![Dwaeji gukbap (pork bone soup with rice) [Herald DB]](https://wimg.heraldcorp.com/news/cms/2026/10/11/news-p.v1.20261011.e7997691adb243b8a2221ccb8f58b778_P1.jpg)
A showcase to crown the best dwaeji gukbap (pork bone soup with rice) — one of South Korea's defining gukbap dishes alongside seolleongtang and sundaeguk — is set to open in Busan.
The Busan city government and the Busan Tourism Organization announced Sunday that the "2026 Busan Dwaeji Gukbap Daejeon Gukbap Showcase" will run for three days, from Friday through Sunday, at Now A Living in the Busan International Finance Center (BIFC2).
The showcase is an offline event following the "Gukbap Summit" and "Gukbap Week" stages of the Busan Dwaeji Gukbap Daejeon competition. Held under the theme "The People Who Make Busan in a Bowl," the program features three main elements: a talk concert called "Gukbap Salon" with chef Gang Leo and food columnist Park Sang-hyeon; the "Gukbap Awards," which honors this year's best dwaeji gukbap restaurants as voted by residents and tourists; and a culinary experience in which 11 of the 20 citizen-nominated restaurants cook their dwaeji gukbap on-site.
"Gukbap Week," a public vote covering the 20 restaurants selected from more than 10,800 citizen nominations, has been running since Sept. 28 and continues through Wednesday. The results will determine the top three and top 10 restaurants. Votes can be cast by tapping the "Busan Dwaeji Gukbap Daejeon" button at the top of Kakao Map, or by scanning a QR code displayed at any of the 20 nominated restaurants.
The most widely accepted account of dwaeji gukbap's origins traces it to the refugees who flooded into Busan during the 1950-53 Korean War. As hundreds of thousands of people fled south and food shortages grew severe, refugees from the northern provinces began cooking a soup similar to seolleongtang using pork bones, offal and head meat — ingredients far easier to obtain than beef. One outlet described the dish as "food for survival, a substitute meal." The original template is said to have been "garitgukbap," a beef-based gukbap popular in the northern provinces of Pyeongan and Hamgyeong. As that tradition blended with the food culture of the Gyeongsang region, the dish evolved into its current form, generously seasoned with garlic chives — known locally as "jeongguji" — to tame the gamey pork smell. The hearty, quickly prepared soup also served as a filling meal for dock workers at Busan Port and the displaced refugees who kept the city running.
Other origin stories exist as well. One holds that a separate lineage of pork bone soup was already being made in the Yeongdo area before Korea's liberation in 1945, using pigs brought in from Jeju. There are also accounts suggesting the dish arose naturally from the pork-eating habits of commoners during the Joseon era, or that it traces back to a Goryeo-era king who distributed pork to his subjects — though neither claim has been substantiated with concrete evidence.
Na Yun-bin, director of Busan's tourism content industry bureau, said she hopes "a bowl of gukbap enjoyed at the showcase will lead visitors to seek out the restaurants and neighborhoods behind it, becoming a gateway to culinary tourism that reveals new sides of Busan."
why37@heraldcorp.com
