These two new Vancouver restaurants elevate Korean cuisine

There’s one dessert ($12), vanilla ice cream topped with rice syrup, a Korean sweet potato tuile, and soybean powder.

At Nabi House, chef-owner Daniel Lee is on a similar trajectory, having done a cook’s tour of duty at restaurants like Bacchus, Le Crocodile and La Quercia in Vancouver, and the opulent Chase restaurant in Toronto.

He 180’ed to Korean food upon opening his own place. “I don’t know if it was a conscious decision but it’s what I really wanted to do, deep down,” he says. In Korean, Nabi means butterfly but also, the warmth in reconnecting with someone. Or, a reunion with foods he grew up with?

It’s also practical. Korean cooking doesn’t require a muscle-bound kitchen. “You don’t need much. You boil, ferment, you only need bare bones equipment,” Lee says. The kitchen he inherited from Aleph Eatery and the short-lived El Compa is a small galley space with one induction stove top and an overachieving Rational oven (a premium, multi-functioning workhorse). “It kinda made sense,” he says about going Korean.

His mother, Vivian, assists him as a cook, bookkeeper and someone to bounce ideas off. “Korean food’s been perceived as peasant food for a long time,” Lee says. “It’s not glamorous by any means but North American Korean food got lost along the way with fried chicken and super spicy and salty dishes. It’s never been an extravagant cuisine.” His approach, he says, will be “straightforward. No micro greens, foie gras, fluid gels or fluff.

As at Nui, there was one dessert: mochi parfait with baked mochi, sweet red beans and matcha ice cream ($12). The baked mochi provided a welcome chew, lengthening enjoyment time.

Our good-natured server was new on the job and her sweet and sincere interactions were so refreshing and appreciated.

Both eateries offer super-focused drinks lists that feature local craft beers and two popular Korean beverages worth checking out. The first is soju, commonly made by diluting high-proof grain spirits with sweeteners. Lower in alcohol content than Japanese shochu, it’s served chilled in a 360ml bottle.

Both restaurants also serve makgeolli, a traditional Korean rice wine made using a traditional slow-fermentation process that gives it a thick and creamy mouth feel. Much different from Japanese sake, makgeolli again has a lower alcohol content and is unfiltered, milky, and lightly sparkling. Nui flavours their rice wine in-house with either yuzu or strawberry. Nui also offers a short list of budget-friendly wines, all available by the glass.

When I was in Singapore, I couldn’t get a reservation at Odette, a three-Michelin French-Asian restaurant. I snoozed, I losed. But I’m thrown a bone. Chef-owner Julien Royer has a cookbook coming out in May with recipes for his sublime dishes. It’s called Odette: Terroir to Table, Heart to Plate. Recipes are rooted in classical French technique, “shaped by the ingredients, traditions, and sensibilities of Asia.”