Setting of ionic date and time does not display properly, Ionic 3?

Ionic Framework ionic-v3
1

I have the following ionic 3 date picker.

<ion-col col-12> <ion-datetime displayFormat="MMM DD, YYYY HH:mm" [(ngModel)]="dateSession"></ion-datetime> </ion-col>

Select the date and time displays this Jan 03, 2019 15:00, for example.

Setting the date and time, on load for however displays nothing.
this.dateSession = 'Jan 01, 2019 00:00'

Doing this
<ion-col col-12> {{dateSession}} <ion-datetime displayFormat="MMM DD, YYYY HH:mm" [(ngModel)]="dateSession"></ion-datetime> </ion-col>

displays this…2019-01-01T15:00:00Z

What would be the way to set this value so that it displays in accordance to the displayFormat, as if the date was ‘picked’?