Where to eat SOUTH KOREA 🇰🇷 Zürich: Akaraka

Akaraka

Bäckerstrasse 30, Zürich

Published May 13, 2025 · by Amanda Rivkin Häsler

What we ordered: For two people, one six course Korean dinner pre fixe menu with meat and one with fish. The meat menu came with noodle soup, pa-jeon, beef tartare, Korean chicken, the option for bulgogi or dolsot bimbimbap (Georg chose the dolsot bibimbap), and ice cream for dessert. The fish menu included the soup, pa-jeon, carrot tartare, fried shrimp tempura, cod filet and ice cream for dessert. Additionally, we ordered the optional extra tteok-bok-ki which came with the pa-jeon. To drink, we split eight 33 cl Cass beers and a large bottle of sparkling over the course of the extraordinary two-and-a-half-hour meal.

Cost: 230 CHF / €244 / $254

We were drawn to Akaraka over other Korean restaurants in Switzerland because of the recommendation of colleagues. Though they had never been to Akaraka, its notoriety with the promise of opera music with dinner was enough to have everyone buzzing, as Korean fine dining and opera, while an exceptional pairing are also not a customary combination.

Sadly, the night we went to Akaraka, we were told when we asked that the Korean owner who performs the opera solos over dinner was off in Korea due to the unfortunate death of his mother. We offered our condolences as we could not do much more than that. We were however fortunately blessed that the Korean food could more than stand on its own. Opera would have been a nice – even exceptional – and of course our disappointment was real, but so was our sorrows for the owner over the loss of his late mother.

That said, over a two-and-a-half-hour leisurely meal, we were served six exceptional courses. Georg of course opted for the meat menu (chicken is a vegetable in his mind), while I consulted the waiter as both the fish and vegetarian options looked wonderful. For some diversity of flavors, I opted for fish. To drink, we went straight for Korean beer Cass, though the Soju was tempting, its better with faster food and louder barbecue.

The opener of noodle soup was a little spicy and with a bit of sesame it did not disappoint. The second course, the pa-jeon, a pancake like appetizer often with scallions, seafood or vegetables, but here with a bit of scallion, is a personal favorite. While it was served with the tteok-bok-ki, recommended by the waiter, which is a round rice noodle in a spicy chili sauce, think a large gnocchi, two pieces of pa-jeon seemed like not enough.

When it comes to pa-jeon, a dish I could truly eat all day, every day when done right, it was nicely garnished with half a cherry tomato and a bit of green for a fried and fresh combination. The dipping sauce, while hard to mess up but not also always great as sometimes it is either too much soy or too much sesame, was on point.

The beef tartare overall looked more promising than the carrot tartare. Though the carrot tartare was nicely spiced and diced, I had to ask if it was crab or cod as I was not sure. The interesting part of the beef tartare was that it was meat but it was in a way packed with the tastes and flavors and also a bit of Korean vegetables, so it was not possible to feel the heaviness of meat. Served on a small blini-like Korean pancake, it was a nice, almost amuse bouche-like sequitur of the pre-courses before the proper appetizer and entrée arrived.

For the fish, the shrimp tempura was wonderful. Perhaps the best course in the whole meal. One whole huge langoustine fried lightly in tempura batter, served over a bed of lettuce. It was juicy, moist and crunchy. The Korean chicken was a bit of a surprise, lightly fried, aerated almost. It was more like a piece of toast for something so fried and complemented by garnishes that presented a bouquet of flavors. A perfect course.

The cod fish entrée was similarly wonderful, though more predictable but a bit of a swirl of caramelized shallots or onions and peppers and a savory sauce really enhanced the preparation. The dolsot bibimbap with the meat menu was a full course, a bit much even after the chicken – but then the real dish came and it was a rich dish from which you could knock out all the other dishes and focus on the main attraction. Instead of these sophisticated pre-dishes, the bibimbap was a full meal that could be appreciated for the sort of everyday food Koreans eat to power a whole day. 

A note on the utensils. As is the case with Koreans worldwide, the tendency for cutlery is thin metal chopsticks and a long-stemmed metal spoon. The chopsticks are easy to maneuver if you are familiar with how to use them, but the metal can throw one off as they are a bit heavier on the grip for those, ok most of us, accustomed to wood or plastic chopsticks. They are delicate though and this is how you know you are really in a friendly, familiar space in Korean dining. It is what a grandmother or elder would have at home for reasons I do not totally understand, but I do know that it is a sign of both comfort and sophistication from my previous Korean dining adventures in America and Istanbul even as well as a friend growing up who had a Korean-born mother.

The dessert was a simple dressed up scoop of ice cream, but nicely so, with a modest square piece of dark chocolate on top, some berries, and what tasted like a graham cracker crunch underneath. While a small cup of green tea at the end would have been nice in combination with the cold, it was already a bit later than expected and we were both feeling a bit under the weather, so we headed home at a not unreasonable hour.

We do hope to return some day and hope to return to hear the owner, down one for the count in his family, and the matriarch no less, belt out some wonderful arias. We do wonder if he takes requests and if we might perhaps put in a few in advance.

How to get to South Korea from Switzerland:

Numerous airlines offer round trip flights between Zürich and Seoul, including Air France, Cathay Pacific, Etihad, KLM, LOT Polish, Lufthansa and Turkish Airlines. Of those, Swiss Air offers code share flights with Cathay Pacific and Lufthansa. From Geneva, additional routes open up via Air China and Finn Air.

How many South Koreans are in Switzerland: About 2,300

Distance between Bern and Seoul: 8,859 km

Distance from Akaraka to Seoul: 8,767 km

Learn how to make South Korea's national dish, bibimbap, and about its origins.

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