Jeju's kitchen is an island kitchen: pigs raised on volcanic pasture, abalone and conch pulled up by haenyeo divers, buckwheat and barley from ash soil, and citrus that only ripens here. Three days across Dongmun Market, Black Pork Street and the coastal diving villages.
Jeju's largest market, opened 1945, runs 08:00–21:00 daily across eight arcades. Morning is the produce and seafood hours: hallabong citrus (10,000–20,000₩/box), dried octopus, and mackerel filleted at the stall. Gate 2 has the fish alleys.
Gogi-guksu (고기국수) is Jeju's own noodle bowl: wheat noodles in milky pork-bone broth topped with sliced boiled black pork belly. Shops off Samseong-ro serve it 09:00–20:00 for 8,000–11,000₩. Add a side of pork sundae for 6,000₩.
Several Dongmun stalls will grill, steam or sashimi-cut whatever you just bought for a 5,000–10,000₩ cooking fee, served at plastic tables with soju. Buy a 30,000₩ platter of hoe (raw fish) and eat it three metres from where it was cut.
From 18:00 to midnight (closed some Mondays) around 30 food trucks fill the market's central lane: black-pork skewers grilled over charcoal, abalone butter rice, hallabong juice and omegi-tteok. Skewers 5,000–8,000₩, most items under 10,000₩.
Diving co-ops along the north-east coast run small canteens where retired haenyeo cook jeonbok-juk — abalone porridge greened by the shellfish liver — plus raw conch and sea urchin. Porridge 12,000–15,000₩, urchin soup around 20,000₩.
Held on dates ending in 2 and 7, this 1,000-stall market near the airport is where islanders actually shop: mountain vegetables, hand-pressed sesame oil, dried gosari fern, and pork butchers selling black-pig cuts far below restaurant prices.
Omegi-tteok is glutinous millet dough rolled in red-bean powder — Jeju's signature rice cake, historically made because rice barely grew here. Boxes of 10 run 8,000–12,000₩; ssuk (mugwort) versions are the island standard.
A single lane off Gwandeok-ro with roughly 20 grill houses. Order 'oGyeopsal' — five-layer black-pig belly — cut thick and grilled on charcoal, dipped in melchi-jeot anchovy sauce, not sesame oil. Around 18,000–25,000₩ per 200g portion.
Jeju's traditional liquors are omegisul (millet makgeolli) and gosorisul, a distilled soju aged in clay. The island's licensed makgeolli producers run tasting rooms; bottles run 6,000–35,000₩ and gosorisul is protected as Jeju Intangible Cultural Property No. 11.
Momguk is pork broth thickened with mom seaweed — a funeral-and-feast dish unique to Jeju, served in the small restaurants strung along the Yongdam shoreline. Expect 10,000–13,000₩ a bowl with barley rice and pickled radish.
Beltfish braised with radish and chilli — galchi-jorim — is the island's other landmark dish, alongside grilled galchi-gui. Port-side restaurants near the ferry terminal serve set meals at 20,000–35,000₩ including a dozen banchan side dishes.
The reclaimed Tapdong seafront is Jeju City's drinking quarter: craft-beer bars pouring Jeju Wit Ale and Pellet Ale from the island's own brewery, plus hof joints serving fried chicken and grilled hairtail until 02:00.