Hallabongs are everywhere in Jeju, from drinks to desserts, and even in the backyards of almost every Jeju resident!
Why pick hallabongs at a hallabong farm?
Even though hallabongs are ubiquitous on the island, they’re actually not the cheapest fruit around.
Of course, they’re comparatively cheaper if you buy them in Jeju, but we realised that a lot of the stalls in the markets (Dongmun, Seogwipo Maeil Olle) are selling hallabongs at prices that would still hurt your wallet if you were to buy in a larger quantity.
We had the wildest idea to lug some hallabongs back to Singapore (which we managed to! and is perfectly legal!) and realised it might be cheaper to go directly to a hallabong farm for wholesale purchase.
We thought through about it and figured it would be a great experience to try picking our own hallabongs in Jeju. Hence, we ended up finding a farm to pick and bring home hallabongs at a lower price!
Hallabong picking experience at Haepoom Farm
After checking around some blogs & websites, we eventually settled on Haepoom Farm, which was more convenient for our itinerary that day. It was also listed on the Visit Jeju website, so we thought it should be pretty legit.
The weather was not fantastic, hence it was only manned by one staff when we reached.
We asked him about picking hallabongs and he told us that it would be KRW8,000 (about USD 8) for 1kg, which was cheaper than what we saw in the markets (cheapest was KRW 10k).
We were warned though that 1kg was about only 3-4 hallabongs because these citron fruits were HUGE and heavy!
He also explained that the farm had 2 kinds of tangerines: hallabongs and cheonhyehyang (crossover between tangerine and orange).
He reminded us that cheonhyehyang was a little more sour and came with a different rate (KRW 10k for 1 kg). You can see them below side by side for reference:
While I loosely used the term ‘pick’, it was mainly using shears to cut the branches and off came the hallabongs! A lot of them were ripe for picking and we had fun going around to search for the juiciest and sweetest hallabongs.
We ended up with 5kg of hallabongs that we actually managed to bring back to Singapore! The staff was also very kind and let us take 2 cheonhyehyang (that we plucked by accident) for free haha.
The fruits made for very nice souvenirs for our families and they also agreed that the hallabongs were delicious! Unfortunately they are really expensive in Singapore and can cost SGD12 for 2 (USD 9).
We really enjoyed the hallabong picking process, which was also faster than we expected! It’s easy to squeeze this into your itinerary even if you don’t have much time to spare.
However, do note that some other farms do offer other add-on experiences such as jam making/tasting, which we unfortunately didn’t have here at Haepoom Farm!
DIRECTIONS
Related Posts:
- Jeju Tangerine Meringue Pie Workshop (failproof!)
- Driving in Jeju: A complete guide, review & tips!
- Ma Maison – Beautiful Jeju Airbnb in a fishing village
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