It was love at first sight when chef Sunny Chae walked into a well-known shopfront on Hunter Street in Newcastle's East End.
He'd been searching for a commercial space to lease after deciding to open his own restaurant - on his own terms - in the city, and he found it at the former Restaurant Mason.
"From the moment I first saw it, I felt that this was the restaurant I had always dreamt of, so I signed the contract right away," Chae said.
"I wanted to introduce a new style of cuisine in harmony with the surrounding restaurants."
Chae was previously head chef at Blooming Garden at Hamilton, which opened three years ago, closed during the 2020 COVID lockdown, and re-opened as a Korean BBQ buffet in 2021.
"The lockdown period was a difficult time for many people, including myself, but on the other hand I shared precious time with my family," he said.
"I missed my life as a chef however there was also a piece of me that was scared to return. The reason I was able to overcome this was thanks to my daughter, Minsol. She told me that she wanted to see me cook in a restaurant again, and she encouraged me. Through her words, I regained hope."
Chae is passionate about cooking for other people. It brings him great joy and satisfaction, and is the reason why he quit a civil engineering course at university to pursue a dream.
He opened his restaurant - CorEat - in Newcastle three weeks ago. It's modern Australian with Korean influences.
"CorEat contains my longing, my identity," Chae, who was born in South Korea, said.
"It represents how I want people to be able to gather together with their loved ones and eat high quality food while having an enjoyable time.
"Up until now, I have worked in America, South Korea and Australia, cooking mostly Western-style dishes. Now I'm adding Korean flavours and techniques to these dishes. Whenever I create a new menu, I try my best to perfect it until I am satisfied. I think it is modesty and respect for cooking, not cooking skills, that increases as time passes."
Chae has worked hard to create a menu at CorEat that uses as many local ingredients as possible.
"People tend to describe the dishes I make as 'fine dining' yet I wish for the dishes I cook to be food that can be eaten comfortably by more people. So, I focused on fine food with a moderate price," he explained.
"I harmonised the ingredients from Australia with ones from South Korea to represent my continual longing for my home town."
He describes the king prawn dish as "representative" of CorEat's menu.
"Tasmanian king prawns are combined with a risotto made using multigrain rice and wild seaweed from my home town in South Korea, with coconut chilli bisque sauce as a finishing touch," Chae said.
"The garnish is accompanied by the squid ink tapioca chips, which originated from the snacks that I often ate back in South Korea when I was young.
"I've also thought about my family's favourite dishes when creating the menu."
During lockdown Chae did a lot of cooking at home. His wife's favourite meal became the smoked salmon and crab meat salad on the menu, accompanied by lemon gel, seaweed parmesan chip and brioche crouton. The prawn pasta at CorEat was inspired by his children.
"This dish went through slight alterations to suit the restaurant by combining squid ink tagliolini (pasta noodles) and katsuobushi with the original recipe. I put my family's love into these dishes," Chae said.
"The duck leg confit is one of the most popular dishes so far at the restaurant. This dish is made by marinating the duck leg in a Korean herbal medicine sauce for 24 hours then slowly cooking it in duck fat.
"Another dish that many people have liked is the marinated pork belly in Korean BBQ sauce, which I learnt from my Mum. This dish is sous vide cooked for 10 hours and flame grilled, and served with my Mum's radish kimchi, vinegar powdered chicharon and a calamari croquet."
As for dessert, the yuzu, vanilla cream and matcha Eton mess has been a hit with diners.
"Yuzu tea is one of the most popular citrus teas in South Korea. I added it to the Eton mess for a refreshing taste," he said.
"In order to introduce different types of Korean liquor, cocktails were added to the menu. The 'My Childhood' is a cocktail made from the combination of a strawberry popsicle pearl which I enjoyed as a child, and the Korean liquor, soju.
"On the whole, I am happy that our restaurant, CorEat, is a place where good people provide good food for good customers."
