Once in a while everyone goes through the stage of craving all the carbs, protein, grease and bacon your body can take (notice how I categorized bacon separately). Finding a good breakfast place in Seoul is not the easiest mission one can devote to. One can find breakfast/brunch places that are alright to so-so to good, but it’s really hard to come across a GREAT place. There are few examples of GREAT breakfast/brunch places in Seoul:
- Butterfinger Pancakes (two locations: 1.) behind Designer Club in Cheongdam, and 2.) near Club Mass, Gangnam station exit #6), serves all-American style & portion dishes
- Suji’s at Itaewon definitely won’t disappoint you either. (Call for directions: 02-797-3698)
But what is the problem with places mentioned above? Besides contributing to your rising cholesterol levels?
The only problem with those places is that you have to wait in a line. If you go during the weekend, you have to wait for a good 20-30 minutes before you can sit down. After you place your order, it’ll take a good 10-20 minutes for your order, which will add up to around 40 minutes of waiting.
So unless you wake up early with the sole purpose of getting some good food, you are going to have to salivate and torture yourself while you smell all that greatness around you. What’s an alternative? Or better yet, is there a better option?
And thankfully the answer is YES!
Read more after the jump.
Macaroni Market, one of my favorite hangout places these days, started offering breakfast/brunch specials on weekends. It’s an all-you-can eat buffet style brunch, and to be honest, I was very surprised by the quality of the food offered.
Usually I am not a fan of buffets. Quality suffers as a result of restaurants squeezing out quantity. Plus, food, no matter what methods were used to keep them warm, just isn’t the same after it sits there for more than 30 minutes.
Macaroni Market offers a variety of hearty breakfast dishes: I am just going to list everything that I can remember in no particular order: grilled vegetables (my all-time favorite), grilled chicken, soup, assortment of bread & fruits, juices (grapefruit & orange), milk, cream-based pasta, mussels, alfredo pasta, and … basically there were 8 hot dishes , and probably another 8 selection of salad or cold dishes you could choose from as well. There was a waffle station as well, along with some cookies and desserts.
But mainly I was impressed with their bacon and egg. Instead of having layers of bacon sitting in a tray, letting each other get soggy with its own grease, bacon is cooked freshly from the kitchen and is served to you. A waitress goes around taking orders for bacon and your choice of egg, and she will present it to you in all its divine glory. And yes! the bacon was crisply done to perfection!
I’ve had brunch in different hotels and equivalent venues, but I was always disappointed with the quality of food. I’ve had both buffet-style where food was soggy and sometimes not even warm.. Most buffets would focus on variety of dishes, so they would have half-decent dishes but just have several of them, which should never be an excuse for poor quality. If anything, it’s better to have limited selection of top-notch dishes than a pile of unreasonable food. What was impressive to me was that Macaroni, at around 16 dishes total, delivered both the quality as well as the variety.
Be warned though, such quality doesn’t come cheap. It costs 24,000 Won per person without 10% VAT.
So if you wake up one morning and you’re starving for some great breakfast, I recommend Macaroni Market, for the following reasons:
The Good
- Great quality buffet-style breakfast & top notch service
- I always liked the classy wooden interior of the cafe side of Macaroni, also offers terrace seats
- Usually no waiting as the venue is large
The Bad
- At 24,000, it’s not your cheapest option
- Starts a little late for those who wake up early (from 11am until 3pm)
Directions
- Get out at exit #2 at Itaewon Station, and walk straight for 300 meters, or for 3-4 minutes. Macaroni Market is on the second floor on your left, right above Buy The Way convenient store.
Contact
- 02-749-9181
Operation Hours
- Brunch only available on weekends (Sat & Sun) 11am – 3pm
Cost
- 24,000 Won + 10% VAT
