I am a chef specializing in French cuisine. But being a Korean and having grown up with an appetite for the Korean traditional bean paste known as doenjang, Korean food has always been a part of me.

In fact, this is the part that I take full advantage of when making my own French dishes. I believe it is my solemn duty to develop dishes that appeal to foreigners by making full use of sauce that encompasses the flavor of traditional Korean soy sauce and other various pastes and therefore, bring people together.

One day I was on a business trip abroad, sitting on a plane waiting for the meal service. What surprised me was the presence of kimchi, Korea's favorite side dish on the menu. ¡°Kimchi to be served on foreign airliners!¡± For a moment it reminded me of how far Korea had come in establishing its presence overseas.

The truth be told, Korea may have established its name in the economic scene but this had nothing to do with promoting food culture. Not because Korean dishes are anything less in quality than that of foreign dishes but because we have become so comfortable with our own food that we forgot how to appreciate it properly. The problem lay in our attitude of taking things for granted.

Food is a barometer that measures quality of life. In advanced nations food is treated in accordance with living standards. People put great effort into making and enjoying it properly, adding much significance to it.

The same can be applied to Korean food. We have lots to talk about in how Korean food is made, the deep taste coming from the fingertips of our mothers for generations and generations. Korean food is also being welcomed as the healthy, slow food of the century, in line with the eco-trend.

Adding a bit of finesse to traditional cooking skills

The function for Korean Night held during the Davos Forum that took place in Switzerland this year was an excellent example of demonstrating the beauty, taste and soul beneath Korean dishes. There was no way I'd miss the chance to oversee the food arrangement together with the First Lady, Kim Yoon-ok.

The table concept of that day was ¡°jeong,¡± referring to the Korean style of love and affinity between family and neighbors. First Lady Kim, who is also the honorary chairwoman of the committee to globalize Hansik (Korean traditional food) made a careful review of every one of the 22 dishes -- 12 kinds of hors d¢¥oeuvre, six main dishes and four kinds of desserts -- all with a mother's love and care.

One of her ideas was ¡°dakgangjeong¡± (fried chicken covered in barbecue sauce and other Korean typical seasonings) which was served as one of the main dishes.

By now, you may wonder what am I -- a French cuisine chef -- doing at a Hansik presentation event, how was I even put in charge of the whole arrangement. Perhaps that is because I, who have been serving and working with French food for the past few decades, am quite well-versed in Western food culture.

There were enough Hansik chefs in other events as well, but my job was to take care of the presentation. While it is important to come up with a good Hansik menu, we still need a strategy to tug people's hearts, making sure it looks very, very pretty and appetizing.

As I've said before, food equals national competitiveness. I believe it was the lack of that certain appeal that led the world to underestimate Korean food all along. That was the reason I volunteered to take part in presenting Hansik in the first place.

Appreciating spicy dishes

Our efforts paid off that night at the Davos Forum. We succeeded in bringing out oohs and aahs from foreign dignitaries with our jeonbok-bossam-kimchi¡± (stir-fried abalone wrapped up in white kimchi), ¡°o-saek-milssam¡± beef and vegetables wrapped up in pancakes made of cactus and black sesame and spinach, as well as other dishes.

I was, again, pleasantly surprised to know that there were quite a few guests who were pretty aware of how to eat Korean food. When we prepared ¡°bibimbap,¡± the vegetable assorted rice dish, I prepared two sauces, one spicy and one non-spicy. I was not too sure of how the guests would handle Korean style spice.

That day I saw eight out of 10 guests choosing the spicy sauce – which was gochujang, the hot pepper paste – to mix into their bibimbap. I was mistaken in thinking that such sauces wouldn't stand much chance. It reminded me of a time I was in the Singapore International Cooking Contest. I won top prize with a sauce that incorporated Korean soy sauce. At that point I can safely say that prejudice against Hansik and Korean flavors is slowly being lifted.

For me, another dish of the day was ¡°kimchi cheese croquette¡± which is a complete re-framing of a Korean side dish to familiarize it to overseas audiences. This, too, received favorable comments.

I may have lived all my working life as a French chef but I sure have confidence in Korean ingredients and dishes. The Davos feast did a wonderful job of confirming my belief as well as the improved status of Korea.

Last year I was selected as the Star chef of Lufthansa, the global German airline, attesting to the competitiveness of Korean food culture. Now that we can find Korean food in the air, it's only a matter of time it spreads throughout the world.

*Park Hyo-nam, 49, is the nation's top French food chef and head chef at the Seoul Hilton Hotel. He studied cooking at 18 and became the first Korean to become a head chef at a hotel run by an overseas chain in 2001. He is also the first in the country to receive the Medaille du Merite Agricole (Order of Agricultural Merit) from France.