Ganjang gejang, or soy sauce marinated crab, is the third most popular food among foreign visitors to South Korea, after fried chicken and Chinese food, according to data from BC Card.
BC Card tracked the spending habits of foreign tourists dining in Korea over the past three years, from 2022 to 2024. Chicken and Chinese food ranked first and second regarding the number of payments made by foreigners. Ganjang gejang, ranked sixth in 2022, climbed to third place this year. Gukbap, a Korean dish made by putting cooked rice into hot soup, ranked seventh, and sundubu, or soft tofu stew, ranked eighth.
“The growing global exposure of Korean food through Korean dramas and films has influenced these changes,” BC Card explained.
Foreign visitors are increasingly traveling to specific regions in Korea to try famous local dishes. Over the past three years, foreign visitors who used domestic transportation such as express buses, trains and rental cars spent more than 50% more on dining than those who did not use such transportation.
Even among Koreans, the number of payments made by tourists from outside the region at local restaurants was seven times higher than residents. In Gangneung, a city on the east coast by the sea, payments by non-locals at restaurants serving mulhoe (cold raw fish soup) and dakgangjeong (fried) were each three times and 7.2 times higher than payments made by locals. For Gangneung’s signature dish, sundubu, non-locals made 4.8 times more purchases than locals.
