The day my brother graduated from elementary school, I woke up excited. On occasions like this, we celebrated at a restaurant that served my favorite food, donkkaseu (돈까스). There was only one place like that in town: a small gyeongyangsik (경양식) restaurant where I grew up.

I remember hoping my mother had called ahead. It was graduation season, which meant everyone would be going there. It wasn’t the kind of place you visited casually — it filled up only when something was being celebrated: a graduation, a birthday, something that called for more than an ordinary meal

Before the main dish, they always brought out soup. You had to choose between cream soup and vegetable soup, though both were really the same kind of roux-thickened soup, the kind you could even find in instant packets at the supermarket. I think I was even encouraged to add ketchup sometimes. Even then, it wasn’t particularly good. But it was served in a low, wide bowl that we never used at home, and that alone made it feel different.

Then came another choice: bread or rice. I always chose bread. Rice was what you ate at home — it didn’t feel right to come all the way there just to eat rice again. When you chose bread, they brought out small rolls, morning rolls (모닝롤), with strawberry jam. It felt like a treat. Sweetness didn’t really belong on the Korean dining table, which made it feel even more special.

If you chose rice, it came differently from home. Instead of a bowl, it was spread thinly across a flat plate, sometimes sprinkled with sesame seeds. That detail made it feel strangely formal, even though it was still just rice.

And then the donkkaseu arrived.

It covered the entire plate — a large, thin pork cutlet with a generous layer of sweet brown sauce. On the side, there was always a small pile of finely shredded cabbage with a light dressing, and a few pieces of danmuji (단무지), sometimes a scoop of macaroni salad. It was a curious combination. Kimchi never appeared, but danmuji did. Still, in a Korean meal, something crunchy and pickled always found its way in, balancing the richness.

What made it feel especially different was how you were supposed to eat it. At home, everything was eaten with a spoon and chopsticks. Here, you were given a knife and fork.

No one really knew how to use them properly. I would cut everything at once, then set the knife down and eat with just the fork. Sometimes my mother would cut it for me. Even the simple act of figuring out how to eat with unfamiliar utensils was part of the experience. It felt like entering a different world. The excitement came from being somewhere that felt foreign, a place where even rice looked unfamiliar. That sense of difference made us behave — as if we were in a proper, high-end restaurant.

There were other options too. A jungguk-jip (중국집), a Korean Chinese restaurant, was another place for celebrations. But Western-style food felt more distant, and therefore more desirable — something to aspire to, compared to the cuisine shaped by the neighboring country, China. Whether it was jjajangmyeon or donkkaseu, I was happy either way, my mouth covered in dark bean sauce or sweet brown gravy. Both felt like a treat.

Only much later did I realize that donkkaseu had taken a longer journey before becoming my childhood favorite.

Its origins can be traced back to European cutlets — particularly breaded and fried meats like the French côtelette or the Austrian Wiener schnitzel. These dishes were introduced to Japan in the late 19th century, where they were adapted into katsuretsu (カツレツ), a phonetic transliteration of “cutlet” (or côtelette), used to describe breaded, pan-fried meat. Over time, the term was shortened to katsu (カツ). From there came tonkatsu (とんかつ, 豚カツ) — “pork cutlet,” with ton meaning pork and katsu referring to the cutlet itself.

From Japan, this style of Western-influenced cooking developed into yōshoku (洋食), and eventually made its way to Korea. The term itself traveled too. In both Japanese and Korean, the same Chinese characters 洋食 are used, read as yōshoku in Japan and yangsik in Korea, both meaning “Western food.” In Korea, it became donkkaseu, part of what was broadly called yangsik. But gyeongyangsik, the version I remember from my childhood, was something more specific, not just Western food, but Western food that had already been adapted, filtered, and localized into something distinctly Korean.

In Japan, yōshoku began developing during the Meiji era in the late 19th century, as Western cuisine was actively introduced and reinterpreted. In Korea, these dishes arrived later, often through Japan, and became popular between the 1960s and 1980s. While Japan continued to refine yōshoku as an evolving cuisine, Korea’s gyeongyangsik settled into a more fixed form — one that now survives mostly as a nostalgic reminder of a time when Western food itself felt rare and special.

It was much later that I first encountered Japanese-style tonkatsu, in places like Myeongdong Donkkaseu (명동 돈까스) in Seoul. It was clearly a cousin of the donkkaseu I grew up eating, recognizable but different. The cutlet was smaller, but much thicker, and it came already sliced. There was no need for a knife and fork — just chopsticks. The rice was served in a familiar bowl, not spread flat on a plate, and it came with miso soup instead of cream soup. Shredded cabbage and danmuji were still there, but the overall feeling was more practical, less ceremonial.

The sauce was different too: less sweet, more balanced.

If you want to eat the kind of donkkaseu that carries that earlier sense of nostalgia, you now have to look for it in bunsik-jip (분식집). Sometimes it is even labeled old-fashioned donkkaseu, or wang-donkkaseu — emphasizing its size more than anything else. What was once reserved for occasions had quietly become everyday food.

Over time, many of the dishes like donkkaseu, hambak seuteikeu (함박 스테이크), omuraisseu (오무라이스), and karelaiseu (카레라이스) that are influenced by yōshoku moved into the category of casual, everyday food. They now sit alongside dishes like jjajangbap (짜장밥), forming a kind of hybrid comfort food that feels familiar rather than exceptional. Even at home, these flavors no longer felt distant. The form remained, but the sense of occasion gradually faded.

I’ve come to realize that there are versions of this dish everywhere. Fried cutlets appear across cultures — milanesa in Italy and Latin America, Wiener Schnitzel in Austria, bécsi szelet in Hungary. They all follow a similar idea: meat, breaded and fried. It’s not surprising — we all know that something tends to taste better once it’s battered and fried.

But what differs is everything around it. In many of these places, the cutlet is just one part of the meal. Sides are ordered separately, and you eat it with a knife and fork as a matter of course. In Japan, it is already cut for you, practical and precise. In Korea, at least in the gyeongyangsik restaurants I remember, it became something else — larger, sweeter, and more ceremonial.

Looking back, it wasn’t just about the food. It was about the setting, the small differences, and the unfamiliar rules that made it feel special. A simple cutlet, moving across countries, had turned into a marker of occasion, something that once made an ordinary day feel like it mattered.

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