Korean restaurant Chae is Melbourne’s smallest and most-popular place to eat

It’s even harder to snare a seat at Melbourne’s hottest dining experience Chae, inside a one-bedroom Brunswick apartment, with the waitlist blowing out even further.

Demand to eat at Melbourne’s smallest restaurant inside a one-bedroom Brunswick apartment has blown out in the last fortnight — with more than 6000 people now on the waitlist.

Chae is a tiny Korean restaurant seating only six people from the home of head chef Jung Eun Chae and her husband Yoora Yoon.

In mid-April, Chae was fully booked and had 4000 people waiting for a table.

After the Herald Sun wrote about Chae’s popularity, there are now 6213 people on the waitlist for May and June (3447 and 2766 people respectively), with chances of snaring a spot slim.

Chae is Melbourne's smallest and most in-demand restaurant, run by Jung Eun Chae. Picture: Rebecca Michael.

Mr Yoon said Chae only opened sittings two months at a time and only considered people on the wait list to fill cancellations.

July and August sittings open on June 1 at 7pm.

Despite the restaurant’s overwhelming popularity, Chae doesn’t plan to add more sittings.

“She will never increase the number of dates or people, as she doesn’t want to compromise the quality of food,” Mr Yoon said.

“The popularity (of Chae) is surreal and beyond what we could have fathomed when we opened the restaurant.”

Mr Yoon was grateful for Chae’s success, even though he was initially against the idea.

“I was always opposed to the idea of running a restaurant where I live,” he said.

“But Chae had such a strong love for this concept and kept pushing the idea, so I eventually said yes.”

Korean cuisine uses fermented and preserved ingredients. Picture Rebecca Michael

Chae is open for lunch and dinner two times a week for six people at one time. Picture: Rebecca Michael

Chae is booked out until July and has a 4000 person wait list. Picture: Rebecca Michael

South Korean-born Jung Eun Chae, or Chae, honed her craft in the kitchens of Melbourne’s best restaurants Cutler and Co and Lume before working under esteemed South Korean cook and Buddhist nun Jeong Kwan.

Chae opened in late 2019 but flew under the radar due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with word of mouth largely behind the venue’s sudden surge in popularity.

While the menu changes with each sitting, you may try Korean dishes like bugak (deep fried vegetables), kimchi (fermented spicy cabbage), chilli hot sauce gochujang or even makgeolli, a milky, sparkling rice wine.

Chae costs $59 per person for lunch or $69 for dinner, which includes about five to six courses, without drinks.

@kara_irving