Korean-born pastry chef, classically trained in France, just opened a new dessert destination, Lysée.
Owned by pastry chef Eunji Lee who was born in Busan, South Korea, she studied pastry and worked in France before bringing her talents to Jungsik in New York.
Her new shop is the fulfillment of what she said was a dream — she told NY Eater that when she was in high school she had posted a writing on her bedroom wall that says ‘In 10 years, I will be a great pastry chef.
Among Lee’s specialties, is a signature layered Lysée made with caramel, Korean brown rice cake, cream, mousse and pecans. Some are Lee and chef and husband Matthieu Lobry’s take on classic French pastries, like Lysée’s airy take on kouign amann which apparently was the result of over five hundred trials.
The pastry shop’s seasonally rotating menu is divided between three themes: patisseries including cakes and tarts, viennoiserie or sweet bread, and gateaux de voyage, which means “pastries that travel well” in French.
Lee told NY Eater, “These pastries symbolize who I am: Korean, with French expertise, and at the same time a New Yorker.” Lee crafted the menu based on the foods that she enjoys eating every day.
Lysée joins Patisserie Fouet and Lady Wong at the forefront of innovative, women-led pastry enterprises that are rethinking traditional pastries and dessert forms through the prism of their immigrant backgrounds.
Lysée is at 44 East 21 Street, between Park Avenue South and Broadway, in Flatiron.
