White House Traditional Turkish Restaurant

 

Where the fabled Kebapistan restaurant in Samsandong left off, White House Turkish Restaurant takes over. In fact, the owners are the same. And if you ever went to Kebapistan, you’ll recognize the menu as well. Having moved from the downtown area near Hyundai department store, the restaurant owners decided to pull up stakes and move to Bangeojin in Dong Gu. The presence of so many more foreigners working in the shipyards means a much larger clientele base.

For those readers who had been to Kebapstan, the menu is very much the same. The outside menu jacket has changed but the dishes remain almost entirely intact from the previous incantation. The cook staff is the same as well, which guarantees the same great tastes and flavors from the past.

If you’re new to Ulsan, you missed a treat from the old location with authentic Turkish food available right in the  heart of the city. It’s a little farther away, but well worth the trip east.  There are few, if any, other restaurants in Ulsan that offer Middle Eastern fare. On our recent visit to White House, we started with bread and hummus. We followed that with dishes of Iskander and Doner Kebap, both of which were excellent and the portions more than sufficient. We walked away fat and satisfied, although we could have stayed much longer and enjoyed a hookah of exotic tobacco the restaurant supplies.

 

 

 

Our waitress, a Korean woman, was very pleasant and spoke moderate English. The rest of the staff is Turkish and although they speak some English, speak Korean far better.  Don’t worry if your Korean isn’t up to snuff as the menu is in English and Korean. Overall we found the entire staff to be kind and helpful. The dining area, in our opinion, was far more inviting than the Samsandong location. There are more  tables, and comfortable, deep red plush chairs that are more conducive to a relaxed meal than the  Louis XIV style austere white furniture in the old restaurant.  The only thing about our entire experience that gave us pause was the Christmas music played on on the muzak. We both raise our eyebrows at that oddity as we visited the restaurant in late June. Otherwise, the entire experience was fine and we plan to return – often. Having been to the Samsandong incarnation of the same restaurant, we were happy to have a Turkish restaurant back in Ulsan, regardless of the distance. I love Korean food, but I also crave variety and White House provides a refreshing  dish of escape from it.  White House gets a thumbs up from us.

To get to White House, head east to Dong-gu. Whether you take the Assano along the river or along the northern, busier side  of Hyundai car factory, at the eastern end of Hyundai take the southern route around Dong-gu along the coast. Once up the hill and into Bangeojin, take a right at the Munhyun intersection (문현삼거리) and go down the hill approximately 300m. White House will be on the left.