How to order food in Korean at a restaurant: from the door to the bill

To order food in Korean you need one pattern, the dish plus a number plus 주세요: 비빔밥 하나 주세요, "one bibimbap, please". Everything else in a Korean restaurant, from getting the staff's attention to paying, is a handful of short fixed phrases, and this guide walks through them in the order you will need them.

The pattern is taught in lesson 4 of Level 1A, before you can say almost anything else, and that is deliberate. It works in a restaurant, a cafe, a convenience store and a market, and it is polite enough for everyone.

The whole meal in one table

Two things about this table. First, you never need a full sentence with a verb ending to order: the noun and 주세요 do the work. Second, 주세요 never changes shape, whatever noun comes before it, so there is no 받침 check and nothing to conjugate.

• 저기요. 메뉴 주세요.Excuse me. The menu, please.1A
• 비빔밥 하나 주세요.One bibimbap, please.1B
• 비빔밥 하나하고 김치찌개 하나 주세요.One bibimbap and one kimchi stew, please.1B
• 물 좀 주세요.Some water, please.1B
• 반찬 더 주세요.More side dishes, please.1B

Step by step, from the door

Walking in. Someone will ask how many you are, often just with 몇 분이세요? Hold up fingers if you like, and say the number with 명: 두 명이에요, 세 명이에요. If the place is busy and nobody has looked up, 자리 있어요? asks whether there is a table.

Getting the staff. Korean restaurants do not run on eye contact. You call. 저기요 or 여기요, said clearly across the room, is the normal way, and nobody will think you are rude. This is the step learners find hardest, and there is a section on it below.

Ordering. Dish, number, 주세요. For one of something you can say 하나 or leave the number out: 김치찌개 주세요 is fine when it is obvious you want one. For dishes cooked at the table, meat above all, the counter is 인분, "portion", and it takes the Sino-Korean numbers: 갈비 이 인분 주세요. Drinks take 병 for bottles and 잔 for cups: 물 한 병 주세요, 커피 두 잔 주세요.

Asking before you order. 이거 뭐예요? while pointing at the menu gets you an answer and often a recommendation. 이거 매워요? is the question that matters most to many of our students, and the answers are short: 네, 매워요, or 아니요, 안 매워요, or 조금 매워요.

Extras during the meal. The side dishes in most Korean restaurants are refilled free, and asking is expected: 반찬 더 주세요, 김치 더 주세요, 물 더 주세요. 좀, "a little", softens any request: 물 좀 주세요 sounds a touch gentler than 물 주세요, and Koreans use it constantly. Rice is 밥: 밥 더 주세요.

Paying. In most places you pay at the till by the door, not at the table. 얼마예요? asks the price, the answer comes in 원, and 카드 돼요? checks that they take cards. Almost everywhere does. If you are leaving, 잘 먹었습니다, "I ate well", is the normal thank-you for a meal, and it makes staff smile.

• 두 명이에요.Two people.1A
• 이거 매워요? — 아니요, 안 매워요.Is this spicy? — No, it isn't.1B
• 얼마예요? — 만 이천 원이에요.How much is it? — It's 12,000 won.1A
• 카드 돼요? — 네, 돼요.Do you take cards? — Yes, we do.1A
• 잘 먹었습니다.Thank you for the meal. (I ate well.)1B

Three words the course teaches later

Level 1B gives you the dish names and the taste words, and that covers the table above. Three things you will want in your first week come later in the course, in Level 2B, because they are rare outside a restaurant. We list them here anyway, because you cannot wait for lesson 10 of Level 2B to ask for a spoon.

• 숟가락, a spoon, and 젓가락, chopsticks. In many restaurants they are in a box on the table or in a drawer under it; look before you ask. If there is none, 숟가락 주세요 follows the same pattern as everything else.
• 포장, takeaway. 포장 돼요? asks whether you can take food away, and 포장해 주세요 asks them to pack it. Many places say 포장 on the menu or the window.

Treat these as vocabulary to recognise now and to own later, when the course reaches them with the grammar around them.

The staff's own lines use two things you may not know yet: 분 and 드릴까요 are the respectful forms of 명 and 줄까요, used towards customers. You do not say them back; you answer with 명 and 주세요, and that is correct.

What we see in class

The restaurant is the first place most of our students use Korean outside the classroom, and what goes wrong is rarely the grammar. It is 저기요. Students from countries where you wait to be noticed find it almost physically difficult to call across a room, and they sit with the menu for ten minutes while the staff, who are waiting for the call, leave them alone. We practise the call out loud in class until it stops feeling rude, and that single habit changes the experience more than any dish name.

The second thing we see is the order of learning. Students arrive with a list of dishes memorised and no counters, and then stand at the counter unable to say "two". In our course the native numbers and the counters, 개, 명, 잔, 병 and 인분, come in lessons 8 and 9 of Level 1A, and the dish names in lesson 9 of Level 1B. If you learn in that order the sentence builds itself. If you learn the dishes first, you can name what you want and not how many.

What did not work for us was teaching restaurant Korean as a script to memorise line by line. Real exchanges never follow the script, the staff speak fast and use respectful forms the student has not met, and the student freezes at the first unexpected word. What works is the opposite: one pattern, noun plus number plus 주세요, and a short list of fixed replies to listen for, 네, 여기 있어요, 잠깐만요. With those, students stop needing the script.

Our page for 주세요 explains the pattern with examples, and the counting page explains the counters. Neither one orders a meal for you. The vocabulary page for food lists the dishes with their levels, and the practice set in lesson 9 of Level 1B is where you put the dishes and the counters together.

Questions people ask

Is 주세요 polite enough for a restaurant, or should I say something longer?

It is exactly what Koreans say. 주세요 is a polite request, and adding 좀 makes it gentler still. Longer sentences are not more polite in this situation; they are just longer.

Do I have to order one dish per person?

In most ordinary restaurants, yes, at least one main dish each, and the staff will assume that is what you mean when you give a number. Dishes cooked at the table, such as meat, are usually a minimum of two portions, which is why you hear 이 인분 so often.

What if I did not understand what the staff said?

Say 네? with a rising voice, and they will repeat or point. You can also answer the question you expect: after you order, the staff's question is almost always about something small, a drink or whether you want it spicy, and 네 or 괜찮아요 covers most of it. Over time you will recognise the respectful forms they use with customers, and you still answer with the plain polite ones you know.