Somssi by Jihun Kim

A Counter Below Mayfair

Somssi by Jihun Kim is a one-Michelin-star Korean restaurant in Mayfair, London, inside the Mandarin Oriental Mayfair. Somssi by Jihun Kim, located beneath the Mandarin Oriental Mayfair on Hanover Square, belongs firmly to the second category. The descent via spiral staircase from the hotel lobby is, in itself, a deliberate spatial transition: the city recedes, the room compresses, and the 14-seat marble counter takes over as the organising principle of the entire experience.

That counter format carries real editorial weight in modern fine dining. At venues like CORE by Clare Smyth and Ikoyi, the tasting counter has become shorthand for a specific ambition: limited covers, focused service, and a menu architecture that rewards attention. Fourteen seats sets Somssi at the more intimate end of that spectrum. The dining public doesn't wander in; it arrives with purpose.

The Room as Framework

The physical design of Somssi does more than accommodate diners, it choreographs them. A marble counter at this scale functions as a stage shared between kitchen and guest. Every plate arrives within eyeline of where it was assembled, and the spatial proximity between chef and diner creates a pressure on presentation and pacing that a conventional table layout simply does not. In London's broader fine dining context, where rooms like The Ledbury and Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester maintain a more formal separation between kitchen and floor, the counter format at Somssi represents a different contract with the guest.

The descriptor "smart-looking" in the room's reception is accurate but incomplete. What the interior communicates is restraint applied to materials: marble, an ordered counter run, and a team in position to receive guests at the foot of the stairs. The effect is less dramatic reveal and more composed precision, a room that signals seriousness without requiring chandeliers to do so. For hotel dining in Mayfair, that calibration is notable, the neighbourhood's restaurant floors frequently lean toward visual opulence. Somssi reads differently.

Korean Refinement at Counter Scale

Korean fine dining has developed a distinct foothold in London over the last several years, with the city's appetite for non-European tasting menus growing in tandem with the broader shift away from classical French dominance. Where venues like The Clove Club have explored British produce through a creative, genre-crossing lens, Somssi applies comparable levels of technical ambition to Korean culinary tradition, working with refinement and originality rather than novelty for its own sake.

Ganjang lobster, one of the kitchen's documented dishes, illustrates the approach. Ganjang, the Korean soy-based seasoning derived from fermented soybeans, is a condiment with deep cultural roots and a salinity profile that can either overpower or deepen seafood depending on application. The description of a "delicate balance of ingredients" giving the lobster "extra depth of flavour" points to a kitchen that understands restraint as a technical discipline, not merely an aesthetic preference. Produce quality is described as foundational, a framing consistent with the counter format, where each plate is visible and individual ingredients bear scrutiny.

This produce-first philosophy places Somssi in a comparable set that includes some of the country's most ingredient-focused kitchens: L'Enclume in Cartmel, Moor Hall in Aughton, and the ingredient-led counter culture that has spread from Tokyo to London's upper-tier addresses. The difference at Somssi is the culinary tradition being drawn upon, Korean technique and flavour architecture operating through a format more commonly associated with Japanese omakase or modern British tasting menus.

Service as Part of the Structure

At a 14-seat counter, the floor team's role shifts. There is no backdrop of ambient table noise to absorb awkward pauses, and the proximity means that hesitation or detachment reads immediately. The reported model at Somssi, dishes described with "infectious enthusiasm by the smiling team", is not incidental hospitality colour. In a counter format, verbal delivery of each course is structural: it contextualises technique, signals ingredient provenance, and maintains the rhythm of the experience. When it works, the service narration becomes part of the dish itself.

This is a style of hospitality more commonly encountered at Japanese counter restaurants and some Scandinavian-influenced formats, where the presenter is as prepared as the cook. That Somssi applies it to Korean cuisine at a Mayfair hotel counter positions the room in a genuinely distinct niche within London's formal dining options, not chasing the French dining-room tradition represented by Waterside Inn or Gidleigh Park, and not occupying the stripped-back gastropub mode of Hand and Flowers. It sits in the space where kitchen culture and dining-room culture have been designed to overlap.

Mayfair's Fine Dining Tier

Hanover Square places Somssi within walking distance of some of London's most formally recognised dining addresses. The neighbourhood operates at a price and expectation level where restaurants compete less on accessibility and more on distinction of approach. In that context, a Korean counter restaurant beneath a Mandarin Oriental property occupies a specific strategic position: the hotel's brand sets a floor for quality expectations, while the cuisine type and format differentiate it from the French-influenced rooms that have historically defined Mayfair fine dining.

Comparable Korean-influenced fine dining outside London, at international addresses like Le Bernardin in New York City, demonstrates that technique-led cooking drawing on non-European traditions can sit comfortably at the summit of a city's formal dining tier when produce and execution are held to the same standard. Somssi's counter format, its documented emphasis on ingredient quality, and its hotel positioning in Mayfair all point toward a similar ambition in a London context.

Those planning further afield in the UK will find comparable produce-driven formality at hide and fox in Saltwood or at Emeril's in New Orleans for transatlantic reference.