[Busan Travel Food] Donghwa Banjeom - A Blue Ribbon Survey-recognized Chinese restaurant among Busan’s top 3 Chinese eateries. A 60-year-old classic Chinese restaurant where Nanjawanseu, tangsuyuk, and jajangmyeon are all delicious.

Baekwonjang’s Rating ★★★★★

Hello.

This is Baekwonjang’s Food Michelin.

Last time, I wrote a post about Suyeong Best Pork Soup, which is also known as one of Busan’s top 3 pork soup restaurants.

This time, I’d like to introduce a Blue Ribbon Survey Chinese restaurant that is said to be one of Busan’s top 3 Chinese restaurants.

For reference, it’s a long-established restaurant, with more than 60 years in business. It’s an incredible place!!

In the last post, I covered Suyeong Best Pork Soup. The main branch has such a long wait that I recommend trying one of the branch locations.

Or, since it’s open 24 hours, you could also go outside of peak hours. Be sure to check it out!

Donghwa Banjeom

My wife found this place through a search and we visited it. A Busan top 3 Chinese restaurant with a Blue Ribbon Survey sticker... how could we not go?!

We went a little late in the evening (we were almost the last customers), and even then there was still a wait.

I think it would probably be more convenient to go earlier in the day, schedule-wise. ^^

It was also featured on a YouTube channel run by Hyun Joo-yeob, and apparently became extremely famous about a year ago. LOL. If you watch the video, you’ll see that he eats every dish so deliciously.

Location: 3, Heukgyo-ro 75beon-gil, Jung-gu, Busan

Parking: Parking in front of the store.

For Seoul people like me who travel to Busan, this is actually a neighborhood that may not feel familiar.

It’s known as a Bosu-dong restaurant, probably because it’s close to the old downtown area.

What’s unusual is that, although there is of course no separate parking lot, they say you can just park appropriately in the alley.

The owner even said you can park in front of the Boseu Police Substation across the street—an unimaginable scene in Seoul, lol.

We parked in the empty spot in front of the restaurant and used that.

Siksin app rating

The first thing that surprised me was... wow, there are so many Siksin app restaurants around here!

I guess that’s because this is the old downtown area... but if you went around to all those restaurants one by one, you could spend years coming to Busan.

Wow, seeing it again, it feels like a whole new world. It made me think Busan is truly an enormous city, no less impressive than Seoul.

Based on the Siksin app, it had 1 star and a very good score of 3.9.

As expected, its 60-year history is something to be proud of, and most of the dishes are priced quite reasonably.

Exterior

A very, very antique-looking entrance.

The red sign says Donghwa Banjeom in Chinese characters. If you turn in from in front of the Boseu Police Substation, you’ll see it right away.

At a glance, you can already see the stickers starting to show, right?

It currently has 1 star on the Siksin app. It looks like it used to have up to 2 stars.

It has received Blue Ribbon Survey stickers for 2020, 2023, and 2024!! At this level, it’s definitely worth trusting and visiting.

It’s a place with more than 60 years of history, starting from Hojungjeong. A place that makes me wonder whether I’m even qualified to judge it...

Almost every dish is known as a recommended menu item, so it’s clearly recognized as a real food spot.

Interior

We were guided upstairs.

Since the first floor was full... (actually, there weren’t many seats), the interior on the second floor showed signs of long years passing.

Just looking at it, you immediately think, there’s no way this place could be bad.

This is the menu of Donghwa Banjeom, one of Busan’s top 3 Chinese restaurants.

We weren’t considering course meals, so I just took photos of the à la carte menu in advance.

Looking again, the menu is reflective... so a few of the letters are a bit obscured.

Well, they say most things are delicious, but the signature dish is said to be nanjawanseu.

And the tangsuyuk that my wife and I always order!! Of course we ordered that too~~

I heard that yuni jajang was a must-try, but it was sold out, so we couldn’t order it. ㅠㅠㅠ

As an alternative, we ordered jjamppong and seafood fried rice.

Time to eat!!!

It starts with a very classic setting. Pickled radish, onions, and chunjang.

Really... I feel like Chinese food has been with these since I was five. Haha.

Sweet and sour pork small (15,000 KRW)

This is the smallest size, and you can enjoy it for under 20,000 KRW.

As of January 2025, when I’m writing this post, it seems to have increased to 17,000 KRW... but just being able to taste such delicious-looking sweet and sour pork for the 10,000 KRW range feels like a great blessing.

At a glance, I thought the visuals were really outstanding.

For some reason, I tend to prefer clear sauces... but even though this one has a slight reddish tint, the sweet-looking sauce just looked so appetizing.

You could say it has a visual similar to Yeonghwajang near Hwagok Station, one of our favorite sweet and sour pork places...

The portion isn’t enormous, but I also wouldn’t say it’s only worth 15,000 KRW. It’s generous.

When the chef pours the sauce for you, it becomes the pour-over style.

It’s not glutinous sweet and sour pork, but a traditional fried pork dish... and the sweet sauce blends together really well.

It was so delicious as soon as it came out that I remember eating more than half of it before the nanjawanseu even arrived.

This really is a genuine great restaurant.... Is Chinese food originally better in Busan...?

Nanjawanseu small (22,000 KRW)

Nanjawanseu? Nanjawanseu? Since that’s what it’s called here, I’ll write it that way.

I don’t think I’ve ever really had this dish before. Is it like a Korean-style Chinese meat patty??

It seems to be minced meat that’s grilled and then topped with a sauce with an oyster-sauce aroma.

I recently visited Hongmyeong, one of the most well-known Chinese restaurants in Gangnam, and I remember this being as delicious as the nanjawanseu I had there.

It seemed to have a rich aroma of garlic and ginger, and the deep, nutty sauce was also excellent.

This just looks so delicious even at a glance.

Being able to try nanjawanseu in the low 20,000 KRW range, lol... I’m simply grateful.

It was moist, had a nice bite, and had a savory meat flavor—really tasty nanjawanseu.

After visiting here, I started liking nanjawanseu more. Haha.

If you look closely, the portion is really generous too..

Seafood fried rice (8,500 KRW)

If it has shrimp in it, then it’s seafood fried rice.

You may have trouble imagining how much there is, but one thing is certain: it’s definitely much more than a bowl of plain rice.

The shrimp casually dropping in is part of the charm.

You can tell right away when a place does fried rice well, right?

Frying rice properly is really not easy...

This is simply a place that does fried rice well. So you can feel the flavor and texture of each grain of rice being stir-fried in oil, which makes it very satisfying.

If you eat it with shrimp too, there’s nothing more to say~ it’s unquestionably excellent fried rice.

From the sweet and sour pork to the nanjawanseu and the fried rice, everything was delicious... this place definitely passes.

By now, I was starting to look forward to the jjamppong as well.

Jjam-bong (7,000 KRW)

I want to write jjamppong... but the menu says jjam-bong.. ㅠㅠ

Anyway, this one has an attractive bright-red broth!!

At a glance, it looks like it contains a fair amount of seafood.

It doesn’t seem like the kind of quality you’d get for just 7,000 KRW.

Even now, while writing this post, I feel my mouth watering....

I think I’ll need to visit a Chinese restaurant again soon..

It’s not overflowing with seafood, but you can see it often enough.

The noodles were quite springy and gave a tasty texture.

And the broth was really delicious!!

As expected, this was a Busan top 3 Chinese food restaurant that did not disappoint.

Despite the portion looking quite large, the two of us completely cleared everything!!!!

We really, really enjoyed the meal today!

Conclusion

As expected, it truly deserves to be called one of Busan’s top 3 Chinese restaurants..

Actually, if you look at my Naver Map, there are quite a lot of restaurants marked in Busan.

It’s a city I want to visit every day, but every time I go, it’s always disappointing that I can only manage to cover 2–3 restaurants.

Anyway, Donghwa Banjeom, one of Busan’s top 3 Chinese restaurants that we visited this time, was definitely a memorable, truly great restaurant!

It’s said to be famous for nanjawanseu and yuni jajang, but since we visited late, we couldn’t try the yuni jajang.

Still, from the sweet and sour pork to the jjamppong and fried rice... the fact that everything was made so faithfully to the classics made the taste simply amazing!!

The prices may be lower than those of many Chinese restaurants in Seoul, but the flavor is truly, truly excellent.

It was a genuine great restaurant worthy of receiving both the Blue Ribbon Survey and Siksin stars.

Taste: ★★★★★

Value for money: ★★★★★

Accessibility: ★★★☆☆

Facilities: ★★★☆☆

Parking: Free parking in front of the store.

Since I’m not from Busan, it’s a bit difficult for me to properly evaluate accessibility, but as a traveler, I do think the route is a little difficult to get to. Haha. Since most people stay in Haeundae anyway, I guess. ^^;;;

Still, if you rent a car, I definitely recommend going! It’s not hard to get there from Busan Station ~ haha.

Because it was so delicious, I thought it was absolutely worthy of a 5-star rating regardless of accessibility or facilities.

My wish is to revisit next time and try the yuni jajang :)

The next post will be about Hongmyeong, a famous nanjawanseu restaurant in Gangnam~!!

Thank you for reading my genuine, self-paid restaurant review post again today,

I’ll continue to be a restaurant curator remembered through carefully selected posts. :)

This was Baekwonjang, a dentist who dreams of becoming both a master implant specialist and a foodie.

Thank you.!!