Who

Until recently, Yeo helmed the kitchen at the French-Vietnamese spot Sapa. Although she doesn't have a kitchen to cook in for the moment, she remains one of the most prominent female chefs on the New York restaurant scene.

Backstory

Born in Malaysia, Yeo spent her childhood shuttling between Kuala Lumpur, London, and Oregon. While on a break from her graduate studies in biochemistry, she took an introductory cooking class at the New York Restaurant School and soon "turned in her lab coat for chef whites," as she puts it, enrolling at the French Culinary Institute. It was there that she linked up with Bobby Flay, whom she'd later work with at three restaurants: Miracle Grill, Flay's Mesa Grill, and Bolo. She later decamped to California for a spell, returning to NYC to open the buzzed-about AZ in 2000. Two years later, she followed up with Pazo. (Both have since closed.)

In August 2004, Yeo opened Sapa, an AvroKO-designed spot in the Flatiron district. But relations between her and owner Brian Matzkow were tense from the start—she threatened to walk in 2005 but decided to stay—and the pair split for good in August 2007. Most recently, restaurateur Peter Glazier tapped Yeo to give the menu at the famous Monkey Bar a makeover. The newly Asian-tinged fare was roundly panned by critics: Time Out's Randall Lane said Yeo's "cloying, gooey sauces... make General Tso's chicken look like a diabetic's meal." Glazier and Yeo parted ways in October 2007.

For the record

Yeo has a variety of different cuisines in her culinary arsenal: She cooked Southwestern at the Bobby Flay-owned eateries, Mediterranean at Paza, and French-Vietnamese fusion at Sapa. Her range is mostly a function of the numerous places she's lived over the years and the extensive travel under her belt. Just before opening Sapa, for example, she spent two years traveling through Australia and Southeast Asia.

In print

Yeo's cookbook, Cooking from A to Z, was published by St. Martin's Press in 2002.

Personal

Yeo is single and lives in the East Village.