Chef With Two Michelin-Starred Manhattan Restaurants Opens New Steakhouse

Chef Sungchul Shim truly embodies the American Dream.

A native of South Korea, he had his heart set on pursuing cooking professionally since he was in high school and would assist his mother in the kitchen. After attending culinary school in South Korea and serving a mandatory two-year stint in the military there, he moved to New York in 2005 to attend the Culinary Institute of America and landed his first externship in Manhattan at Le Bernardin, which, he said, changed the trajectory of his career.

His top-tier résumé includes cooking at some of the most celebrated restaurants in the city under some of the biggest names in the industry—Thomas Keller at Per Se, Charlie Palmer at Aureole, and Gordon Ramsay at The London NYC.

After 18 years of experience, he said, “I felt like it was time to do my own style of cooking.” In 2020, three months prior to the pandemic shutdown, he opened his first restaurant, Kochi, inspired by Korean street food.

During COVID, Shim, who nearly died from the virus, was determined to make the fledgling Hell’s Kitchen eatery work and, when he recovered, personally delivered takeout food and meal kits to customers. Because of his talent and perseverance, he not only made Kochi a success but was able to open three more restaurants—Mari, Don Don, and Mari.ne—in the next three years.

Two of his restaurants, Kochi and Mari, even earned a Michelin star. Despite receiving the industry’s highest honor, Shim remains humble. “The star is not for me, it’s for the restaurant. So all the service, all the food, and then all about the customer experience,” he said.

His “dream concept,” however, was always a steakhouse, and in February he made that vision a reality. After three years of transforming a space on Eighth Avenue, between 47th and 48th streets, once occupied by a Staples, he unveiled Gui, which translates to “grill” in Korean.

Now, the hands-on chef spends his time at Gui—which he describes as having “an American steakhouse format with Korean heritage in it”—and each day at 5pm, starts the dinner service by tasting each of the six sauces that are offered as accompaniments to his steaks.

“Consistency is very, very important. And I’m at the pass during the service. I check every single menu item we send out to the guest, from the raw bar to the grill,” he said.

The doting dad, who takes Sundays off to spend with his wife and two children, said his son’s favorite menu item at Gui happens to be their bestseller, the prime rib. But, for the most part, his kids are not impressed with their father’s haute cuisine.

“They like to eat, but not fancy stuff. Hamburgers, they eat very weird, no ketchup, no cheese—and steak, only salt.”

Tell us about your experience working at high-end Manhattan restaurants and how they helped you to eventually open your own.

Le Bernardin was a great experience. It’s all fine dining, and the chef is very professional. It’s sort of like the military. It’s so organized and clean. And the food is amazing. After that, I wanted to learn from the best. So I worked at Aureole restaurant under Charlie Palmer. I learned a lot of techniques there in American and French cuisine. Then I moved to the Waldorf Astoria hotel, Peacock Alley. Then I went to Neta, and after that I worked at Bouley for Chef David Bouley. Then I moved to Gordon Ramsay’s, The London Hotel. Finally, I had a job opportunity at Per Se, and from 2009 until 2012 I was there. That changed my culinary passion and what I should do. Chef Thomas Keller has a different approach to the culinary scene. It was all about caring, it’s not pretentious. So that’s what I learned from him. His philosophy is always caring, caring for the staff, the guests, and the food.

Three months after you opened your first restaurant, Kochi, COVID hit.

We shut down for six months, and then we switched to takeout and a meal kit. The funny thing is, the day we got the liquor license, I drove to Albany to pick it up, and the next day we got the announcement that the restaurant business was shut down because of COVID. Later that week, I got so sick, I was in the bedroom of my house for three weeks. I couldn’t move—I had COVID. I almost died. And then the restaurant’s walk-in boxes broke, so all the food got ruined. We lost almost everything, $200,000. Then we tried to do another business with the lunch box and meal kit. Three of us started doing it. We had like $1,000 in sales on a weekly basis. We had to pay rent, we had to survive at that point. And since we were only open for three months, we weren’t allowed to get any assistance. So it was very tough. Then we started the outdoor dining and delivery. I delivered the food to the customers’ houses.

What are the concepts behind your first four restaurants?

Kochi is an eight-course chef tasting and a street-food, skewer-inspired menu. And the second, Mari, is hand-roll inspired and a 13-course chef tasting. Traditionally, in Korea, we eat a lot of seaweed when we have a meal, and the rice and condiments, we just wrap it all up. So that was the concept, to have one perfect bite, like omakase-style. The third restaurant, Don Don, is a retro-style Korean barbecue. We dry-age the pork belly at least two to three weeks so it gets a nice texture and flavor. Mari.ne is a casual wine bar. It’s right next to Bryant Park, and it’s a grab-and-go style.

You opened Gui in February. Take us into the meat program there.

We use a live wood-fire charcoal grill that’s our signature specialty—that’s why it took so long, so many permits. Our cooking philosophy at Gui is influenced by Korean and Asian flavors. Also, different from other restaurants, we do have a shareable menu, so you can enjoy fried rice, noodles, stew, more variety. Our meat program is very, very good. We use Creekstone Farms, in Upstate New York. La Frieda, they source it. The meat is dried for at least four weeks, and then they send it to us. We have a dry-ager and keep them six to eight weeks. We have a tomahawk [steak] we age more than eight to 12 weeks in house. And then we have a Wagyu program, which won a championship award in Japan. We purchase a whole cow and then break it down, so customers can order a special part.

Who is a celebrity you’ve cooked for at Gui?

[Actor] Daniel Dae Kim, he came here. He loved our prime rib, and he loved our Wagyu katsu sando. He was so impressed. He’s Korean, so he understands our concept and was very appreciative of what we’re doing.

How do you balance being a father and a husband with all your responsibilities at your restaurants?

Oh, that’s very tough. I’m grateful that my wife supports me as a chef, so she doesn’t complain too much. She understands how the business is. Every Sunday, I have a day off, so I stay with the kids. My wife is very social, so on Sunday we have friends over and barbecue.

To learn more, visit www.guinyc.com