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A Jeju Island barbecue restaurant is facing backlash after a customer said staff stopped her from feeding her baby a snack, calling it outside food.

The account, posted on the social media platform Threads on Tuesday, described the incident at a restaurant on Jeju Island specializing in black pork.

"We were eating black pork when someone suddenly came over and told us not to feed the baby rice puffs because they counted as outside food," the poster, identified only as A, wrote. "I was so taken aback that I lost my appetite, and the baby cried a lot."

Rice puffs, a puffed-rice snack for infants and toddlers, are commonly given to babies as a substitute for a pacifier since they can hold and dissolve them in their mouths.

A said she later left a review on the reservation app CatchTable, but it was taken down after the restaurant reported it.

"I doubt I will ever go back to Jeju," she added.

The post drew about 3,400 likes and more than 500 comments. It spread across online communities under the title "The Jeju rice puff incident" and racked up hundreds of thousands of views.

Many online commenters called the restaurant's response excessive, with some writing, "Babies cannot eat samgyeopsal, naengmyeon or doenjang stew either -- this makes no sense," "Banning rice puffs is too much. There is no flexibility," and "At this rate, they will tell parents not to feed formula either."

As the controversy spread, the restaurant posted a reply directly under A's post to explain what happened.

"Based on the various accounts and the circumstances at the time, we believe some of our staff on the scene did not recognize rice puffs as a snack for infants and toddlers and mistakenly treated them as ordinary outside food, leading to the wrong response," the restaurant said.

"We do not ban children from eating rice puffs at our store. We have prepared baby food, high chairs and even a microwave for warming baby food," the restaurant said, adding, "Even so, if such a response happened on site, it is our responsibility for not sufficiently sharing and training staff on our operating standards."

Regarding the reported review, the restaurant apologized, saying, "As the post became a public issue faster than we expected, we grew worried about the impact on our brand and on Jeju's restaurant industry, and we responded too quickly before fully looking into the facts. We are also sorry for hastily judging the poster's intentions and jumping to conclusions about the facts."

Following the restaurant's explanation, some online commenters urged restraint, saying things like, "This is a place that even prepares baby food -- it seems like a simple mistake," and "This was a case of an inexperienced staff member lacking flexibility, but the witch hunt has gone too far."


bbo@heraldcorp.com