1 Hat Chef: Mika Chae, Doju

Mika Chae is the chef and owner of Doju in Melbourne, awarded 1 hat in the Good Food Guide in 2026.

Mika Chae has built a restaurant with a clear point of view. At Doju, Korean flavour and technique sit inside a modern Melbourne restaurant without losing their identity. The result earned one hat and a Critics’ Pick in the Good Food Guide in 2026.

This is not a story built around a legacy venue or a chef stepping into an established room. Doju is Mika’s first restaurant. That gives the hat more weight.

An unconventional start

Mika did not come into the trade through a formal culinary path. Before moving to Australia in 2013, he studied journalism and broadcasting in Korea. He started as a kitchen hand in Melbourne, then moved into cooking from there.

Doju’s own story follows the same line. It describes a start in dishwashing before a chef brought him into the kitchen. That kind of path usually builds resilience and a sharper relationship with the work.

The restaurant also ties its identity directly to Mika’s background. Doju combines Jeollanam-do, his hometown, with meju, the fermented soybean block behind staples such as doenjang, ganjang and gochujang.

What Doju says about his cooking

Doju works as a hatted-chef subject because the restaurant says something specific about the chef. The venue describes the food as modern Korean, built around seasonal ingredients, technique and shared dining. Wider coverage around the restaurant places it clearly in a Korean-Australian context.

That gives the food shape. Korean foundations are central, but the restaurant is not positioned as a traditional room trying to preserve the past unchanged. It is a contemporary kitchen using those foundations in a modern setting.

What chefs will recognise

Public material around Mika returns to produce, fermentation and ingredient handling. A feature with Natoora focuses on cucumber varieties and kimchi. Doju’s own language also keeps coming back to seasonal ingredients and the work involved in translating Korean flavours into a restaurant format.

That gives chefs something solid to look at. The food is not just Korean-inspired in a broad sense. It appears to be built from decisions that run from sourcing through to the finished dish. For a one-hat restaurant, that gives the work real weight.

A first restaurant under pressure

Doju has been described as Mika’s first restaurant. That changes how the hat reads. It is one thing to step into an established system. It is another to build your own place and have it recognised this early.

A first restaurant has to find its shape while still holding a standard. The menu, the identity and the daily rhythm of the kitchen are still being worked out in real time. If that process leads to a hat, it usually means the chef has been clear enough about what the restaurant is trying to be.

What one hat means here

Doju’s one hat in the Good Food Guide 2026 confirms Mika’s work is being recognised beyond the attention that often comes with a strong opening. The Critics’ Pick result adds to that.

It shows what can happen when a first restaurant is built on identity, clarity and a style of cooking that already knows what it wants to be.