Abby Lee, AYALA Squaremeal Female Chef Series 2025

Abby Lee

Few chefs have left as strong a mark on London’s culinary scene in recent years as Abby Lee. With Mambow—her now-iconic restaurant—she has brought the city a bold, authentic, and deeply personal vision of Malaysian cuisine, a culinary tradition still underrepresented in the West. But behind this success lies a journey as moving as it is inspiring.

Born in Singapore and raised in Malaysia, Abby began her culinary journey in childhood, helping out in her family’s bakery. Even then, she knew cooking was more than just a job—it was a calling. At 15, she left Asia to study in London, driven by dreams of punk rock and freedom. Yet the cultural and emotional distance soon shook her. In an effort to fit in, she temporarily turned her back on her roots, trading the flavours of her childhood for the food of her new English life.

Her initial dream of studying art and fashion was quickly dismissed by her parents, and she reluctantly enrolled in an economics degree. A sense of unease settled in—until baking brought her a renewed sense of purpose. She eventually joined Le Cordon Bleu, where she discovered a kind of discipline that finally made sense: the structured intensity of professional kitchens.

After gaining experience in Italy and launching her first pop-up in Spitalfields, the pandemic abruptly halted her momentum. In search of clarity and connection, she returned to Malaysia. That homecoming proved transformative. She rediscovered her family’s recipes, followed her aunt through markets, documented techniques, tasted everything. For the first time, she realised this forgotten cuisine could become her true voice.

Mambow was born from that revelation—first in Peckham, then in Clapton. Initially, Abby remained faithful to her family’s recipes, reproducing each dish with respect and precision. But little by little, she began to blend her two worlds. Mambow evolved into a reflection of her hybrid identity: rooted in Malaysian tradition, but free-spirited, contemporary, and distinctly London.

In 2022, just as the restaurant was thriving, Abby faced a new challenge: a breast cancer diagnosis. What followed was a long and grueling fight—treatments, surgeries, physical exhaustion. Throughout it all, she stayed connected to her restaurant, managing menus and leading her team from afar. But illness forced her to rethink her relationship with her body and her work: “As chefs, we’re taught to push through everything. But now I have to listen to myself—that’s the complete opposite of what I was trained to do.”

Today, Abby is slowly emerging from that difficult chapter. She doesn’t yet know when she’ll return to the kitchen full-time, but that hasn’t stopped her story from being told. Mambow continues to speak for her—a place where two cultures meet, where exile, doubt, and illness have been transformed into generosity and meaning. It’s the story of a woman who found her voice in food, and who still nourishes others with honesty and heart.