What's Eating Jackie Oh

Jackie Oh is done being your model minority.

She just hasn’t told her second-gen Korean American parents yet. They would never understand her unconventional dream to become a professional chef. Just ask her brother Justin, who hasn't heard from them since he was sent to Rikers Island.

For now, when she isn’t avoiding studying for AP World History, Jackie is improving her French cooking techniques and working at her grandparents’ Midtown deli Melty’s.

Then the most unexpected thing Jackie gets recruited for a casting audition for the teen edition of Burn Off!, her favorite competitive cooking show. Even more unexpected, Jackie becomes a contestant.

Jackie is thrown headfirst into the cutthroat competitive TV show world filled with psych outs, picky mom critiques, and dreaded microaggressions to lean into her heritage.

All Jackie wants to do is cook her way. But is her way to cook traditional French cuisine? Lean into her heritage? Or is it something more? To advance through the competition, Jackie must prove who she is on and off the plate.

Mandy Graul