한국국제교류재단

There is a pattern to how economies develop: once incomes reach a certain level, people start spending on experiences rather than material things. Korea’s GDP crossed the thirty-thousand-dollar mark in 2017, and the Seoul edition of the Michelin Guide appeared around the same time. That timing speaks volumes. But the ambition of the chefs was just as important. International travel was tightly controlled through the 1980s. After those restrictions were lifted in 1989, chefs who had studied abroad or worked in leading restaurants outside of Korea came home and set out to build something from the ground up. It demanded extraordinary effort.

Korea possesses a long-standing culinary asset: fermentation. When discussing Korean food, fermentation is the topic that most captivates leading chefs and international gourmands. Fermentation isn’t uniquely Korean, but few cultures have built it into daily life the way Korea has, where making kimchi at home isn’t some project; it’s simply a given. In the early 2010s, acidity came to the forefront of global gastronomy, and that aligns precisely with the qualities that fermentation brings to food. When I was at El Bulli and the Alícia Foundation, some of Spain’s finest chefs said something that stayed with me: Korean fermentation was exactly what I should be studying. Coming back to Korea and joining Sempio was part of that. I needed to understand fermentation properly from the inside out.

Different things, as it turns out. European chefs tend to approach fermentation like researchers. Japanese chefs recognize the Korean reverence for ingredients but are caught off guard by the boldness and deliberate rusticity of Korean cuisine. Southeast Asian chefs, on the other hand, find their footing quickly. Fermentation and spice are a shared language, so the conversation starts almost immediately.

Start in a different place. A restaurant survives by being loved, so what the guest wants is what matters. Culture isn’t fixed; it grows from how people live with it. Consider gochujangjjigae [red pepper paste stew]. Is that Korean food? Scholars from the Joseon Dynasty probably wouldn’t have thought so. Koreans are generally believed to have begun widely consuming red pepper paste only around the 19th century. And yet today, gochujang, ramyeon [instant noodles], and tteokbokki [spicy rice cakes] sit at the very center of what people associate with Korean food.

Localization works the same way. A cuisine that refuses change, growth, and new combinations eventually loses relevance. It becomes isolated and, over time, risks disappearing. Right now, gochujang and ramyeon are having their moment, but the spicy side of Korean food is only its starting point. Get someone in through the spicy side, and Korean cuisine has a way of drawing them further in unexpectedly.

The NANRO Academy educates restaurant professionals on hansik traditions. Pictured are meju — fermented soybean blocks essential for soy sauce and pastes — crafted at the Kim Myung-sung Fermentation Research Institute.
Courtesy of the NANRO Foundation

Fine dining runs on precision — precision in temperature, timing, and the chef’s creative intent. Increasingly, restaurants are finding ways to apply that precision without sacrificing what makes Korean cuisine distinctive. Onjium, ranked fourteenth on the 2026 Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants list, offers a compelling example. The main dish is served for sharing, and each course comes with specifically paired kimchi. It demonstrates that a meal unfolding course by course can coexist with the communal nature of the Korean dining customs. In fact, Western fine dining is already moving in this direction, loosening its grip on strict sequential service in favor of sharing and collective dining experiences. Get it right — the simultaneity and abundance of the Korean table — and fine dining has considerably more room to breathe.

The biggest issue is a severe labor shortage, though improving the treatment of foreign workers is also urgent. This isn’t just about solving a staffing problem; it may be one of the most effective ways for Korean cuisine to spread internationally. It isn’t uncommon for foreign workers who have trained in Korean restaurants to go home and open their own places. When we say Korean food is thriving, we’re measuring it in two ways: whether younger generations continue to embrace it and whether it’s being enjoyed beyond Korea’s borders. Both matter.

A second challenge is regional representation. Korean fine dining needs to represent food cul¬tures beyond Seoul. Put simply, the rest of the country deserves a place at the table. In countries where fine dining has taken root, distinct region¬al food cultures form the broader gastronomic foundation. Korea isn’t there yet. Busan’s addition to the MichelinGuide’s coverage in 2024 is a reason for cautious optimism. One of the chefs at Restaurant SAN, which ranked fifty-fourth on the Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants list, is from Busan, and the menu includes dwaeji gukbap, the city’s signature dish of pork and rice in a milky pork bone broth. We need more chefs willing to draw on their own regional identity and elevate it to an international level. Freshness and spectacle defined the past decade of Korean fine dining. The next decade must be about depth and substance. Sustainability is the defining challenge.

Seven out of ten chef-owned restaurants eventually close. Cooking and running a business are entirely different disciplines, and that disconnect is where most chefs stumble. For that reason, mentoring is at the heart of the NANRO Foundation’s mission. Programs bring chefs into conversation with experts in finance, marketing, and branding — fields rarely touched by culinary training. The academy is also meant to be a platform where different cultural industries feed into each other. In France, gastronomy has spent two centuries weaving itself into fashion, film, wine, and luxury goods. Japanese food developed alongside design, craft, and content. No cuisine can truly thrive in isolation. The NANRO Foundation aims to help build the ecosystem necessary for Korean cuisine to endure and thrive.

Invited by the NANRO Foundation in 2025, Chef Ferran Adrià joined local chefs at Cheonjinam Hermitage in Jangseong. Pictured here, the group listens to Venerable Jeong Kwan’s explanation of traditional Korean fermentation culture.
Courtesy of the NANRO Foundation