German pastries at Backerin

After learning to bake bread in Germany, chef-owner Lee Ho-kyoung opened a small bakery, christening it Backerin, in Samseong-dong in Seoul in July 2020.

From her small perch, she sold her German bread – several varieties of pretzels and brotchen – and sweets like her fluffy lemon mini gugelhupfs.

Even before Lee opened Backerin, she loved bread.

“While living in Korea, I already loved bread so much that I used to bake bread at home on occasion,” Lee, 30, revealed in an email interview.

Then, at university, Lee went to study abroad in Germany.

“In Germany, I ate bread for meals and as snacks,” Lee recalls.

Her stay in Germany stayed with her and after returning to South Korea and graduating, Lee decided to enroll in a national vocational school in Germany to study baking.

While studying there, Lee also worked in a bakery.

When Lee returned to Korea, she had a clear idea of ​​where she wanted to open, “a bakery that made delicious sweet and savory breads with honest ingredients like the bread I made for my family and friends. friends”.

Lee says she uses organic flour, German rye, Korean whole wheat, organic German whole wheat, natural sourdough, commercial fresh yeast and cultured butter to make her baked goods at Backerin.

“I use a German natural butter made using lactic acid to ferment it,” Lee explained.

There is a very warm, down-to-earth vibe at Lee Bakery, which offers no seating, only a long counter with treats for the carb lovers to take out.

If we visit Backerin’s Instagram account, we can find out which breads will be sold on the day and when those breads will be ready to go.

For example, one morning in particular, Backerin’s salted butter stangen came out of the oven a little after 11:30 a.m. out of the kitchen – a tray filled with warm, chewy, chewy buns with chunks of melted butter tucked into it. each center.

When crafting her non-traditional salted butter stangen, Lee revealed that she was inspired by salzstange, a German bread sprinkled with salt that can be enjoyed with butter.

“Although butter goes into this, it’s got a lot less butter than a croissant and is light and soft on the inside with a particularly chewy texture,” Lee said of his salted butter stangen.

In addition to his salted butter stangen, Lee also makes a diverse selection of pretzels, including his Backerin pretzel, which Lee says is a German pepper pretzel.

“When I lived in Germany I liked eating them the most and when I came back I couldn’t find a place that sold them,” Lee explained.

Lee says his pepper pretzels are topped with ground black pepper, which gives the pretzels a slight fire.

Indeed, there is a lovely warmth in her shiny and browned Backerin pretzels, which are soft and chewy in the center.

Lee also makes deliciously sweet cinnamon pretzels, which are shiny from a layer of butter before being generously topped with a second layer of cinnamon and sugar.

Then there is his brotchen, German buns, with a nice thin, cracked crust and a soft, airy center and his miniature lemon gugelhupf.

Lee revealed that she infused the dough of these citrus mini cakes with lemon zest and added lemon juice to the frosting to give her cupcakes their zest.

For the winter, Lee also revealed his intention to do stollen.

Backerin

1F, 33-14 Samseong-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul

(0507) 1309-7960; @backerin_seoul

Open Wednesday to Saturday from 11:30 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Bread and baked goods cost between 2,500 and 9,000 won.

By Jean Oh ([email protected])