San Francisco chef Corey Lee gave a modern and very technical spin to Asian cooking back in 2010 when he debuted Benu, his minimalist, 40-seat SoMa restaurant that often highlights ingredients and techniques—from pine needles to Asian pear and preserved persimmon-braised proteins—from his native Korea.
And over the years, Lee has earned praise for his ultra precise, Asian cooking rooted in French technique via dishes like an exemplary lobster coral xiao long bao: a tissue paper-thin-skinned soup dumpling plumped with lobster meat and lobster consommé that resembles a small, crimped water balloon.
This year the acclaimed restaurant celebrates a decade of maintaining Three MICHELIN Stars (note: Michelin didn't offer ratings in 2020 due to Covid), and we caught up with the chef to reflect on his successes over the years, the importance of consistency, and his potential new pup.
It’s been 14 years, congratulations! That’s a huge accomplishment. How’s it going?
Thank you. The years just flew by and, in many ways, it still feels like the first year. It's never easy, but I'm very happy with how we are doing. The food we are serving and the experience we offer our guests has never been better.
Over the years, how has the restaurant changed?
We've remodeled the dining room three times; the last time was in 2022. The food has evolved, and the dining room needed to change with it. As far as our cooking, it's been a natural and steady evolution rather than big program changes overnight or abrupt stylistic moves. When I opened Benu in 2010, offering tasting menus imbued with reinterpretations of Asian cuisine, especially Korean, was uncharted territory, and it took time for our identity to materialize and take shape. But now we understand ourselves as a restaurant so clearly, so our cooking is more authentic, and that only happens when it comes from a deep place. Of course, now, Korean cuisine has evolved to a place where New Korean fine dining is almost its own genre, but it certainly wasn't like that before Benu opened.
Tell us about the discipline it takes for you and your team to maintain Benu's Three MICHELIN Stars for a decade.
I think the single thing that requires the most discipline to achieve is consistency. You can be inspired to create a great dish anytime. Or you can be super energized and work endlessly for an opening of a new restaurant. But over time, it's really about consistency, and that requires rigorous commitment. The hours, the development, the training—those things can't happen just when you feel motivated or inspired. I believe that to do great work, in any field, you have to fully commit yourself.
How do you keep your team excited and motivated?
It starts from the top, and motivated people attract other motivated people. But to be honest, I don't think that much about it. My job is to provide an environment where my team can do good work, train them properly, give them opportunities to grow, and teach them skills that will help them be successful. But they need to be self-motivated and excited about what they're doing for themselves.
What is your biggest takeaway from running a longstanding Three Michelin Star restaurant?
I think the most important thing about running a Three Star restaurant is that you shouldn’t make being a Three Star restaurant your goal. You have to cook food that you’re personally connected to. The stars have to be a byproduct of devoting your life to a profession that fulfills you on a deeper level.
Anything you would have done differently?
Many, many things. But the one that stands out is not having been more available for my friends and family.
What’s the biggest learning experience you’ve had over the years?
The experience of working and living through Covid. I learned so much about our industry and the place of food and restaurants in society.
How far in advance do customers have to book these days?
We release reservations one month in advance and the prime times fill up pretty quickly. But occupancy in San Francisco is noticeably down since Covid, and for the first time in 14 years, we have tables open on some nights. Of course that can be unnerving, but I also like that people have a chance to book at the last minute. I think part of living in a great city is having the option to dine spontaneously at great restaurants.
Your menu today versus the day you launched, what’s the same and what’s different?
I opened Benu to explore how the cuisine of my native culture and the flavors I grew up with could inform my cooking as a professional chef working in the fine dining arena. I'm still very much on that exploratory journey, but generally I think our menus in the early days prioritized offering highly creative dishes that people had never had before, whereas now I'm more focused on serving dishes that are of a quality and authenticity that I’d be happy to serve again and again. It's easy to become knowledgeable about trends or the latest techniques, and then apply them to your menu to offer something that feels new, but it takes a lifetime of experience and maturing to become a gourmet. For a chef, that trajectory represents the difference between being focused on developing a new dish versus mastering one.
What would you say are your most iconic dishes?
We've always started with a 1,000-year-old quail egg so that's probably one of them. I serve that as the first bite because the eggs are highly alkaline and help calibrate our palates and olfactory senses for the rest of the menu. Another is our xiao long bao, which is a mainstay because that's a personal statement on how we as Asians need to value our traditional foods more. The stuffed mussel is probably the most visually recognizable. We're also known for our quail preparations but that's mainly a testament to our rancher Brent Wolfe of Wolfe Ranch. And then finally our pine needle sikhye (malted rice drink), which I love because it's a Benu dish, but feels like something that has been around forever, and more importantly, it's a perfect way to end a meal.
What are you most excited about right now?
I recently found out that my 13-year-old dog's grandson is in need of a new home so I’m visiting him next month.
What’s on tap for Benu for the future?
Next year is Benu's 15th anniversary. We'll celebrate and take a break before working on the next chapter.
Hero image: Eric Wolfinger / Benu
Thumb image: Corey Lee / Benu
