Michelin chef infuses tradition into food

Chef Corey Lee of Benu in San Francisco poses in his kitchen. He has his first cookbook coming out in April and plans to come to Korea to promote it in May.

For chef Corey Lee, the owner of the prestigious Benu restaurant in San Francisco, keeping an element of tradition in his dishes is key. As the first Korean-American to receive three Michelin stars, the last of which he was awarded in October, Lee is now ready to share his take on tradition through his first cookbook, slated for worldwide release in April.

"I like to make a reference point to a tradition when I cook", he said during a recent interview with the Korea JoongAng Daily early this month.

This use of tradition, the chef explained, could be the dining manner of a culture or a vegetable that's indigenous to the area the restaurant is located in.

Lee developed his belief while working in California for about 15 years after moving from New York to lead the kitchen at French Laundry - another restaurant with three Michelin stars. Only 12 establishments in the United States received the accolade for the 2015 edition of the esteemed Michelin Guide.

"I was left with an enormous amount of pressure to retain those stars as the head chef at French Laundry, but interestingly, in my own restaurant I feel far less burden as I just feel good about what I'm doing", Lee said.

"I feel responsible more than anything in the sense that [the honor] comes with some expectations from guests".

The chef, who had no cooking experience when he first started bussing at a restaurant in New York, says he could be a source of inspiration for Korean chefs who want to stand out in the food industry.

As well as recipes, Lee's book explains how he struggled to climb up the culinary ladder and made his parents acknowledge that what he does is a real profession.

Lee plans to visit Korea in May after his publication is released to share his insights in person.

Q. What do you think the cookbook will do for you?

A. As a chef, publishing a book is a way to expose your cuisine to other chefs and aspiring young cooks. I certainly spent an enormous amount of time reading cookbooks, and that was a very important part of my learning. I just wanted to participate in that tradition. Also, you reach an audience you can't reach as a restaurant. Obviously, a restaurant is a place people have to travel to in order to dine there and only has a certain number of seats, so the number of people it reaches is very finite. But with a book you can reach a much larger audience.

Do you think your food and restaurant represents Korean cooking?

Being Korean is a big part of who I am and it naturally comes out, but I don't have an agenda to increase awareness of Korean cuisine. I think I try to cook the food I find interesting, exciting, satisfying, pleasurable, and how that's labeled is mostly up to diners. Diners who have a lot of experience with Asian or Korean food probably think that the food at Benu is a rendition of Asian or Korean food. But someone who has no reference point would not classify it as Asian food.

What is the most Korean dish you have ever made?

One is made with kimchi. We take the liquid from kimchi and add modified starch. Then it changes the viscosity, so we form that into little flowers and [after baking] it becomes very crispy. Another is when we mix kimchi with pork then stuff it into a little shell and put a sip of raw oyster on top. So it is like bossam but is re-worked in terms of texture and becomes a little canape. That's a very Korean thing, and you will get it once you start eating it. But if you look at it you would have no idea. We are also working on a variation of gujeolpan - a wrap of vegetable, eggs and meat. We are designing it in a way it looks very modern.

What's the most interesting element of Korean cooking?

It generally has to do with the way things are seasoned. Basically a lot of it really comes down to jang, a fermented sauce, like gochujang and doenjang. Those are the most flavorful things you can season with, whereas with western food most of the seasoning is done with salt.

The porcelain used at Benu are from Korean porcelain company Kwangjuyo. Did you have them made specially?

The dishes have been in my family household as long as I can remember, so I always associated the patterns as something very iconic in Korean cooking. I knew I wanted to incorporate some of that aesthetic into the food and the restaurant. But the ones they had were too traditional for [Benu] or too obviously Korean, so I'll sketch something and I'll send it [to the company], and they turn it into a real sketch. Sometimes [I tell them what I will put on the plates]. For example, I tell them this is for a modern version of gujeolpan then they intuitively understand what I'm looking for.

How do you explain a dish inspired by Korean food to other chefs who don't have experience cooking it?

It's very hard, but sometimes you don't even explain it and it's okay. I've certainly had my share of time working at a French kitchen, and a French chef would explain to me this French dish. Intellectually I could understand it, but emotionally it's not there. I'll never know what it's like to be a little kid and have your grandmother cook your cassoulet in the southwestern part of France. Just because I can't relate to it emotionally, that doesn't mean it's not valuable to me. It doesn't mean I can't execute it better than a French person.

How would you evaluate the restaurant scene in Korea?

The cover of chef Corey Lee's first cookbook. Provided by Phaidon Press

I think we are going to see some really exciting and original restaurants in the next five years. You see a lot of Koreans abroad who are travelling and working at renowned restaurants and they will eventually come back home and open restaurants or will have opportunities to showcase what they really learned abroad. You have to give them time to develop and evolve. It takes time for them to define their way and come up with something original.

Many chefs now train at world-famous culinary schools in the United States or in Europe. Is this essential?

[Being a chef] can't be such privileged profession. It's a profession that anyone can get into, and that's how I ended up here. It can't be a high-class activity. [I wish] young Koreans chefs would see the path I took and maybe look at the experiences as something they might want to do. I'm really very partial to seeing young Koreans interested in cooking because I think they will be part of molding [the restaurant scene], which will determine what the industry is like for the next generation.

Compared to other Asian cuisine, for example Japanese, Korean food seems relatively lesser-known in terms of fine dining. Why is this?

The difference is that the Japanese themselves have a reverence for cooking and that is ingrained in their culture in a way other Asian cultures don't have. They are willing to pay for a very high experience so there is a buy-in from their own culture. I think you need the true buy-in for any cuisine to really grow and flourish.

So how did they manage to have Japanese-inspired Western-style fine dining outside of Japan?

It happens very organically. Japanese people move to various areas around the world and they want the kind of cooking that [they enjoyed] when they were living [in Japan]. Some are more casual, but there are also some very high-end things. Whereas with Koreans, they don't have fine-dining experiences [with Korean food] in Korea. So how can they miss something that they never had? It has to reflect the dining culture of their native country. I think fine dining is relatively new in Korea. So how do you have that abroad if it's even new in Korea?

What can we do to spread Korean food abroad?

We don't approach things by saying "how do we increase Korean cuisine abroad?" It really does have to happen organically. I think we are on the right track, but it's not happening as vertically or fast as some people would like. I think it's important to understand [that cooking] is a slow craft. It's more important that just saying "Let's promote Korean cuisine". Let's take this time to really build a foundation for cooking.

BY LEE SUN-MIN [summerlee@joongang.co.kr]