Ex-Singer Wins Over U.S. Critics with Culinary Skills

After having successfully reinvented herself as a restaurateur in the U.S., where she runs the Heirloom Market BBQ in Atlanta, Georgia, former singer Lee Ji-yeon is now being noted for her culinary prowess by local media.

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Lee, who was a popular singer in Korea in the late 1980s, recently took sixth place on a list of "The top 10 dishes of 2011" by a food blogger writing for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She was credited for her Korean BBQ pork sandwich offered at her restaurant in affluent Sandy Springs.

The sandwich is served on toasted potato buns and has a filling of smoked pork marinated in gochujang (red pepper paste) with chopped kimchi on top. The blogger commented that it appeals not only to the growing Korean population in the southern part of the U.S., but also to barbecue-loving southerners.

Lee made her debut as a singer in 1987 when she was a high school student and released several hit songs. She moved to the U.S. in 1990 and became a chef as she entered Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta, a spin-off of the famous French cooking school.

She received the grand prize in a southeast regional cook-off in 2009 and ranked second in the American Culinary Federation's national competition in Las Vegas that same year. She also worked as a chef at the St. Regis hotel chain.