Hiding behind a banchan shop in Long Island City, this intimate chef’s counter is as much a classroom as it is a restaurant. Chef Hooni Kim builds a deeply personal menu around Korean fermentation, drawing on kimchi, doenjang, gochujang, ganjang, ssamjang, and other products that have been aged for years. His philosophy extends beyond flavor to ideas of nourishment, tradition, and the relationship between food and digestion, all of which he shares freely with guests. These fermented ingredients lend remarkable depth to deceptively simple dishes, from silky tofu with doenjang to beef with ssamjang. Later, a comforting spread of rice, pork, fried egg, seaweed, and deeply flavored aged kimchi brings the experience closest to Korean home cooking.