The story
He spent eight or nine years behind the counter at sushi omakase restaurants, learning to read fish the way some people read weather. When it came time to open his own place, he chose Sokcho over Seoul — his wife grew up here, and he wanted a kitchen near the water, not a basement in Gangnam. He opened Kitchen Ohmu on November 27, 2022, just as COVID was loosening its grip, in a quiet spot he picked for three reasons: no key money, easy parking, and walking distance to the market where he buys his fish every morning.
“새롭지만 익숙한 맛 — 'New, but familiar.' That's the line I cook toward every night.”
Owner, Kitchen Ohmu
What they stand for
He calls it 'new but familiar' — a six-course meal that starts with Japanese foundations and borrows from French technique wherever it makes the dish better. The courses move from cold (chawanmushi, sashimi) through warm (papillote, soba) to a finishing rice pot and dessert. He sources everything from the local markets — Sokcho Tourist & Fishery Market, the wholesale seafood market, the Daepo Port auction — and builds menus around what's best that week. His secret, he says, isn't a secret at all: recipes anyone could follow, but that demand so much time and patience that most kitchens give up.
Behind the signature
The dish that defines Kitchen Ohmu is the cheong-eo rillettes — herring mashed with potato, spread on bread, a French bistro move executed with Japanese precision. It shows up in spring and summer when herring is at its peak. Come fall, the kitchen pivots to mackerel and yellowtail. Right now the seasonal anchor is a mackerel soba — buckwheat noodles in a broth that changes with whatever the boats brought in. The menu rotates roughly every three months, and regulars plan return trips around it.
Local tip
The restaurant sits on Jungang-ro, the main road through downtown Sokcho, about a 5-minute walk south of the Tourist & Fishery Market. Street parking is easy. It's a residential stretch — no neon, just a wooden sign that reads 'Japanese Dining.' Look for it across from the Lotte Cinema area.
Seasonal note
The omakase menu rotates every three months. Current season (spring 2026): chawanmushi, sashimi, mackerel soba, papillote, clay pot rice, and dessert. The herring rillettes — the chef's signature — return in late spring when herring peaks.
For travelers
The chef handles English service himself — not fluent, but enough to explain each course as it lands. One night, an Italian chef visiting from Rome tasted the papillote and started asking for recipes, recognizing the French and Italian influences hiding inside a Japanese framework. The papillote — fish baked in parchment with vegetables, finished with brown butter — is consistently the dish foreign guests remember most. No one has ever refused a course.
