Abby Lee

The Path

Classical training gives a cook habits that remain visible even when the food is not classical. Abby Lee trained at Bristol and Le Cordon Bleu, taking on structure, repetition, and control before working in Michelin-star restaurants in Italy, where timing, texture, and restraint sit close to flavour. Restaurant identity often changes through service, address, and pressure. Lee became chef and restaurateur at Mambow in Spitalfields, London (from 2020), then chef and restaurateur of Mambow (since 2022). Across those moves, the work tightened around Malaysian cuisine made with confidence, fluency, and a clear appetite for interpretation.

The Work Today

Modern Malaysian cooking at Mambow in Clapton, London is built around heat, brightness, fragrance, and balance. Today, Lee is chef-owner of Mambow in Clapton, London. The plates keep comfort in play without letting weight take over, and treat tradition as usable knowledge rather than museum material. Reimagined classics require enough respect to stay legible and enough movement to earn their place on the menu. Achar Awak carries preservation, sharpness, and generosity through brightness and bite. Otak-Otak Prawn Toast keeps a recognisable form while giving it new texture and lift. Umai Sarawak sits in the same register: close enough to its source to read clearly, loose enough to feel cooked in the present. Peranakan Chinese braising gives Babi Chin its force: pork belly, bold flavors, and a structure that depends on patience and seasoning rather than ornament. In Lee’s East London work, the dish shows lineage-aware cooking without display nostalgia. Memory is treated as an ingredient only when it can be cooked, tasted, and served.

Signature

The signature set at Mambow includes Babi Chin, Achar Awak, Otak-Otak Prawn Toast, Umai Sarawak, and tau yew bak.

In Their Words “I wasn’t familiar with Malaysian cooking at all; I’d only watched my family make it. To cook in that way for the first time was definitely really inspiring.”

Acclaim

Guide recognition matters most when it names work already being tested in service. In 2025, Mambow in London received a Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand. For Lee, the recognition sits alongside the restaurant’s movement through Spitalfields, Peckham and Clapton, with Malaysian cuisine as the through-line.