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Start
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Hwangmae Mountain
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Theme Park
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Gagopa Sikdang
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Jeongyang Wetland
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Punggyong
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Sonkalguksu
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Sorigil
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Seongbo Museum
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Haeinsa Temple
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Gobau Sikdang
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Finish
Well, we’ve walked quite a long way so it’s not strange that we feel hungry. ^^* Do you like Buddhist cuisine made with only vegetables by any chance? Hapcheon would remind you of Haeinsa Temple where the Tripitaka Koreana is kept so after we took a look around the temple, we headed to Gobau Sikdang(restaurant) near the temple. It’s not exactly food for monks but it just has vegetables in it without any meat.
There are many restaurants around Haeinsa Post Office after we pass the entrance to the temple. Most of them serve set menu with seasoned wild vegetables, and there’s Gobau Sikdang, known for delicious set menu with seasoned wild vegetables for 45 years here. It’s not exaggerating to say this is the most famous one here. Set menu with seasoned wild vegetables is Korean table d’hote made with food materials gained from the mountain. You might think it would be too light without any fish or meat but everybody speaks highly of it so we went inside.
It looks old outside as its age but it was clean inside. The weather was chilly and the warm floor with big sitting cushions made us recover from fatigue.
There are a few cuisines on the menu but as most people eat Sanchae Jeongsik(Set Menu with Seasoned Wild Vegetables; 12,000 won per one person) they just prepared the table after checking the number of customers. The common dishes were fifteen and three more extra dishes including Deodeok(mountain herb whose roots have restorative propertive) jeon(pancake), rich soybean paste stew and stir-fried shiitake mushrooms. And an extra bowl of rice just in case we need it!! You see?
The most popular menu and cuisine here is this Deodeok jeon. Most people would eat Deodeok with no additional ingredients or fry them with gochujang sauce but here, it’s sliced first, seasoned with gochujang sauce, and fried with dough made of water parsley and welsh onions. Colorful look stimulated my appetite.
Even it’s fried with oil, I still could smell its scent and slightly bitter taste goes well with spicy and sweet sauce. You cannot eat this anywhere else so we finished the whole dish.
Next to Deodeok jeon, we liked stir-fried shiitake mushrooms. Shiiake is too soft and smooth but these were strangely chewy. It’s because they’ve been dried first then soaked in water, and I assume they did it to make us feel like we’re eating meat. Tough stems were removed while the rest was fried with salt and this is as good as it gets.
Third main dish was rich soybean paste stew. There’s no meat but it has different kinds of mushrooms, tofu and vegetables. Unlike its look, it’s deep and delicious that we did not need any other dish to eat a bowl of rice.
Another common dish among fifteen dishes that I would like to tell you about is fried chili pepper. The seeds were removed, dough was applied to the chili peppers, steamed them, dried them under the sunlight, fried them and finally boiled them down in sugar sauce. You cannot see this often since it’s VERY complicated to make them. It’s fried so crispy of course, and boiled down in sugar sauce so it’s sweet and chewy. I asked my wife to make these at home and she looked sharply at me that I like dishes that are complicated to make.
This one is boiled chewy stems removed from mushrooms that I told you about. It’s hard to cook them ‘cause the stem parts are quite tough but they were just chewy and delicious. Good.
This one is bracken ferns fried with erilla seeds after boiling them. The scent of bracken fern remained that made me feel healthy. This one was also delicious.
This one is a pickled Japanese apricot and it was crunchy and sweet but it did not have much sugar in it, which I liked.
Last dish I liked was stir-fried black mushrooms. I could still feel the chewy texture and scent of black mushroom, amazing.
Most of the dishes at Gobau Sikdang were not strong, just clean and neat with original tastes. All the dishes were amazing that I could eat two bowls of rice, and especially, chewy shiitake mushrooms which replaced meat, Deodeok jeon and complicated dish, fried chili pepper, stimulated my appetite and convinced me that their know-hows and sincerity were quite unique.
If you go to Haeinsa Temple, I say you should eat Sanchae Jeongsik(Set Menu with Seasoned Wild Vegetables) here. You wouldn’t even notice that there’s no meat to have a satisfying meal. Gobau Sikdang is a must-visit restaurant in Hapcheon but it’s only for those who are willing to go to Haeinsa Temple. Otherwise, you’re going to have to pay for the admission fee (3,000 won per person) and parking fee (compact car: 4,000 won) because it is inside Gayasan National park.
Address : 13-5, Chiin 1-gil, Gaya-myeong, Hapcheon-gun (경상남도 합천군 가야면 치인1길13-5)
Telephone : 055-931-7311
Opening Hours and Holidays : 09:00 – 19:00, No holidays
Last comment…
How was my 2-day trip to Hapchoen? Hapcheon was way more dynamic and beautiful city than I expected. It seems like active yet sensitive, unsophisticated yet delicate, modern yet traditional city. The nature was beautiful and it shistory was indescribably creative with impressive relics. If you’re thinking of visiting Hapcheon, I hope you plan a fun trip based on my post.
