The first dish created by Bomee Ki and Woongchul Park is an unconventional version of the classic French tattoo Tatin, which is made from Daikon instead of traditional apples. The couple team self-conceived Sollip (a modern European restaurant in Korean style) opened in London in 2020. Park is responsible for savory dishes, while Ki is responsible for pastries and desserts, but they often share ideas.
“I was like, ‘Hey, dear, I wanted to make a tartardin, but a savory version.” “We started thinking about which ingredients we could use. We decided to make Daikon or Korean cabbage. We tried both and Daikon was the winner.”
“This became our signature dish,” Ki added. “In Korea, Dakun is one of the most famous and popular vegetables.”
“It’s different now,” Parker of the dish pointed out. “It’s more refined. But it’s a simple idea at first.”
Sollip combines the couple’s Korean influence with their traditional French cooking training and develops a shared interest in local British ingredients. Parker grew up in Cheonan-Si, not far from Seoul, and Ki comes from Gwangju. The couple met in 2009 while attending Le Cordon Bleu in London, although their initial encounter was short. “A friend introduced us,” Parker said. “Nothing happened at that time.”
After completing the course at Le Cordon Bleu, Parker returned to work in South Korea for a French restaurant Milieu in Jeju Island. He has been following Ki’s personal blog, where she posted photos of pastry works and immediately thought of Milieu when she needed a pastry chef.
“She didn’t have a job at the time, so she was lucky to say yes, she came to our restaurant to help us develop the pastry menu,” Parker said. “That’s how we started.”
Ki smiled and added, “He started.”
The couple married in 2013 and soon decided to return to London to work at restaurants such as Ledbury, Koffmann and The Arts Club. A few years later, they returned to South Korea, but could not shake their love for British cities. “When I was in high school, I used to love watching Jamie Oliver perform,” Kee said. “He was very attractive, I like that accent. At the time, I thought, ‘Maybe I want to go to the UK one day’
What’s more serious is that she sees London as a place to embrace different cultures. “We felt there was room here to express our story through food without too much explanation,” Ki noted. “This openness gives us confidence to be subtle and personal in our approach.”
In 2019, Ki and Park, who were two children at the time, decided to move to London permanently with the goal of opening their own restaurant. In the past, Parker thought he was the chef in someone else’s kitchen. But he realized that having his own restaurant takes youth and strength, which he had now in his 30s. He doesn’t want to delay his dream. “I was like, ‘If we were too late, we couldn’t do it because physically.” “Why wait until we were 40 or 50 to pursue that dream?” What does this mean? That was the moment when I started thinking about moving back to London. ”
Park went to the UK alone in June 2019 with two goals: looking for a place to live and find a restaurant. He gave himself three months to work. He explores thousands of steps in different communities every day and eventually finds an intimate restaurant space in Bermondsey, not far from London Bridge Station. “Sometimes I know nothing, it’s actually better,” he said. “When someone asks me what kind of property I’m looking for, I only know the money and the scale. Otherwise, my mind is very open.”
The family officially moved to London in the fall of 2019. They spent the next few months designing restaurant spaces, developing menus and creating business plans, usually only two or three hours a night. Even if budget constraints don’t allow Ki to immediately realize her vision, internal aesthetics are important.
“We hope this space reflects the same value as our food – calcium, simplicity and connection to nature,” she explained. “Without taking a traditional or decorative approach, we drew inspiration from North Korea’s Yeo-Baek concept, which is the beauty of the blank.” For Ki, we hope guests “will feel warm and calm when they enter, not through grand gestures but through quiet thoughtfulness and relaxed feeling.”
When Sollip is about to debut in early 2020, the pandemic hit. This restaurant won’t be truly open until August 29, 2020. They started with ordering products, but the UK quickly locked in for a second, and then the third time. By the spring of the following year, Ki and Park were finally able to come up with their original vision: a thoughtful tasting menu with Korean inspiration demonstrated modern European technology (Sollip’s four-course lunch is currently £78, while a seven-course dinner is £152).
Sollip’s focus is not on the open Koreans. Instead, ingredients including kimchi, gochujang and daikon are just natural extensions of Ki and Park. “Even if we have experience and education in French technology, our identity is Korean,” Ki said. “We love our country, we know our strengths are Korea, but we are not trying to make every moment have Korean influence.”
“You have your own knowledge from life experiences, then the chef’s experiences, and then your own food memories,” Parker added. “So, as a chef, your food comes from all of this.”
The outstanding dishes on the current menu are handmade Korean noodles made from Italian-sourced chestnuts, and sourdough fermented with coke rice. It is presented gracefully in a bowl with Perilla seed oil. Finding this in one of the Mitchell Star restaurants in England is an unusual dish, but it feels strange in the best way. Sollip used to offer bread treatments, but the chef eventually swapped it out.
“In Korea, either rice or noodles,” he said. “We tried different noodle recipes, but we wanted to be as simple as possible. That’s how we landed on the perilla seed Oil, one of my favorite ingredients in Korea. But we couldn’t get it in London, so we got it directly from my mom. She sent us two boxes a month.
Beets usually include traditional French Madeleine, with ki with basil and other flavors. She described her dessert method as “rooted in constraints” and said she wanted to leave an unforgettable impression on her guests. “I care a lot about the clarity of flavor and form, so I often focus on what I delete rather than what I want to add,” she said. “Every element has to be reason to be there and feel necessary. I’ve gone through a lot of testing and tasting until I feel absolutely confident.”
One of her favorites is Black Pain Perdu, which usually appears on the menu in the winter. She uses Seoritae (a Korean black bean) to make ice cream and present it with caramel pecans, burning vanilla and charcoal brioche. “I’ve always loved Pain Perdu and wanted to reinterpret it with Korean lenses,” she said. “It’s comforting, but precisely – it feels like Solip.”
Sollip’s overall experience reflects the combined intentions of the two chefs. Everyone focuses on every aspect of the restaurant, but the duo always works as a team, especially between balancing family life and work.
“Although our responsibilities were split, we shared ideas for almost every detail and made decisions together,” Parker said. “We also rely heavily on each other’s feedback on the menu and often develop ideas side by side. [And] When one of us feels tired or begins to lose motivation, another step comes with support or push. ”
“We have the same values and directions, but our personality is very different,” Ki added. “This difference is actually good for us,” he added. [because] He is instinctive and bold, while I am more detailed and driven and reflective. From the beginning, we made one thing clear: minimize the challenges of couples’ work and maximize their strengths. ”
They always leave their emotions at home and never bring them into the kitchen, which is the rule they follow from day one. “It sounds too good to achieve, but it’s really easy for me to work with him,” Ki said.
From the challenges posed by the pandemic to the help of staff once they can be opened to raising young children away from parents. This is still a struggle due to the rising cost of living. But it’s worth taking risks. Sollip won the first Michelin star in 2022 and has won the success of locals and restaurants that Korean tourists seek while dining in London. “Koreans cheer for us [on] Parker said they kept saying, “We are proud of you.” This makes us happy, but at the same time humble. ”
At the end of August, Solip will celebrate his fifth birthday – a landmark Ki is not sure they will reach. She called it “very excited,” especially as she and Park reflected on the journey here.
“Now, I have more feelings for Sollip than I did in the early days,” she said. “It’s a space shaped by people who both staff and guests pass by. I feel the same about London. This love naturally leads to the desire to do better and create a space that both our guests and our team can feel satisfied.”
