Arirang TV is launching "K-FOOD: Gyeongbuk Edition," a four-part weekly series premiering October 14 at 9:00 a.m. KST that puts the regional cuisine and tourism of Gyeongsangbuk-do, South Korea, in front of a global audience — a signal of how K-food's cultural momentum is expanding well beyond Seoul's most familiar exports.
The program takes a "taste road variety" format, embedding signature regional dishes within broader travel narratives covering history, natural scenery, and hands-on experiences. Across four episodes, two celebrity teams — dubbed the Taste Crew — work through Mungyeong, Pohang, Gyeongju, and Andong, sampling local specialties while producing social media content designed to travel across international platforms.
The Menu, Episode by Episode
Each installment anchors its food story in a distinct culinary identity. The Mungyeong episode leads with spicy freshwater fish stew and Yakdol pork alongside the region's coal heritage sites and rail bike trails. Pohang's episode turns to the East Sea for snow crab and mulhoe — a chilled raw fish soup — pairing seafood with coastal landmarks including Jukdo Market and Yeongildae Beach. Gyeongju, framed around its Silla-dynasty history, balances museum visits and palace grounds with dishes tied to the region's aristocratic past. The series closes in Andong with heotjesatbap, salted mackerel (gan-godeungeo), and Andong jjimdak — braised chicken — set against the backdrop of Hahoe Folk Village and the city's traditional market.
For operators and importers tracking beverage industry analysis and food import patterns, the series is worth watching as a demand signal. Global interest in Korean cuisine has already driven measurable increases in exports of gochujang, doenjang, and fermented side dishes, and programming that spotlights lesser-known regional specialties tends to accelerate curiosity among both foodservice buyers and consumers. Dishes like mulhoe and jjimdak remain largely unfamiliar to Western restaurant menus — exposure through widely distributed streaming content often precedes commercial interest.
Why Operators Should Pay Attention
Arirang TV's explicit goal is to extend global K-food enthusiasm into regional tourism branding for Gyeongsangbuk-do — but the downstream effect for the food and hospitality industry is a potential pipeline of ingredients and menu concepts that haven't yet crossed over. Korean regional cooking traditions differ substantially from the Korean-American dishes that now appear on mainstream menus, and series like this one function as a kind of advance market research for chefs and importers willing to track what audiences are being introduced to.
Food & Beverage Magazine has covered the accelerating crossover of Korean culinary culture into North American foodservice, a trend that shows no sign of plateauing. For restaurateurs already working with Korean-inspired menus or sourcing Korean ingredients, the regional specificity of "K-FOOD: Gyeongbuk Edition" offers concrete direction: the dishes highlighted in Andong and Pohang represent categories — braised proteins, raw seafood preparations, fermented grain dishes — that translate well to contemporary Western casual-dining formats.
The series airs every Wednesday on Arirang TV and streams via the BeMyKorea YouTube channel, giving it reach well beyond the network's traditional broadcast footprint. For foodservice and restaurant technology coverage professionals watching how content shapes consumer palates, that dual-platform distribution makes this series a meaningful cultural touchpoint rather than a niche regional broadcast.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
