J Chong

The views and opinions expressed by speakers and presenters in connection with Art Restart are their own, and not an endorsement by the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts and the UNC School of the Arts. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

J Chong was a well-respected chef in her community of Asheville, NC for years before she suddenly acquired a national profile thanks to her participation in HBO Max’s cooking-competition show, “The Big Brunch.” Suddenly J, who only recently had decided to strike out on her own by creating J Chong Eats, had a new platform on which to extol the flavors of her bedrock cuisine, traditional Cantonese.

She also had a platform on which to express her unique perspective as a Canadian Asian queer woman making food and creating a business in the American South. In “The Big Brunch,” her talent, honed from years of working in some of the finest kitchens in foodie-destination Asheville, is on full display, as are her resourcefulness and kindness. Watching her at work, it is easy to understand why her craft is known as a culinary art. Furthermore, her vision for J Chong Eats, which relies on pop-ups rather than a bricks-and-mortar restaurant to sell its creations, bespeaks a nimbleness and commitment to community outreach that are hallmarks of so many of the artists we feature on “Art Restart.”

Which is why it was surprising to discover that J, upon receiving an invitation to appear on “Art Restart,” did not initially consider herself an artist. 

In this interview, J takes a deep dive into her artistry and explains her unique take on how she intends to share her talent with her community.

Choose a question below to begin exploring the interview:

• You didn’t immediately think of yourself as an artist. Do you now? How useful is it for you to think of yourself as an artist?
• How much rehearsal do you put into a dish before you let a tongue taste it? And where is your rehearsal or studio space?
• Where do you get your flashes of inspiration? If you suddenly have an idea for a totally new focal point or a new dish, where does that come from?
• We’ve talked about your history and how what makes you you enters the flavors you make. How does queerness enter those flavors?
• What are the advantages and disadvantages of doing your work in Asheville?
• What did the break of the pandemic, teach you about yourself and your career dreams that you might not have known beforehand?
• J Chong Eats has not been in a brick and mortar and is doing pop-ups as a different model right now. What are the advantages and disadvantages of that system?
• Thinking systemically, what would make it easier for you or another chef who wants to do her cooking through a pop-up or as nimbly as you?
• What impact do you want to have on the world of the culinary arts in general?
• What does that look like for a chef to be mindful about cooking outside of her culture?
• How do you like to get critiques?
• You speak about writing a combination cookbook/memoir. How’s that project coming along, and how are you prepping for it? Where are you finding inspiration for it?

Pier Carlo Talenti: When I invited you, you took a few days to think before responding, and your response was, “After some thought, cooking is a form of art.” Which surprised me because it meant to me that you didn’t immediately think of yourself as an artist. Do you now? How useful is it for you to think of yourself as an artist?

J Chong: It’s such an interesting question. After thinking about it when you posed the question, I was like, “Yeah, actually, we do create beautiful items. We situate items on a plate for the guests to receive.” The saying always goes, “We eat with the eyes first.” I guess we are trying to present something that looks satiating to the guests or yourself. 

Prior to that question, I never really considered myself an artist. I still am teetering to accept that title. I guess, for me, artists are painters, drawers, dancers or musicians. I never really thought of anyone in the culinary world as an artist, I guess.

Pier Carlo: You’re the art that deals with our most crucial senses, which is smell and taste.

J: That’s accurate. [She laughs.]

Pier Carlo: [Laughing] And also, unlike the other arts, we need your productions to survive.

J: Right. I mean, essentially, then in that case, I guess we’re all artists in our own right because we all have to at least cook, hopefully, at least once in our lifetime, so we have to create something. Sustenance is food. Food keeps us alive.

Pier Carlo: When I’ve seen you at work on television or seen other chefs at work, the way you conceive of how flavors will mix in someone’s mouth seems to me so much like a painter working on her palette.

J: Ah, yeah. You’re convincing me, absolutely. [She laughs.]

Pier Carlo: Oh, good! So looking at your work through an artistic lens, as I would like to do, I’d love to know what your rehearsal or studio time looks like. How much rehearsal do you put into a dish before you let a tongue taste it? And where is your rehearsal or studio space?

J: That’s a good question. I typically test things at least once. and what that looks like is, it could be either at home or it could be in the commissary kitchen that I rent at the moment. You pick flavors. You try to use things that are in season.

How I do it, I try to pick a protein or — the main focus of the dish may not always be a protein — the main focus that I want the dish to be, and then I build on top of that. I start with how I’m even going to cook the focal point. It could be grilled or boiled. Anything. I just basically start from there. 

I typically like to create new dishes at home because it’s so comfortable for me and I’m in my own safe space. I typically test at least once in my own kitchen.

Pier Carlo: And in the process of refining a dish, is there more addition or subtraction involved?

J: It goes either way. If I am happy with the way the dish turned out, the way I envisioned it in my brain and then translated it to the plate, it may need just a slight seasoning tweak, maybe more salt or a little less salt. And then there’s times where I’ve just totally reconstructed the whole dish in its whole, even changing out what I thought the focal point would be.

Pier Carlo: Oh, so changing out the protein altogether, for instance.

J: Correct. Yeah, exactly.

Pier Carlo: Where do you get your flashes of inspiration? If you suddenly have an idea for a totally new focal point or a new dish, where does that come from? In dreams, in the shower, eating other people’s food? 

J: All of the above. [She laughs.] I tend to think about it in the shower when it’s near to final, near to being served to the public. Basically my cuisine is Cantonese, so I always try to stay with my Cantonese cuisine. Then if, let’s just say, radishes are in season, I will go with that and then go off with memories of my childhood dishes that I’ve eaten to try to make the dish more Cantonese than New American.

Pier Carlo: I see. So there’s also a little bit of storytelling in your art.

J: Absolutely. Yeah, a lot of storytelling. I’m the person that always says that food is medicine and it’s also our story on a plate essentially. A lot of mine comes from just basically childhood memories of a lot of my favorite things I liked to eat. I wasn’t allowed to be picky when it came to food, growing up. It wasn’t like the adults had their own meals and the children had our kids’ meal, let’s just say. We all ate everything that was served to everyone, so I think for me, that’s helped me go off of memory with dishes because Cantonese food was the very first taste I’d ever tasted in my life.

Pier Carlo: The typical immigrants-and-children-of-immigrants story is that the children of immigrants go full-on into assimilation and will stop eating, let’s say, the Cantonese food and will go straight for the McDonald’s or the steak and it’s the next generation that then goes back to its roots. So it’s interesting that all along that flavor has remained really crucial, seminal to you.

J: Absolutely. And I honestly think it’s just living in United States specifically … . I grew up in Canada, in Toronto, but when I moved to the United States to attend college when I was about 19, what I saw was being served as “Chinese food” was not what I grew up eating. There were maybe one or two items; I’m like, “Oh, yeah, I saw that on the dinner table.” I think for me as I’ve gotten older it’s so important for me to stick to my roots and grab from my memories because I am at the point in my life where I want to reintroduce what Cantonese food is to the world. That’s really where my passion and drive stems from.

Pier Carlo: You strike me as a very resilient and strong person. You went to a Baptist college in Mississippi, is that correct?

J: That is correct. [She laughs.] I appreciate the amount of digging you did. That’s great. Awesome.

Pier Carlo: Which makes me think, talk about guts! It was a soccer scholarship, right?

J: That’s correct.

Pier Carlo: Were you out at the time?

J: That’s a funny story. I basically came out in college maybe three months into my freshman year. I knew deep down inside that I was queer, and I just had to test the waters a little at a Southern Baptist College. People ask me all the time why I chose Mississippi or that college, and basically two things: soccer and because I wanted to come out. I thought Mississippi would be the best place to come out. [She laughs.]

Pier Carlo: [Laughing] Surely, even in Toronto, they know that — granted there’s a lot of queer people, of course, who live in Mississippi, but still — it’s not the first place you think of to come out.

J: No, absolutely not.

Pier Carlo: Especially not a Baptist college!

J: Right, exactly. I mean, I don’t think I ever have taken the easy way through life, so why not start with coming out at a Southern Baptist College in Mississippi?

Pier Carlo: Wow, good for you. You went full-throttle.

J: Of course.

Pier Carlo: We’ve talked about your history and how what makes you you enters the flavors you make. How does queerness enter those flavors? Does it at all?

J: I don’t think necessarily it translates into the flavors or the dish. I think just my presence alone, being a queer Asian chef specifically, is pretty out there. Anyone that doesn’t agree with my lifestyle and who I am, they’re probably not going to want to try my food. So maybe it does, now that I said it out loud, maybe my queerness does have an indirect part in my cooking.

Pier Carlo: How long have you been in Asheville now?

J: Almost seven years at this point.

Pier Carlo: And how long have you been in the South?

J: Hm, so I’m 45, and I went to college at 19.

Pier Carlo: Wow.

J: And minus three years, I think, in between, because after college, I moved back to Toronto.

Pier Carlo: So you’re a Southerner by now.

J: Oh, yeah. I may not want to say that out loud, but that is accurate.

Pier Carlo: You totally are. So tell me about living and making your work in a small town, granted Asheville is a very cosmopolitan small town.

J: Absolutely.

Pier Carlo: But it’s not Toronto or Seattle or New York. Tell me about the advantages and disadvantages of doing your work there.

J: Oh, yeah, I like that question. I would say the advantage is the teaching part, educating people or taking pride in being one or two of the first people to introduce my cuisine’s flavors to an audience. I like that thrill of it. And I did say pride. I’m very proud of cooking Cantonese cuisine. 

I would say the disadvantage is having to reintroduce it to people or sometimes a lack of specific ingredients. But I think Asheville’s done a really good job with the Asian markets that we have here, that we can source all of our flavors and ingredients.

Pier Carlo: How long did it take you to create those relationships with your suppliers?

J: Being a minority or a person of color, I think it’s immediate, especially in a town like Asheville where you don’t see a lot of ethnicities around, specifically Asian people. I think it was just almost immediate, the welcoming, when you go into an Asian market being Asian. It’s just we embrace each other with our eyes, maybe not with our words or physically. It’s just like, “Oh, hey, I see you. OK, welcome. Let’s do this thing together in Asheville.”

Pier Carlo: Do you ever have to ask a supplier or a farmer in Asheville to grow something that is not currently available, that is not in their rotation?

J: I haven’t had to yet, which is great. There’s one specific farmer in town, they’re named Lee’s One Fortune. They’re out of Marion, NC, and they are Laotian family. Their land is so large, and everything that they grow and produce is pretty much a lot of Asian-inspired vegetables. I’m very fortunate that in Asheville we can get it seasonally and that I can get it so fresh.

Pier Carlo: Wow, that’s amazing. Good to know.

Now, I believe you made your huge life change decision to strike out on your own right when the pandemic hit, is that right?

J: Yeah, yep, that’s correct.

Pier Carlo: What did the break of the pandemic teach you about yourself and your career dreams that you might not have known beforehand?

J: I think it reaffirmed my passion and my drive. I sat on it for probably a good bit before I actually gave my notice. I gave my notice in February of 2020 — I worked for a well-known restaurant group here in town — and I believe all the restaurants closed down in March of 2020. So I was still technically employed, but my goal was to quit my job to start J Chong Eats.

I think the pandemic just taught me, one, life is short. Because at that time we didn’t know what was happening with the pandemic and we were all very fearful because there was a lack of information and we were hearing the numbers of deaths rise. So for me directly, I was like, “Ooh, well, if I’m going to do it, I might as well do it now because we don’t know what the future holds.”

I was in my early 40s when that happened, so I was very comfortable with who I was at the time. I was confident that whatever I chose to do, I was betting on myself. And I’m very comfortable in that kind of situation. If anything, it reaffirmed that whatever I put my mind to, I can probably most likely accomplish it.

Pier Carlo: I like to talk about reinventing outdated systems. Certainly for artists, the pandemic showed them what really needed to be rethought. In your case, the first thing that comes to mind is that J Chong Eats has not been in a brick and mortar and is doing pop-ups as a different model right now. What are the advantages and disadvantages of that system? 

J: I’ve been very, very fortunate and extremely grateful that my model has brought me this far almost three years in. I’m so grateful that not having a brick and mortar has been successful for me, and I think that’s just because I have no desire — and I’m not wishy-washy on this — to ever own a brick and mortar. Staying true on that path has helped fizzle that out. 

Pier Carlo: Can you talk more about that, why you’re so certain that is not your path?

J: I think it also goes back to my age, because I am getting older and I really don’t want to have the stress or be tied down to something such as a brick and mortar. And with my personality, too, I like to be flexible. I think that’s why I wear so many different hats with J Chong Eats. I’m a vendor at local farmers’ markets; I provide private dinners in people’s homes; I also provide private cooking classes in people’s homes; and I do pop-ups around town. 

I love the mix-up and the freedom that I have with all of that, as opposed to waking up every day and going to a brick and mortar and doing my job for, let’s say, five to six days a week. It works very well for other people, but for my personality, it just seems too ... I don’t like to be that constrained. I don’t want to be tied down. I think that’s why, specifically, I’m so adamant that a brick and mortar is not my path.

Pier Carlo: Thinking systemically, what would make it easier for you or another chef who wants to do her cooking through a pop-up or as nimbly as you?

J: I like collaboration, so maybe having a little bit more collaboration with people who are interested in having not just myself but other talented people that cook for a living come into their space for an evening and just provide a meal or dishes to their guests. I look at it more as community and collaborating with another establishment, let’s just say a wine bar in town, and bringing their community and my community and meshing them together. 

It’s always intentional who I do pop-ups with, and I always think about our community because we help each other out. I think that’s how businesses should look at things, especially when it comes to food and beverage, because Asheville’s so well known for food and beverage. And I also think it’s getting harder for a lot of people to own brick and mortars at this point because real estate has gotten so expensive. I think the model of a pop-up definitely has grown, and I love it. I love the concept.

I’m one that likes to stay true to the O.G. aspect of a pop-up. I’m not sure where it started, but pop-ups basically are, a chef will go into a space and use the kitchen or whatever that kitchen “looks like,” because some wine bars, all they have is a toaster oven and maybe a hot plate. So you have to get creative with your pop-ups and your menu. 

Typically I do this: I don’t release the menu of what I’m serving until the day of, because I like the thrill of what a pop-up brings. It brings people together; it creates an atmosphere of excitement and the unknown. For those that are adventurous when it comes to eating, I think it’s an exciting time. So personally, for me, I truly like to keep to the original style of what pop-ups are. 

Just to give people an understanding of what pop-ups really are, I don’t have a brick and mortar, so the food I don’t sell that night at the pop-up, I can’t turn around and sell it tomorrow because I don’t have a restaurant. So the concept for people doing pop-ups is essentially to sell out. That is our goal. Sometimes we sell a little earlier, which is great, and sometimes it takes a little longer to sell out, but my goal always is to sell out at a pop-up.

It’s thrilling. I mean, imagine next time you come into Asheville and you now have a pop-up, it’s just exciting to know that you’re going to go to a wine bar and have maybe a glass of wine and you won’t know what the menu is or what you’re going to feast on until you get there. I mean, it’s exciting to me. Maybe it’s not exciting to you, but it’s definitely exciting to me.

Pier Carlo: Yeah, it’s thrilling to me. I love letting the chef decide what am I going to eat. I’m putting my faith in her talent.

J: Right.

Pier Carlo: And it makes me happy that you found a lot of people who have that sense of adventurousness up there. I worked in the theater for so many years, and so many of our audiences did not want to see something completely fresh. They were afraid of world premieres; they wanted to see the tried and true. So I love knowing that you have a community that wants to be surprised.

J: I give a lot of props to Asheville because I think Asheville is such a town where we embrace authenticity and individuality. Asheville truly embraces it. Going back to us being a food-and-beverage town and an arts town, we’re always willing to pivot or to follow the next up-and-coming thing. Asheville’s always been super-supportive of me. It’s pretty amazing sometimes to witness it and be sometimes standing there and just watching it happen with fellow chefs and fellow friends in the industry and just seeing their successes. It’s just really beautiful to see how Asheville embraces us.

Pier Carlo: We’ve touched a bit about the impact you’re having, just being a queer Asian woman in the world of fine-food-making in the American South. What impact do you want to have on the world of the culinary arts in general?

J: I think staying true to what our passionate cuisines are. I have conversations with friends all the time, specifically chefs of color, about food appropriation. I find myself speaking on it a lot because it’s important to me. I think that’s why I choose to cook Cantonese food because it is something that I am, one, passionate about and two, like I said before, that’s my first flavor. It’s my ethnicity. It’s an extension of who I am, so I cook from there.

I find that a lot of times some of my favorite meals or favorite chefs are those that cook their people’s food, essentially. I think that’s beautiful. I would like to see people just staying true to them. Or at the same time, if you’re going to cook someone else’s cuisine, to be mindful about it and be mindful of how you’re creating another culture’s or ethnicity’s food that might not be your own.

Pier Carlo: What does that look like, do you think, for a chef to be mindful about cooking outside of her culture?

J: I guess it’s the appreciation part of it. Do the research, figure out the history of where things come from or how the flavors came about. Or I guess just educating. I would personally educate myself on where it came from, stems from, and then dive deeper in on what it means to that culture or that region, let’s just say. 

I even do it with Cantonese cuisine sometimes because I don’t know my direct history, so sometimes I even have to do the research for my own cuisine. I think just being mindful and understanding that it’s an appreciation. And if I were to cook someone else’s cuisine, I would do it with the utmost respect.

Pier Carlo: When you want to take a break in the kitchen and do something else, what’s the other food you like to cook? Italian, French, Japanese? Is there another back-pocket fun cuisine you like to do?

J: I would have to say Southern food because my wife is from the South. She’s actually from Mississippi. 

Pier Carlo: Oh my God, you really are fully Southern. Wow.

J: [She laughs.] Thanks for calling me out. My wife is from Mississippi, she is Southern, and learning her grandma’s recipes or her family’s recipes, I always try to cook them at home for her because it’s also her comfort food. Now I’ve adapted it as my comfort food since I’ve been in the South for so long. I do cook a lot of Asian cuisine at home, but I would say Southern next. Yeah, that’s it.

Pier Carlo: How do you like to get critiques?

J: It’s all about how we say things, right? I mean, we’re always going to be critiqued. We’re critiqued the minute it hits the table. It is hard to see someone’s reaction when they do not like your food. It is very, very difficult. But at the same time, I mean, we’ve got to learn from it and try to understand what they didn’t like. 

Sometimes it’s just at the end of the day, people just don’t like a specific item that was in the dish, let’s just say. It didn’t taste well on their palate. I embrace criticism, and I stuttered because it’s difficult, but I embrace it. I just like to be told head-on, and I think that’s why when I test things, my wife is the first tester. She’s a great tester, but she is the one that I always go to, I think, one, because I trust her, I know how to handle her critique. She knows how to say it to me for me to understand and be able to receive it. But also, we’ve been together for almost 17 years now, so she’s been eating my cuisine for that many years.

Pier Carlo: Did she like it from the start, or did she have to develop a new palate, you know what I’m saying?

J: [Laughing] Yeah, I do. I think it took maybe year two, year three maybe, where she was fully into it. I mean, I did go too exotic at first, but I’ve learned so much with just hearing her, because when we go out, we’re guests too. Essentially, she tries flavors for the first time always. So, yeah, I enjoy her critique, and I think it helps me grow as an individual to be able to make my dishes better.

Pier Carlo: In “The Big Brunch,” you speak about writing what sounded to me like a combination cookbook/memoir, which involves a whole bunch of artistic skills, including writing and, further down the line, graphic-design ideas. How’s that project coming along, and how are you prepping for it? Where are you finding inspiration for it?

J: Yeah, it’s slowly coming along. I think that’s one area where I am intentionally taking it slow. I think because there’s so much emphasis on this ... thank you for also saying “slash memoir” because that is truly how I want to write it. I think I’m taking a very slow approach to it because it is so new and it is out of my comfort zone. 

Pier Carlo: Are you doing any writing?

J: I’ve done a little bit of writing and more speaking, though, so I may make voice memos and speak it rather than write it. That’s been helpful with the process. I guess preparation is just trying to think of what recipes I want to put out there in the world and just digging deep to try to remember the story or the memory that is attached to each recipe.

Pier Carlo: Hm, it’s so interesting because, of course, food and smell are so integrally connected to memory.

J: Right, right. So think about when you would come home, let’s say, in the middle of the day when you were nine years old and you would run into the home and it was about to be dinnertime. My favorite smell and fondest memory is literally the smell of jasmine rice in the rice cooker, not even on a pot in the stove. There’s just a different sweet, fresh scent that comes from jasmine rice when it’s freshly cooked in a rice cooker. Yeah, and it’s memories, it’s childhood. I’m cheesing right now as I’m explaining it to you. It’s our childhood.