On September 24th, Korea CQ held the ‘Jungyookpo Forum’ at SMT HOUSE, located in Cheongdam-dong.
 
Andrey Kulik Russian Ambassador, Marina Suanova Spouse of Russian Ambassador, Eric Teo Singaporean Ambassador, Minjae Kim Spouse of Singaporean Ambassador, Jungja Kim co-CEO of Jungyookpo, Jiyoon Kim co-CEO of Jungyookpo, Erwan Vilfeu President of Zuellig Pharma Korea, Mark Chung President of KCMI, James Park Director of BIO Plastic Surgery, Youngha Go President of AMC Asia, Haewon Park President of CHA Bio F&C, So Yoon Park Representing Researcher of Lemonade&Co., Ian Jeong Director of Jeong-Ian Oriental Medicine Clinic, Yun Jung Park CEO of Mint Tour, Il Kwon Shim Executive Director of Cosmos Corporation, Kwon-ha Ryu CEO of Korea Joongang Daily, Hoo-ran Kim General News Editor of The Korea Herald, Young-jin Oh Digital Managing Editor of the Korea Times, Sun-hwa Dong reporter at The Korea Times, Didier Beltoise President of Cs, and Choi Jungwha President of CICI attended this event. 

Members gathered in the 1st floor lobby-lounge of SMT HOUSE and greeted each other, enjoying the welcome drinks prepared by SMT HOUSE, and the Jungyookpo tapas-bar, which had walnut and dried persimmon wrap, cheese, Jungyookpo tartin etc., specially prepared by the co-CEOs of Jungyookpo - Jungja Kim and Jiyoon Kim. 

The forum officially took off with the welcoming remarks by Choi Jungwha, president of CICI. We then saw a video on the activities of CICI in 2019 and upcoming event up until 2020 summer, and shared good news of our Korea CQ members. 

Jiyoon Kim, CEO of Jungyookpo, then gave a brief introduction of Jungyookpo. Jiyoon Kim is a global-brand marketer with 22 years of experience, having lived in Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong, LA and Seoul and worked on brand advertisements and marketing for many global brands such as Apple, McDonalds, and AMMEX. 

Jungyookpo was launched by Jiyoon Kim and her mother, the traditional Korean food expert with 30-years of experience Jungja Kim. Jungyookpo is a modern interpretation of traditional and artisan Korean beef jerky. While the brand does not have a separate offline store, they have held 18 tasting seminars and events since their opening in January 2018, collaborating with places and organizations such as with 101 Architects, Tchaboon, CICI, and SMT HOUSE. 

After learning about the Jungyookpo brand, Sung-ho Yoo, CEO of SM F&B Development, gave us a tour of the SMT HOUSE, which will be officially opening after its renewal in the beginning of October. 

SMT is a multi-complex dining space with the concept ‘Seoul Style’ that reinterprets the lifestyle of Seoul, which is a mixture of various nationalities and Korea's integrated culture. SMT, which consists of five floors, has a concept for each layer, so visitors can enjoy a variety of foods from casual dining to fine dining. The 5th floor is a roof-top bar with soft lighting and sensuous atmosphere that is great for small-scale parties. The 4th floor’s concept is Korea, and you can enjoy Korean food, and the 3rd floor concept is China. The 2nd floor has private rooms where you can enjoy all types of food from SMT. Finally, the 1st floor has a lobby-lounge and a Korean Pocha-inspired space like space – a ‘cart bar’ that can be seen in the streets of Seoul. 

 
After touring SMT HOUSE, the Jungyookpo tasting forum officially started. 

Jungyookpo has experimented with 9 different meat parts, drying them and testing them, and as of now they are using 5 different parts – eye round, chuck tender, top blade, tenderloin, and the neck chain. The meat is dried the traditional natural way, 100% wind dried at 5°C - 30°C, which makes it soft and also grillable. 

A grill was prepared for each table, and members tried the different types of meats and listened to CEO Jiyoon Kim’s interesting explanations about Korean traditional handmade beef-jerky. 

After the grill, members also had Jungyookpo rucola salad, baked camembert cheese with Jungyookpo sticks, Jungyookpo tartins, pine nut porridge, three-colored vegetable pancakes, royal braised short ribs, and lastly, white-kimchi noodles for dessert. 

 
At the end of the evening, we had time for the lucky draw. We’d like to congratulate all members who won.
 
We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to Jungja Kim and Jiyoon Kim, co-CEO’s of Jungyookpo, for the interesting forum and delicious dinner, Haewon Park, president of CHA Bio F&C, and Didier Beltoise, president of Cs, for sponsoring lucky draw items, and members who attended the forum.
 
Korea CQ MeeJung Kim