Hankering for spicy fried chicken and beer? Want a seafood pancake and soju? Need it all at midnight? For more than a decade, the north-western pocket of the city in and around Healeys Lane has been a good spot for casual, affordable Korean food, especially late at night.

Restaurants have come and gone, but the K-quotient has gradually risen, leading to the nickname Kimchi Street, and since last September, an official City of Melbourne designation as Koreatown.

Last weekend, Lord Mayor Nick Reece unveiled Korean totem poles on Little Lonsdale Street to oversee the entrance to cobblestoned Healeys Lane. The three-metre-tall, carved-timber “jang seung” are similar to those that guard the entrances of villages in Korea.

There are more than 20 Korean businesses here already (mostly restaurants but also karaoke, photo booths and skincare stores) and the rubber-stamping of the precinct is boosting momentum. Hong Kim, owner of Healeys Lane fixture, Seven Star Pocha, will soon turn a Japanese restaurant he owns on the street into a Korean grill.

“We’re looking forward to expanding the Korean food offerings and giving more options for the customer,” he says.

Good Food explored Healeys Lane with Korean chef Mika Chae, who owns contemporary restaurant Doju nearby on Little Collins Street.

“I would come here for cheap food and drinking games when I was a student,” says Chae. “Now I come after work late at night to unwind and get something to eat. It’s a fun precinct with good energy and a great place for Korean food.”

Seven Star Pocha

“Pocha” means outdoor food carts and this eight-year-old mainstay brings street-food energy to its casual, sometimes raucous dining room. If you’re here after 7pm, you’ll probably need to queue, but don’t worry about missing out: the place is open till at least 2am.

Army stew (budae jjigae) is a key dish, set on the table in a huge tureen over a butane burner for you to cook yourself. As the broth starts to burble, ladle the liquid over the noodles on top to soften them, then stir them in with a jam-packed array of sausages, beans, tofu and kimchi. “When I was a student, five of us would share one of these,” says Chae.

Other must-try dishes here are the pizza-sized seafood pancake stuffed with calamari, shrimp and mussels, and boneless fried chicken: try a double plate with sweet chilli glaze on one side and creamy onion on the other. This trending combo sees chicken pieces covered in sliced raw onions and smothered in a bechamel-like sauce.

Shop H, 535 Little Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, se7enstar.com.au

Dong Dae Moon

One of the newer restaurants in the precinct, Dong Dae Mun brings the energy of its namesake neighbourhood to Melbourne. “Dongdaemun in Seoul is the place for having a bite, walking around and enjoying authentic street food in a crowded setting,” says restaurant manager Min Kyo Choo.

The specialty here is kimbap rice rolls filled with cooked meats, seafood and pickles. Try the bulgogi beef version with perilla leaves and eat it alongside tteokbokki, chewy rice cakes tossed with a sweet-spicy sauce that also works as a tasty dip for your kimbap. Also try handmade pork dumplings and the winter-friendly guksu, a spicy broth with handcut noodles.

466 Little Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, kpos.com.au/dongdaemoon

Jang Gun

The street’s old stager, Jang Gun has been here since 2013. At the time, they were the third Korean restaurant to open here but Gami, the fried chicken franchise next door, is the only remaining shop that predates Jang Gun. We love this place for its cosy timber booths, which you can (and should) book. Put on supplied gloves to eat soy-marinated raw crab and ju-meokbap, a DIY rice bowl which is a recommended crab pairing.

To make ju-meokbap, use your fingers like chopsticks to mix rice with mayonnaise, seaweed flakes, pickled radish and sesame seeds. Form the mixture into bite-sized balls for your crew to enjoy.

Another great dish here is the beef pancake (jeon), meat slices dipped in egg wash and fried like an omelette. If you love egg dishes, also try the fluffy, sauce-striped cheesy egg roll.

3/21 Healeys Lane, Melbourne, instagram.com/janggunmelbourne

Pizza Monster

Here’s a bold statement: South Korea is the world capital of fusion cuisine. Here’s a place to debate the assertion: Pizza Monster, an Italian-Korean mash-up that serves pizzas with, say, bulgogi beef, corn, sweet potato mousse and almond flakes on a black rice dough base, and carbonara with oyster sauce and spring onion. Crazy? No. Crazy-good. Pizza Monster is small, cute and chic, perfect for a pizza date with a difference. Try the Shark Attack cocktail for some pour-your-own theatre.

3/535 Little Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, instagram.com/pizzamonster_melbourne

Mr Lee’s Foods

Soondae is sometimes spelled “sundae” on Korean menus, which can get confusing if you don’t know that this Korean delicacy is a sausage made with blood and glass noodles steamed inside pig intestines. Bouncy in texture and gentle in flavour, it’s the specialty at Mr Lee’s, served steamed on a platter with other (less mild) offal such as liver and ear. Dip it into the spiced salt on the table and enjoy with beer. Mr Lee’s is also famous for pork soups, most of which include soondae.

1/535 Little Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, instagram.com/mr_leesfoods_cbd

Seoul Toast Bong

Most of Koreatown stays up late but this sandwich shop is a weekday-only daytime place catering for city workers who need something comforting around midday. (A lunchtime fried chicken tray meal is only $12.90.) There are hundreds of branches of this franchise in South Korea and this is the first one outside its home base. The bulgogi cheese toastie with fried kimchi is an easy win, and there’s DIY instant ramen with a choice of toppings.

Shop 6, Healeys Lane, Melbourne, instagram.com/seoultoast_bong

How to drink Korean

While Good Food is an advocate of the responsible use of alcohol, it’s impossible to ignore the fact that drinking is a huge part of Korean dining culture. Beer and soju (a distilled alcohol similar to vodka) are consumed liberally, separately and together. The combination of both is called “somaek”.

Start by pouring a shot of soju into a tumbler and topping it off with beer. Shove a spoon into the glass to create bubbles and make the drink smoother.

You can also pour half-tumblers of beer, line them up in a row, and balance shot glasses on the rims, straddling two glasses. Fill the shot glasses with soju and tip the first one into a beer glass, creating a domino fall-down of tumbling soju glasses. It’s messy stuff. You won’t see tablecloths in any of these restaurants.