Places to eat in North Korea

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After we had visited Kim Il Sung's birth place at Mangyongdae, we had an outside barbeque picnic lunch at a place called Ryonggak Mountain. Again the food was excellent and a food way to cook and eat. We had, what we hoped were, beef and duck on skewers which we cooked on a small grill on the table, salad, bread and more bottles of beer.

We came here on our last evening in North Korea and the food was top rate. It was a duck barbeque restaurant where you cooked the food yourselves at your table and was good fun. Included were bottles of beer and even some rice wine.

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This was lunch on our first full day in Pyongyang in a restaurant opposite some embassies, including Romania and Iran, on a street called Sariwon Street in the east of the city. Don't ask me what the restaurant was called but the food was great. You cooked it yourself in a small pot in front of you which was good fun.

We ate a couple of times in two of the Yanggakdo Hotels restaurants. The first night of the tour we ate at the No.2 restaurant and had soup/bread, beef burger, salad and beer served to us by girls wearing traditional Korean dresses. We also had breakfast every morning which consisted of toast, eggs, coffee and yoghurt. The food was fairly good but not as good as other restaurants that we went out to in the city.

1. You can't choose restaurant. They'll take you where they plan to.
2. Buffet breakfast means: you are sitting and waitress is bringing piece by piece to you.
3. Korean barbecue was the best thing we ate.
4. Korean food isn't that bad, but then..nothing special.
5. You won't starve. They take care for visitors.
6. You can't order "something" else.
7. Even if you don't eat meat, sometimes they just forget.
8. You can always buy some nibbles in hotel shop (coala bear filled with chocolate was the best buy)
9. They serve you beer (lunch and dinner).
10. Everything is included in price of tour.

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Writing a review of an individual restaurant is rather pointless because as a visitor to North Korea you won't have any saying on which one to chose anyway. The guides (or more likely their bosses or the bosses' bosses or the....) will decide for you.

An educated guess would be that there are about a dozen restaurants serving foreigners. All of them state owned of course.

I must say that the food I had during my visit was quite ok. The Koreans are eager to show tourists the best they've got, so there is no reason to fear that you have to live on rice with...eh...rice for a week.

Several times we had hot pot which (at least the two first times) was really nice. At most meals they served kimchi, Korean cabbage. I thought it was delicious and it didn't take more than a week after my return home that I went looking for it in Asian food shops.

In many restaurants you sit on the floor eating which for the unpractised can be quite uncomfortable.

Favorite Dish: Kimchi!

Honestly, food is surprising good (at least to an asian like me). You'll be served with local food most of the time and can almost bet that there'll be Kim Chi on your table for every single meal. Personally the food actually taste better than those in south korea. Perhaps, the favouring is milder. You can bet that you are serve as a worthy guest when it comes to food there.

So, like with most of the things you will do in North Korea, there will be little alternative but to accept the places you visit and restaurants you eat in. The pick of the bunch in Pyongyang, would have to be the BBQ duck restaurant. The tables are set up so you grill within the constraints of your chair and along side are various dips, sauces and side dishes. All in all a fun 'fondue' style approach to eating. Add in a bottle of snake-wine for authenticity.
Like everything on the tour you dont need to fork out cash as it will normally be all inclusive - except for a little beer maybe.

Favorite Dish: The duck, but of course.