KBS ‘Problem Children in the Rooftop Room’
At 8:30 p.m. on the 26th, on KBS2 ’Problem Children in the Rooftop Room’, Chefs Jeong Ji-seon and Lee Moon-jung open up about the hardships they faced as female chefs in the Chinese-cuisine field.
KBS2 ‘Problem Children in the Rooftop Room’ features Chef Jeong Ji-seon, the ‘Queen of Chinese cuisine’, and Chef Lee Moon-jung, who left a strong impression as the ‘Chinese-cuisine witch’ on ‘Culinary Class Wars 2’.
On the broadcast, Chef Jeong Ji-seon draws attention as she confesses the discrimination she faced as a woman after entering the conservative Chinese-cuisine world. She revealed, “Even after winning a gold medal at an international culinary competition, I was treated like an invisible person in the kitchen,” recalling a past when even getting into the kitchen was difficult.
“They would not let me enter the kitchen at all, and they would not even let me get on the grill.” She disclosed the bitter past of being unable to go to the grill even when cleaning. The life story of Chef Jeong Ji-seon, who quietly walked the path of a Chinese-cuisine chef without yielding to discrimination, can be confirmed on the main broadcast.
Chef Lee Moon-jung, who worked for 25 years in five-star hotel restaurants in Korea, also said, “There are virtually no women chefs in hotel Chinese restaurants; at most there might be one,” and surprised the Rooftop Room MCs by revealing that it took a full 10 years to be allowed to handle the core of Chinese cooking, the ‘wok’.
The two chefs then shared stories of being unable to leave the kitchen even in late pregnancy, eliciting sympathy. Chef Jeong Ji-seon said, “I hid my pregnancy and competed in a cooking competition until the sixth month,” and added, “I worked in the kitchen until the day before giving birth.”
Chef Lee Moon-jung likewise revealed that she hid her pregnancy at first and worked in the kitchen until a month before giving birth”. Why the two chefs had to guard the kitchen so fiercely while hiding their pregnancies can be found on KBS2 ’Problem Children in the Rooftop Room’ at 8:30 p.m. on the 26th.
