Chungdam

The pyeonbaek box is three tiers of hinoki cypress with stock in the bottom one, and the steam coming off it cooks seafood in the middle tier and sliced brisket and ribeye in the top in just under fifteen minutes.

Why go

Every table on Greek Street has its own grill, and the staff will cook on it for you, which is the part Jay Rayner liked most: "huge fun but, unlike previous Korean barbecue experiences, it is also low maintenance" (The Observer, via Harden's). The room is named for Cheongdam-dong, a restaurant district inside Gangnam, and it sits on the address YMing held for 35 years. Hinoki and pyeonbaek are the same cypress in two languages, and the box is the reason to come rather than the barbecue, which you can get across Shaftesbury Avenue for less. Restaurateur Jay Choi also runs Shibuya Soho and Hongdae Pocha, so this is a small group with three Soho rooms rather than a chef betting on one.

Order this / avoid

• Order: the pyeonbaek box, and let it feed the table. Before it, the Chungdam pickles, which run Korean pickling over whatever is in season, and the beef tartare with pear and sesame. If you barbecue, the fillet mignon is the value cut against the wagyu.
• Avoid: ordering the box and a full grill spread at two heads. And read the bill: the 12.5% service goes to the kitchen, so anything for the floor staff is a second decision, which is the thing David Ellis put in his headline.

What locals & experts say

• Jay Rayner, The Observer (23 June 2024), on the grilling: the meat and vegetables "cloud the air above our table with an intense savouriness. I live for clouds of savouriness above my table." He also records the pricing plainly, that the room "styles itself as a refined version of the clattering tabletop barbecue places to be found across Shaftesbury Avenue, and it's priced accordingly." ref
• David Ellis, Evening Standard (16 August 2023), two stars, the other side, with his own caveat attached: "I've heard Chung'dam praised over and again, so it may well have been an off-night; we took a late sitting. But [...] it's not cheap, and Korean can often be so much more exciting than this." On the steak: "cooked beautifully but, if not quite dreary, was certainly dull." ref
• Catherine Hanly, Hot Dinners (2 May 2023), on the box mechanics and what is in it, and on the seasonal pickling. ref
• Harden's logged the opening and then had nothing to add: "It opened too late to inspire survey feedback." No diner survey has caught up with it since. ref

Good to know

• Where: 35-36 Greek Street, on the corner of Romilly Street, between Piccadilly Circus and Leicester Square. The venue and the food-hygiene register both write the name Chung'dam.
• Timing: noon to 3pm and 5.30pm to midnight Monday to Thursday, noon to midnight Friday and Saturday, closed Sunday. These come from Harden's listing: the venue's own site returns nothing our fetchers can read, so treat them as third-party.
• Groups: there is a private karaoke room, and the steam box is built for a table rather than a couple.
• Service charge: 12.5%, and it goes to the kitchen.
• Hygiene: FSA rating 3, inspected 18 May 2026. The three components, where lower is better, are Hygiene 10, Structure 5, Confidence in Management 10. The building scored best and food-hygiene practice and management confidence scored worst, so this is a food finding rather than a plasterwork one. The venue stays listed and this is stated in the same breath. ref
• Michelin: not recorded. The guide cache this project holds is stars only, so it can establish neither a listing nor an absence.

Jeff's take (his words)

Nothing. His saved-places export carries an empty Note for this row, checked against london/data/_src-part3.csv. The master CSV's "Korean BBQ with pyeonbaek steam boxes on Greek Street" line came from an enrichment pass. It was checked rather than repeated, and it holds: two sources describe the same three-tier hinoki box.

Verdict (Chef Jeff ladder)

could-visit — Go if you are already in Soho and the table wants theater. The pyeonbaek box is a genuinely uncommon piece of kit in London: three tiers of hinoki cypress with stock in the base, steaming seafood over beef for fifteen minutes, and the grill built into every table means the cooking happens in front of you or by a waiter who does it better. What is missing is a persuasive sentence about the food. Jay Rayner enjoyed it and wrote mostly about the air and the low maintenance; David Ellis gave it two stars and called the steak dull, allowed it might have been an off night, and then pointed people at Kangnam Pocha instead. It is a small-group operation from Jay Choi, who runs two other Soho rooms, so the burden of proof on edge and value sits with the kitchen, and the current FSA 3 has its weak marks in food hygiene practice and confidence in management rather than in the building. Fun format, unproven cooking, and priced as though it were proven.