Okipocha

About

Lively indoor pocha in Sangam-dong famed for comfort snacks like gimbap, jjajangmyeon, and butter-grilled pollock roe served with banana.

Tucked into Sangam-dong near Digital Media City Station, Oki Pocha is the kind of weathered indoor cart bar where afternoon drinking easily bleeds past midnight. Behind its seasoned storefront lies a surprisingly spacious room filled with the clinking of cold draft beers, soju glasses, and chance reunions among neighborhood regulars and media workers. The sprawling menu reads like a checklist of classic drinking food, beginning the moment you sit down with complimentary side dishes of elbow macaroni and pan-fried pink sausage. One of the undisputed signatures is the butter-grilled pollack roe (*butter myeongnan-gui*). Served alongside sliced cucumbers, raw onions, and an unexpected plateful of fresh bananas, the salty, pan-seared roe gets stacked together and dunked in mayonnaise dusted with cumin seeds, creating a savory-sweet, rich bite designed to pace your drinks. Equally essential to the Oki Pocha ritual are the late-night comfort carbs popularized by celebrity regulars like comedian Lee Guk-joo. The no-frills gimbap sticks strictly to old-school basics, rolled thin and simple so it can be tossed back between sips. It pairs naturally with a bowl of spicy ramyeon, a fragrant bowl of udon piled high with crown daisy, or their nostalgic, tent-style *jjajangmyeon*, which patrons often dust with red chili flakes for extra bite. If you are drinking with a crowd, the kitchen turns out a steady stream of substantial drinking fare: hearty seafood scallion pancakes (*haemul pajeon*) packed with ingredients rather than excess batter, egg-battered Spam, and spicy stir-fried octopus with thin noodles (*nakji bokkeum somyeon*). With doors opening at 3:00 PM, it caters just as easily to an early daylight pour as it does to an unruly second or third round. It avoids modern gimmicks in favor of reliable drinking food, dependable drafts, and the magnetic hum of a classic Mapo watering hole.