Nolita)
A Korean salisbury restaurant with a delightful country home decor and a simple, non-english menu. Come for the Salisbury steak, stay for the Salisbury steak. TO GET THERE: Going south out of the Benchwarmers’ alley, turn left and walk just a block or two. It’s on your right. Or consult the helpful map on this page. I heard at Bench that there’s a place that makes handmade hamburgers in Shinae. So after meeting some friends nearby, we set out to...
Read MoreBurritos in Ulsan! Sort of!
UPDATED: May 9, 2012, to include a 2nd review: It’s getting easier every year to find good Western food in Ulsan. We can now pig out on Indian food in five different places, and find Turkish, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese and Thai restaurants scattered about the city. The Italian restaurants actually serve decent pasta and pizza in most cases, though their ideas of sweetened garlic bread and “risotto” still need to be challenged. Heck, you can even get a kabob...
Read MoreBulgogi Brothers
Tucked away inconspicuously on the second floor of a neon-swathed building on Samsandong’s main thoroughfare, above Paris Baguette, is Bulgogi Brothers, a fabulous Korean restaurant. The very first time I came here was with the Vice Principal’s son, an interesting young man recently out of the armed forces after completing his two years of compulsory service. Upon entering, the customer is greeted with a touch of class. An unknown female vocalist sings a plethora of songs from different genres...
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