10 Best Kdramas For Foodies, 2020 Edition

Crash Landing On You

If you haven’t yet watched Crash Landing On You, it’s time you did. A wealthy South Korean heiress crash lands into handsome North Korean soldier. Their attempt to get her safely back across the border leads to all sorts of drama, adventure, hilarious hijinks and romance between the two actors whose chemistry is off the charts, Hyun Bin and Son Ye Jin. The news that they are officially dating was the first kilig good news of 2021. CLOY certainly had us craving for Korean food. Watch on Netflix.

Photo Credit: CLOY made us crave Korean food

Crash Landing On You

CLOY is considered a romantic drama or romantic comedy, it’s also a food-centric story. Food is conveyor of plot, and one compelling thread is about how food is the love language that lead character Captain Ri (played by Hyun Bin) uses to show his feelings for Seri (Son Ye Jin). Read about it here. Watch on Netflix.

Photo Credit: Food is the love language in Crash Landing On You

Dinner Mate

If you’ve finished watching CLOY feeling a little sad for the character of Seo Dan (Seo Ji-hye), you’ll be happy to know that Seo Ji-hye gets her own romance in this show. Here she plays a digital content producer who bumps into handsome psychiatrist Kim Hae Kyung (Song Seung-heon). They eat dinner together and decide to become “dinner mates” which inevitably leads to romance. Watch on iQIYI.

Dinner Mate

You know, eating together in a series of different settings and situations can really let you get to know someone. It’s fun and a little heartbreaking to watch this couple go through this dance together, with both of them dealing with past romantic disappointments. It’s not smooth sailing, which just makes us love the story even more. We love the romance, but we also love the little food-themed travelogue as the pair takes us on a ‘tour’ of South Korean restaurants, from streetfood and market stalls to pricey joints. We love the local color just as much as the romance. Watch on iQIYI.

Dinner Mate

Interestingly, Kim Hae Kyung uses food therapy to provide healing. We watch him prescribe salmon pasta to help a patient overcome the anxiety of a difficult breakup, while he serves abalone porridge to another patient (played by Sandara Park) who’s been traumatized by body-shaming critics. Funny how the food psychologist ends up inadvertently finding true love through food! Watching the food scenes makes us feel so much better, too — and also hungry! Watch in iQIYI.

Eccentric Chef Moon!

Moon Seung Mo (played by Eric Mun), a highly acclaimed chef who inherits his family’s 80-year-old restaurant, meets and falls in love with a fashion designer with amnesia, played by Go Won Hee. That is the main premise. But the story is enriched by the chef’s penchant for pop up restaurants where he serves Korean dishes made from handpicked ingredients. The romance is delightful, but so is the food and the chef’s impressive knife skills. Watch on Viki.com.

Flower of Evil

On the surface, police detective Cha Ji Won (played by Moon Chae Won) leads a charmed life with a loving marriage and an adorable daughter. But as she investigates a series of murders, she begins to suspect that her handsome, perfect husband may be hiding something. All this suspicion and intrigue against a veneer of family happiness and beautiful meals together (cooked by the perfect husband, naturally) will send a chill up your spine. Watch on Netflix.

Flower of Evil

Is this man who cooks such wonderful meals, who seems so loving and is such a good father —- can he possibly have something to do with murder? Watch on Netflix.

How Are You, Bread?

A master baker makes magical bread that grants people’s wishes and helps them get in touch with their feelings. TV show writer Noh Mi-rae (played by Lee Se-young) tries to cast him in her new baking show, but he refuses. Her attempts to get him to sign on lead to a fun romance. We absolutely adore the baking scenes where the chef is so meticulously working on his breads and pastries — then showing us the amazing results. Watch on K-Plus.

It’s Okay To Not Be Okay

This mesmerizing modern fairy tale has a beautiful princess trapped in her castle, an evil witch, and a courageous hero, all in the fantasy setting of urban South Korea. The courageous and respectful way the story deals with mental illness is just one reason for falling in love with this show. IOTNBO is a fairy tale for grown ups. Watch on Netflix.

It’s Okay To Not Be Okay

In this show, food is a vehicle for nurturing, healing, self-acceptance, and even coming into one’s own. But we won’t say any more lest we spoil it for you. Watch on Netflix.

It’s Okay To Not Be Okay

We love the eomma (mother) character of Kang Soon-deok (played by Kim Mi-kyung) whose cooking nurtures and nourishes everyone. Watch on Netflix.

Photo Credit: Our favorite Kdrama moms nurture through food

Itaewon Class

A retelling of the David and Goliath story, with food as the medium, this series pits Park Sae-royi (played by Park Seo-Joon) against Jang Dae-Hee (Yoo Jae-Myung), the CEO of the biggest food company in South Korea. To exact his revenge, our hero opens his own tiny restaurant in the bustling Itaewon district, and we are fascinated by how he he manages to keep winning while ignoring all the rules of the industry. Read about it in the link below. Watch on Netflix.

Photo Credit: Itaewon Class breaks all the rules in the restaurant biz

Itaewon Class

We love all the food scenes that show us vignettes of Korean culture. The subtle rules of soju drinking, the way people bond as they eat together, the tofu stew that is the secret star of the show. Read about it in the link below. Watch on Netflix.

Photo Credit: The rules of soju

My Dangerous Wife

Popular chef Kim Yoon Chul is bored in his marriage to Sim Jae Kyung. He’s slowly becoming involved with a colleague at his restaurant, a ruthless woman who will do anything to get what she wants. And then, Chef Kim’s wife becomes involved in a mysterious kidnapping case. Watch on iQIYI.

Mystic Pop-Up Bar

A mysterious pojangmacha (outdoor drinking place) has been popping up all over Korea, as a venue for Weol-ju (played by Park Si-eun) to lure customers inside where she gets them to drink and tell her their troubles. It turns out that she has a unique ability to enter their dreams and help them resolve their grudges. She has been doing this for 500 years, but she has a quota to help 100,000 souls and time is running out. Interesting premise, eh? Watch on Netflix.

Mystic Pop-Up Bar

We love the comedy, the drama, the chemistry between the characters. We adore the food — grilled pork with ssamjang, grilled mackerel with crispy skin, stir-fried octopus, steamed dumplings. Serve us a bit of that paired with soju, and we’d give up our grudges, too! Watch on Netflix.

Sweet Munchies

A Kdrama that has a love triangle with lots of mouthwatering food is something we can buy into. The setting is Chef Park Jin Sung’s bistro where she cooks such delicious food that the people who eat it are healed of their stress and troubles. Into this setting comes her love interest — and a rival. Can her food make a difference? Watch them battle for love through tofu stew, fried chicken, soju and other delicious discoveries. We finished this show laughing and crying — and hungry. Watch on Viu.