Ansan's Multicultural Food Market Outside of Seoul

About an hour outside of Seoul lies the city of Ansan. Due to its many factories and links to shipping, it has an enormous foreign population which, for a country as homogenous as Korea, is rare to find.

The community that sprung up surrounding the foreign population was one that gave the people what they wanted - good food from home. Whether you’re looking for fresh Uzbek-style bread, some Nepalese food, or even some Chinese grocery items, Ansan Multicultural Food Street has you covered.

HOW TO GET THERE: Go to Ansan Station exit 1 and walk straight/follow the flow of people, you can’t miss it!

We stopped by around noon on a Sunday and started off with a Chinese chive pancake (we got the spicy kind). It was 2,000won for a massive bag that took us all day to eat. After that, we visited a noodle shop where the menu was in Chinese - we weren’t 100% sure what we ordered but it was delicious. You could also grab side dishes from the market stall out front and bring it in to the restaurant. We were the only people there speaking English or Korean, but the staff helped us out :)

We walked around for a bit, poking our heads into shops and then finally settling in to Imperia Cafe which wasn’t a cafe at all, more like a diner (that ironically didnt have any coffee lol) The woman working there only spoke Russian so we ordered a crepe-like dessert that we weren’t too sure about, a cherry lemonade, and a black tea. Whatever it was, it was tasty and pushed us over the edge hahah Before our food coma could hit, we hopped back on the bus to Seoul!

I wouldn’t recommend this for a solo trip, but if you bring friends, cash, and an empty stomach, it was a great little change of scenery!