Creating the Saffron 59 magic: Irene Khin Wong

Irene Khin Wong cut her teeth in the professional world as an investment banker, but her real passion has always been for the culinary arts.

It is a passion that traces her deep-seated roots in Southeast Asia, where in the country of Burma (Myanmar) she was born. Years later, as she bade adieu to Wall Street, Irene found her muse as the chef-owner of Road to Mandalay, a highly-successful Soho restaurant in New York City.

She later embarked on a three-year sabbatical based in Ho Chi Minh City, refining her craft and sharing ideas with the city’s restaurant-hotels, before launching Saffron 59.

Irene returns often to her homeland as well as other Southeast Asian destinations from Singapore to Northern India, taking full advantage of the ample opportunities thereby to expand her recipes.

Pursuing excellence in cuisine is but one facet of Irene’s bond with her native land. For years she has been an involved benefactor of charitable organizations in Burma and Southeast Asia. These include ongoing projects like Women’s Development – whose efforts have housed 72 orphaned girls and recently opened a library in Yangon (Myanmar). She has also been involved with Friends Without a Border (FWAB) for the past 10 years, where the organization’s hospital in Cambodia has treated up to a million patients, with initiatives to expand to Laos and Burma.