Eating with Seoul: my top vegan restaurants in the city

The soul of Seoul is the food. It’s the city that never stops; 24-hour restaurants, themed cafés and home to some of the biggest food markets in the world. It’s not unusual to find most needs catered for relatively easily whilst strolling around in the twilight hours. Since moving to here in 2016, I’ve been documenting the ins and outs of being a vegan in Korea – and I have finally collected enough information (aka, eaten a ridiculous amount) to introduce my top vegan restaurants in Seoul!

Eating with Seoul: a vegans guide to surviving in South Korea.

It’s no secret that following a plant based diet in Korea hasn’t been the easiest of things. It’s the land of the meat eating, BBQ loving, fried chicken partying. Korea and ‘vegan’ do not usually come hand-in-hand; it was difficult and daunting arriving in a foreign country with this extra obstacle to overcome. But fear not my fellow vegan explorers – Korea is not a total meat frenzy. As I approach the one year mark, I’ve found some awesome vegan havens, some quirky alternatives to traditional cuisine and a few useful phrases – so here’s my guide for surviving in Korea on a plant based diet.  

A hearty bowl of Ma La Tang – the ultimate comfort food.

Now that I’m approaching the six-month mark in Korea, Ma La Tang (마라탕) has become a kind of ‘home comfort’ – with no access to a nourishing roast dinner or a traditional Friday night trip to the chippy, this is the closest I’ve had to ‘proper family food’ (sounds like something Jamie Oliver might say?). My favourite food in Korea is healthy, veganish and ironically, not Korean.

A vegetarian in Mangwon; exploring Seoul’s new hipster hangout.

Past the street merchants and western style cafés of Noksapyeong, we came over the horizon onto Itaewon-ro, to the sound of a thumping baseline and hordes of people. We’d accidentally arrived on the day of the annual Global Village Festival; a weekend-long celebration of international cuisines, music, fashion and crafts. But this wasn’t the hidden gem of the weekend.

Eating with Seoul; a vegan festival

After the painless Saturday morning operation of moving to a new apartment, less than 200m from our school, Molly and I ventured north of the Han River to the annual vegan festival held in the Seoul Innovation Park. Nestled at the foot of the Bukhansan National Park is a centre for stimulating the creative economy with consideration to social and environmental issues – a perfect place to hold a vegan festival.