Baek Jong-won has a number of jobs and titles, such as chef, food researcher, entertainer, writer, essayist and businessman. He is busy running big franchise restaurants and coffee shop chains, while appearing on various TV shows, including "Baek Jong-won's Alley Restaurant" of SBS and "High School Lunch Cook-off" of tvN.
This winter, the prolific and active Jack of all trades launched a new reality show, "Delicious Rendezvous," to be first aired Thursday night on SBS.
In the program, Baek, who is famous for spreading astonishingly simple yet tasty recipes for Korean home staples, displays his ability again.
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"Delicious Rendezvous" (SBS) |
He creates new recipes for a selected ingredient from a small farm or fishing village and sells the food in busy public areas like bus terminals and service stations.
He and his teammates -- Kim Hee-chul of boy band Super Junior, Kim Dong-jun of boy group ZE:A and comedian Yang Se-hyung -- travel to remote farming villages of the country and discover ingredients that are not selling well.
"I'm concerned about an oversupply of farm products, such as potatoes and garlic, this year," Baek said in a press conference Thursday. "This show is designed to seek ways to promote consumption of these excessive ingredients through discovering simple and delicious recipes."
Moreover, he also focuses on some farm products and seafood that aren't popular because there are no proper and easy ways to cook them. His team discovers these less-used items across the nation and invents delicious dishes out of them.
He said this show will help restaurant owners and cooks get information on unknown foodstuff and recipes, while audiences also can get a glimpse of new dishes to cook at home.
"This program is difficult for me too, as I have to come up with new fresh inventive recipes with strange foodstuff that are rarely used in cooking," said Baek, who hosted hit cooking variety shows like tvN's "House Cook Master Baek" and SBS's "Baek Jong-won's Three Great Emperors." "I think this is a compilation of my past shows on cooking and selling food." (Yonhap)
