Jin Caldwell and Kyurim Lee were looking for a fresh start when they moved to Portland. The pair had built their careers working in hotels in Las Vegas, Caldwell as a chocolatier and Lee as a pastry chef, but were craving a change of pace.

“We had enough of Vegas,” Caldwell said. “I’d been searching for a town that we felt was more community driven, and maybe a little bit more of a relaxed atmosphere compared to Vegas.”

After visiting a handful of times during the summer, Caldwell proposed opening a small neighborhood bakery to Lee, and in 2019, JinJu Patisserie was born.

This week, the pair were honored with one of the highest accolades in the food world – a James Beard award for most Outstanding Bakery in the U.S. They spoke with OPB’s “All Things Considered” host Crystal Ligori about finding their path in the culinary world and melding Asian flavors with French patisserie.

Ligori: Traditional French patisserie is a pretty male-dominated scene. As two female chefs, can you talk about finding your own path in the culinary industry and what your time in Las Vegas was like?

Kyurim Lee: I worked in several hotels while in Vegas. Mainly, it’s all male chefs [and] some of the chefs have a really strong opinion towards women–that women are a little bit weaker than men. So, I’ve been trying to show them, we women can do the same as men can do. I worked really, really hard and so did Jin to show how strong women chefs are. Winning the James Beard [award], I’m sure they’re pretty shocked in Vegas. A lot of chefs that we know, I’m sure they’re really, really shocked.

Jin Caldwell: If you look back 20 years ago, all the famous pastry chefs working in New York, Las Vegas, it’s mainly French dominant. It was more like ‘Put your head down and work hard,’ and our opinions really didn’t matter. But over 10 to 15 years, it’s really changed, which is really great to see. There are a lot of female chefs shining through our industry. At the awards, seeing the female chefs and especially connecting with a lot of Korean women, it makes us so proud.

Ligori: You both are from Seoul originally — how have your Korean roots shaped what you offer at Jinju?

Caldwell: At Jinju, we try to incorporate a lot of Korean flavors and Asian flavors in general. We are hands-on owners and we wanna really show our passion through being a role model and example of small business. I think when the owner is not there very much, there’s a disconnect between customers and the owners. As Koreans, we’re trying to incorporate kimchi, bulgogi and we incorporate other Asian flavors like matcha and red bean paste. A few weeks ago, it was kimchi and barbecue fried rice filled in our croissant dough. I think a lot of people want to try something new that they haven’t tried. And it’s been really working out well for us because we see people get so excited to try something new and experience it, so for us, that’s really easy.

Lee: I think they trust our opinion more than before. Before we were very skeptical about introducing new flavors to the customers, but now I think our customers really are grateful that we are bringing new flavors to our store.

Caldwell: I think at the same time because we were trained by French chefs, we have a lot of flavors that are more European, and then we just add a touch of our background flavor.

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Ligori: I know that you were nominated in this category last year too, and you said it was a surprise to be nominated again. What does this win feel like?

Lee: This year, we really didn’t really expect that we’re gonna be in the final, and definitely didn’t think we were gonna win.

Caldwell: Last year, when we were nominated as a semifinalist, if I can be frank, that’s when Kyu got diagnosed with breast cancer. She went through surgery and it was a really challenging time for us personally. After her surgery, we had to close the shop for several weeks, like six weeks actually, so we knew last year we didn’t really have a chance to advance to be a finalist, cause the store wasn’t really open during the time when they decide the finalist. So this year, when we got nominated as a semifinalist, we’re happy, but we didn’t ever expect that we would win. We had a mindset of just really engaging with the whole experience, meeting some good chefs and connecting. And we were really shocked when they called our name.

Ligori: What’s next for JinJu?

Lee: Next chapter, I think we’re gonna keep pushing what we are doing. Probably try to make a different plan about bringing new concept as well. We are trying to brainstorm about bringing a new thing – what can JinJu do differently? So Jin and I, we are brainstorming what could be the next one.

Caldwell: We need to decide if we are going to expand from our small shop right now, because we have only like 1000 square feet… It’s a very small shop. So what will be the next chapter? I personally would consider writing a cookbook of our journey together. That’s something I always wanted to do in my career. So that’s one thing that I would love to explore in the future.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2025/06/18/all-things-considered-jinju-patisserie-outstanding-bakery-james-beard-awards/