Award-winning Tartine Bakery is expanding from San Francisco and will open its first overseas branch in Seoul’s Hannam Dong area on February 9.
There are plans to also open about four more Tartine Korea outlets over the next 12 to 18 months.
Heading the Korean branch will be pastry chef Lee Hyun Hee and chef Edward Lee, co-founder of Baroque Bakery and Pizzeria d’Buzza in Seoul. The two Korean chefs have spent six months in San Francisco learning the bakery’s recipes, says Food And Wine magazine.
Tartine founder Chad Robertson, who has studied Korean martial art taekwondo, describes Korea’s food culture as “really amazing” with its take on Western food.
Tartine’s San Francisco shop attracts queues for its morning buns, a croissant dough rolled into a bun form and dusted with sugar, orange zest and cinnamon, as well as its buttermilk scones studded with currants, and fresh loaves ranging from baguettes to offerings made with buckwheat and quinoa.
Meanwhile, the bakery has just opened a 464sqm bread factory in San Francisco that combines a pastry shop, restaurant, ice-cream parlour and coffee shop in a warehouse space. The company plans to replicate this concept in a 3716sqm space in downtown Los Angeles, which will also include a coffee lab and roastery as well as a trattoria and pizzeria.