After two years, recognition from the Michelin Guide and a glowing review from the Los Angeles Times, modern Korean restaurant Kinn will close this week, with its chef and owner underscoring the importance of mental health within the restaurant industry.
“I think our products are often undervalued and we have to make compromises,” said Kiyong “Ki” Kim, who announced Kinn's closure last Friday. “Whether it's quality of life, finances, sleep, we have to please our guests and please our customers instead of making sure we stay healthy. Adds”.
The Koreatown restaurant is scheduled to close on Saturday. Kim said she lost approximately 20 pounds in the past few weeks due to stress and anxiety. As a chef, she finds critical praise and seeing satisfied customers “addictive,” leading to a workforce of chefs who rarely prioritize themselves.
Before opening Kinn, Kim co-founded Korean pop-up Naemo in Los Angeles and worked at San Francisco's Benu and New York City's Jungsik and Atomix. The 20-seat Kinn, her first restaurant, is a collaboration with In Hospitality Group, which also operates Koreatown fried chicken shop Chimmelier, and opened in November 2021 with a la carte offerings, but quickly reformatted to a tasting menu setup.
Their five courses expanded to seven and included dishes like signature slow-braised crispy octopus, charred kimchi-stuffed Little Gems, peach-glazed bulgogi, and tomato-perilla burrata salad, which evolved with each season.
Kinn won acclaim for its seasonal tasting menu that includes dishes like a summer bibimbap with seaweed rice.
(Mariah Tauger / Los Angeles Times)
Earlier this year, the global gastronomic compendium Michelin Guide added Kinn to its California listings as a notable new restaurant choice. “Whether preparing dishes or presenting them, the chef and his team provide an exclusive experience,” said the guide.
Michelin also included Kinn in its guide to the best Korean restaurants in Los Angeles.
In May, LA Times food critic Bill Addison called kinn “one of the freshest culinary voices in Los Angeles,” he described Kim as “masterful” and wondered if the restaurant could be the future of fine dining in the city.
Although the restaurant is closing, Kinn will still appear at this year's fair. LA Times 101 List Event on December 5. The restaurant was initially going to appear on the list, which will be revealed that night, but Times restaurant critic Bill Addison swapped Kinn for another entry upon hearing the news. “In an effort to make the list as up-to-date and useful to readers as possible, it will not be listed,” Addison said. “We are delighted to welcome him and honor the great work that the Food section said he did.”
“That will be the end of us,” Kim said.
Financial and spatial limitations
The premise of offering an ambitious seven-course tasting menu at an affordable price ($95 per person) also proved difficult for the team, which didn't always cross the sales threshold needed on a given night. Kim noted that his concerns about the restaurant's future began in April, due to inconsistencies in guest seating and compromises the chef said he had to make given the restaurant's financial and spatial limitations.
As the months passed, Kim said her mental health deteriorated, especially after alerting staff last month about the impending end.
The professional chef regularly appears on lists of the most stressful jobs, including being ranked number one by recruitment firm Zippia earlier this year for long hours, poor job security and managing staff on top of cooking. According to a recent survey According to culinary experience website Cozymeal, 70% of chefs participating in the survey had experienced anxiety about working in a restaurant, while many also suffered from sleep disorders, depression and substance abuse.
Multiple nonprofits and other support organizations exist to help members of the service industry combat depression and addiction, such as Restaurant After Hours, Focus on Health, A Balanced Glass, and Healthy Hospo.
“Unfortunately we had to close Kinn due to its [Kim’s] health issue,” Dustin Dong Hyuk Lee, a partner at In Hospitality Group, told The Times in an email. “It's very sad, but I'm sure he will come back stronger than ever!”
The outpouring of support has been a shock to the team since the announcement last Friday, with bookings already full for the week, the chef said.
“We are very, very grateful,” Kim said. “We have already seen many familiar faces after the announcement and everyone is reaching out. I didn't know there were so many people who cared about us. “It has been very emotional.”
Grilled mackerel with sautéed kimichi from Kinn.
(Mariah Tauger / Los Angeles Times)
Closing the restaurant has helped Kim find new camaraderie in other chefs who have reached out to spread empathy, having closed restaurants themselves, and he said the experience has helped him learn to be more empathetic in turn.
“I'm very hopeful now and I'm trying to be as strong as possible mentally,” he said.
Kim hopes to remain in Los Angeles after Kinn closes, ideally cooking elsewhere before reopening her own restaurant one day.
“What I really want to do is focus on the present moment, but I am very excited about the future. I feel like what the future holds is very bright, and even brighter than Kinn's prime.”
