Hey there, I'm Guy Fieri, and we're rolling out,
looking for America's greatest diners, drive-ins, and dives.
-This trip... -Peace out, dawg.
...things are getting meaty in all kinds of cuisines.
I'm hearing magical sounds like the orchestra in Flavortown.
There's a butcher gone wild in Tampa...
It seems like it's carnivore candy land.
...that even has Chef Robert Irvine pumped.
I didn't say flex.
I'm just showing you the sandwich.
[Guy] Yeah.
And in Arkansas...
The whole food scene has exploded.
...we've got Vietnamese rolls and bowls.
There's a lot of flavors going on here.
And hearty homemade Italian.
What a gift you brought these folks!
That's lights out, man.
That's all right here, right now, on
"Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives."
[main theme plays]
So I'm here in beautiful Bentonville, Arkansas,
just right at the downtown area, and I'm here to check out
an Italian restaurant, and it's the same old story.
Yeah, it starts out as a kid that wants to be a chef -- in Germany.
Oh, yeah, he was a German chef.
And cooked in restaurants when he was 16 and then finally
packs up his bags and goes to New York and works with
the Italian greats and packs up his bags and goes to LA
and works in more Italian restaurants and goes to
Monterey and opens his own restaurant and more Italian.
Finally, he packs his bags one last time,
moves to Bentonville, Arkansas, and this is Mezzaluna Pasteria.
Y'all can pick up table six.
Mezzaluna is absolutely the best place to eat in
Northwest Arkansas.
And your octopus.
Food is just so fresh and meticulously put together.
Linguine vongole ready for the patio.
[customer] If you've never had handmade
pasta, you're in for a surprise.
[Guy] That real deal pasta is actually coming from
German-born chef and owner, Soerke Peters, who cooked up
the world before falling into loving Italian.
-Did you cook in Germany? -Oh, yeah.
German, French, continental.
-You name it. -Yeah.
The thing is, I wanted to move to New York City.
-OK. -Nobody wanted to hire me but the Italians.
-And here we are. -What are we making today?
[Soerke] We're gonna do a spaghetti carbonara.
You speak so Italian when you say it.
[Soerke] Carbonara, pick up, please.
-The carbonara is amazing. -They cure their own pancetta.
He puts a duck egg in there. It's just perfect.
-OK. -All right, here we go.
-Where's the machine from? -From Italy.
So this is where we're gonna mix the double zero flour
from Italy. We'll turn this on. -OK.
Our egg and water mixture.
We're gonna let this mix how long?
-Ten minutes? -Yeah.
[Guy] Once we extrude...
[Soerke] We can use it immediately, but usually it's
gonna dry a little bit. -[Guy] Let it dry.
[Soerke] Now we're gonna make our pancetta seasoning.
-I love pancetta. -OK.
So salt, curing salt, brown sugar, nutmeg,
toasted ground fennel seeds, ground bay leaves,
cloves, fresh black pepper, minced garlic.
-[Guy] So we'll rub this on... -[Soerke] Beautiful pork belly.
[Guy] And how long is this gonna set up?
-Three weeks. -Wow.
-Beautiful. -Oh, it looks great.
Yeah, let's not skip today, Chef.
I did go to the gym.
[Soerke laughs]
Have our fresh pasta. Get a hot pan, some oil.
Take some of the pancetta, render out the fat.
Some of that starchy pasta water.
And then we toast the pasta. Reggiano Parmigiano.
Fresh parsley, salt, pepper, some Pecorino,
build the heat. -[Guy] I like that technique.
[Soerke] So we have a nice duck yolk.
[Guy] And that's all she wrote.
More cheese than I typically put in my Carbonara,
but I'm not kicking it out of bed.
Pasta is al dente and beautiful.
And there's something about Italian flour
that doesn't eat as heavy.
I love the pancetta, very toothsome.
The richness of that duck egg. Creamy, luscious, delicious.
Spaghetti alla Carbonara.
You just get the full flavor that explodes in your mouth.
You can just tell it's authentic.
This is where the food scene's at in America.
-Bentonville? -[woman] Bentonville, Arkansas.
It's really grown.
I haven't been to Bentonville in 15 years.
-Well, a lot changed. -A lot's changed.
The whole food scene has exploded.
[Soerke] Yeah.
[customer] Since Soerke came to Bentonville,
it's changed the game as far as Italian food.
[server] Lasagna de pollo.
[customer #2] The lasagna is one of my go-tos.
There are two kinds of sauces, at least.
It's different, but the textures are perfect.
This is gonna be the lasagna.
We're gonna make a chicken sausage ragu.
Start out with some mirepoix, ground chicken thighs,
salt, paprika, black pepper, ground toasted fennel seeds.
So that goes into the mirepoix.
-How much white wine? -[Soerke] Whole bottle.
And some bay leaves.
How long are we gonna let that cook down, Chef?
-[Soerke] 20-30 minutes. -[Guy] Are we making bechamel?
Yes, we're gonna make a bechamel, and we also
have a marinara. -What's in the marinara?
[Soerke] Mirepoix, canned tomatoes.
Cook this for about an hour and a half, then we'll add
extra virgin olive oil, fresh basil, garlic, -Right.
pass it through a food mill.
While that's working, bechamel time.
[Soerke] Melted butter, white button mushrooms, a little salt.
Cook it down, a lot of nutmeg.
[mouths] It's a lot of nutmeg.
[normally] Add the flour to that.
That'll build your roux.
Then the heavy cream.
[Soerke] And next we have our tomatoes that are blended.
Once that cools, we can start to build the lasagna.
-Yes. -With the house-made pasta.
-Yeah. -That's beautiful.
OK, so we use our chicken sausage ragout,
a little bit of each.
Take our first layer.
And we just keep this party going?
[Soerke] Six times.
And when is the Parmesan cheese going?
Right at the very end on top?
[Soerke] Right on top of this next layer.
-Everybody's on every layer? -Yes.
[Guy] You have a flow chart here I can follow?
OK, it gets topped and another Parmesan cheese.
We're gonna go right to the oven and cook it.
-[Soerke] 45 minutes. -[Guy] When service happens,
heat up in the pizza oven.
Yeah. Here's our bechamel.
Somebody told me you like a corner piece.
Oh, I'm corner piece all day.
Finish extra virgin olive oil, and we're ready to eat.
Make sure he didn't cheat me on a layer.
[Soerke laughs]
Yeah, it looks like there's six.
What's one of the biggest misunderstandings people have
about German food? -Sausages only.
-And is that correct? -No, that's not correct.
The same thing with lasagna. "Oh, it's so heavy."
That's light.
One of the things I pick up those -- the nutmeg married with
the white wine in the Bolognese.
There's not a ton of cheese, which I like.
All you get is a little bit of the saltiness
of the Parmesan.
The bechamel makes it nice and creamy.
Acidity from the tomato.
Really good texture from that ground chicken.
Beautiful tenderness on the pasta.
It's a really delicious,
balanced lasagna -- that's lights out, man.
[Soerke] Lasagna, pick up.
The mushrooms that are in it are really good.
The way it blends gives it a really unique flavor.
It's outstanding.
Whenever we have people that come to town,
we bring them here.
-You know you can count on it. -Yeah.
[customer] You come in here with your friends, your family,
you truly feel at home.
[Guy] What a gift you brought these folks.
The food is delicious, but the story about you
and to have no boundaries of where you go, I love it, man.
[Soerke] Thank you.
[Guy] Coming up, I'm meeting up with Chef Robert Irvine
in Tampa, Florida.
How many of those could you eat, Irvine?
Probably all of that.
[Guy] At an out-of-bounds butcher shop...
Mmm.
...sandwich stop.
You wanna talk about a flavor bomb.
We're gonna have to push the car home.
You drive, I'll push.
2 [car doors close]
[Robert] I don't care who you are.
You can't drive like that in Tampa.
Hold on.
Chef Robert Irvine's in the car.
Nobody's gonna give me a ticket.
You've lived here forever. Come on.
You're gonna love this restaurant, Chef.
Why am I gonna love it? It's a vending machine.
No, no, no. That's just part of it.
This is a real deal butcher shop.
This guy does it all. He's farm to table.
He raised his own hogs.
He was taught to be a butcher by his grandpa.
And he's got a full-blown restaurant.
Only you, Guy Fieri, would bring me to a restaurant
with a vending machine called the Boozy Pig.
Exactly. Let's eat.
Rocking man in the window.
I've definitely never seen a restaurant that was also half
butcher shop.
[Andrew] Bacon coming in.
They got a little bit of everything.
They've got some Italian inspiration,
some Cuban inspiration.
[Andrew] Giuseppe going down on the press.
[customer #1] I know where the proteins are coming from when I eat here.
They're pasture-raised and butchered in-house.
[Guy] And the meat master running things head-to-tail is
Chef Andrew Boozy Tambuzzo.
Explain to me what we've walked into, because it seems
like it's carnivore candy land.
We started butcher shop and restaurant from day one.
-And you raise hogs. -I do.
Ever since I was ten years old,
I've been making sausages with my grandfather.
This is your picture of you and your grandpa
right here? -[Andrew] Yes, sir.
Did you veer from what he taught you and start
your own stuff, flavor-wise? -I did, yes.
One El Mixto going down.
I have the El Mixto, and it's just roast pork,
ham, salami, Swiss cheese.
It's the best Cuban sandwich in Tampa.
-OK, Chef, what are we into? -Pork leg to make our ham.
Kosher salt, granulated sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon sticks,
bay leaf, crushed red, rosemary and thyme,
some currants, salt, some juniper.
I'm surprised you didn't bruise the herbs.
-[Andrew] They got smashed beforehand. -It's boozy.
Of course they got smashed. Hot water on that.
Let it steep. You're gonna bone out this leg.
-Truss it. -[Andrew] Brine gets brushed in.
It gets agitated.
It comes out of the tumbler, and then it just goes into
a cambro for about seven days. -With the brine.
[Andrew] Rinse, and then into the smokehouse it goes.
Six-hour cold smoke and roughly four-hour hot smoke.
-Next step. -Mojo pork.
Two pork shoulders. Score it a little bit.
Garlic first. A little salt, a little pepper.
-Cumin, oregano. -[Guy] A little red wine vinegar.
[Andrew] And a little bit of water.
[Guy] How long is this gonna marinate, Chef?
[Andrew] Overnight.
200 degrees for about 12, 13 hours.
Got it. Next step.
[Andrew] Salami cotto.
[Guy] And this is all pork trimmings
-Correct. -We're gonna give it a primary grind,
season it, and grind it again? -[Andrew] Yes, sir.
[Guy] Milk powder.
[Andrew] Salt, black pepper, smoked paprika,
granulated garlic, crushed red, a little ground fennel, nitrate.
[Robert] Mm, mm, mm.
[Guy] And a little water to make sure that it all blends evenly.
-[Andrew] One more pass through. -And then we'll case it
in the natural casing.
[Andrew] Prick it, let it rest overnight in the fridge.
[Guy] Into the smoker six hours.
[Andrew] 200 degrees.
[Guy] And then peel the casing and slice it.
-[Andrew] You got it. -[Guy] Love it.
[Andrew] Let's build our El Mixto.
So we have our loaf of Cuban bread.
[Guy] What size is the sandwich?
We're gonna build the whole thing at once,
and then we're gonna cut off the one.
-We'll make sure mine's kind of about this big. -OK.
-He doesn't eat much. -So we have our smoked ham.
Mmm.
-[Andrew] Salami. -Don't be shy.
-Put it all on. -[Andrew] Swiss cheese.
-Pickles. -This is pre-workout snack.
[Andrew] Little mayo-mustard mix.
Mojo pork.
With this calorie bomb, we're gonna have to push
the car home. -You drive, I'll push.
-Into the press. -I'm starving, come on.
[Andrew] And we're gonna plate it like such.
The sandwich itself is amazing.
[Guy] You wanna talk about a flavor bomb.
The Mojo pork's delicious.
My favorite part of it is the ham.
It's not overdone with the cheese, not overdone
with the pickle. -That's about right.
[Guy] And the fact that you put it on the panini press,
you're getting that little bit of crust.
How many of those could you eat, Irvine?
Probably all of that.
[Guy] But he goes to the gym for like three hours in
the morning, three hours at night, so.
-Oh, I didn't say flex. -I'm not.
I'm just showing you the sandwich.
Yeah. Which way is the beach, Robert?
Thank you very much.
El Mixto going down.
From the ham that's cured here, the pickles that are made here, it's special.
Do you ever come and get steaks and all that,
or just eat in the restaurant? -While I was waiting outside,
I bought some beef jerky.
-Out of the vending machine. -Of course.
[Robert] Do people honestly come at 3 o'clock in the morning to
get steak? -I want a camera on it.
-I wanna see who shows up. -That would be really cool.
I'll have to send you some footage.
They better have my bacon.
What are we gonna do next?
-The knuckle sangwich. -This I gotta see.
After Irvine eats the rest of the big sandwich.
See you in a minute.
Where are you going with that?
2 When they find out that Chef Robert Irvine was here,
when they find out you came here,
it's gonna be amazing.
It's gonna be amazing.
Welcome back.
Lucky to have my brother from another mother.
Chef Irvine lives here in Tampa.
We're hanging out at the Boozy Pig with Chef Andrew.
-BLT in the window. -Best butcher shop in Tampa.
You can just come get, like, fresh meat.
They have a breakfast menu, a dinner menu, sandwiches.
We're back for the knuckle sangwich.
Now, as everybody knows, my company is Knuckle Sandwich,
but this is "Sangwich." What's in this, Chef?
[Andrew] Braised beef.
So we have the actual knuckle muscle off the back leg
of the cow. -[Guy] OK.
[Andrew] We're going to make some slits in it.
Start off with a little bit of fresh garlic, kosher salt,
black pepper, herbs right down in the middle, red wine,
and some water.
12 hours at about 200 degrees.
OK, so while that goes to the oven low and slow,
what's happening over here? -Whole pork belly,
we're gonna cure it into bacon.
Kosher salt, brown sugar, granulated sugar,
and curing salt.
[Guy] How long are we gonna brine that for, Chef?
[Andrew] 12 days.
Hang it on the hooks, get a nice, dry, tacky surface
so the smoke will stick.
Eight-hour cold smoke and about a six-hour hot smoke.
-Rinse the brine off. -[Guy] Cool and slice.
[Andrew] We freeze our bacon so it cuts uniformly.
About 20 minutes in the oven, and then flat top to service.
-What's the next step of this? -Our knuckle cheese.
It's gonna be a truffled herb goat cheese.
So we start off with our softened goat cheese,
green onion, thyme, a little rosemary,
salt, pepper, garlic, truffle oil,
incorporating everything with a little bit of heavy cream.
So this is healthy then?
This would be the best pre workout.
Are we going on that Cuban bread again?
[Andrew] We are, yes.
Knuckle, cheese, the braised beef on top
with the mushrooms and onions, followed bacon,
a little pepperoni.
Brush it with some butter
and into the press.
Ready to plate.
Love the bacon. I mean, just --
That's probably the best bacon I've had in a long, long,
long time.
The treat and the specialty of this is the house-made.
I think what he's telling you here is you don't tell
your story enough, because
the flavor of the food is amazing.
But nobody knows that you do all this work
to make this simple sandwich, -Right.
It's really good.
[Andrew] Thank you.
I got the sangwich.
I love that whole pulled meat thing.
-The pulled meat thing? -[customer #1] Yeah, yeah.
[Guy] It's pretty special.
Flavors are definitely different to what I'm used to.
Irvine's family.
Is this a normal thing that you would find in Australia,
a butcher shop and a restaurant at the same place?
-No. -100% no.
-No. -How about goat cheese?
Yes, we love goat cheese.
-Do they make any cheese from kangaroos? -No.
-Can you milk a kangaroo? -Not safely.
Give me one bread pudding for 104.
[customer #2] What they put together here is so authentic
and such high-quality.
I gotta tell you, I was a little scared walking in.
Because you bring me to a place with a vending machine.
It's called Boozy Pig. You're right.
I would be a little freaked out too.
You made me a believer.
Well, you made me a believer, not him.
-Well done, Chef. -Thanks.
[Guy] Up next, a father-son's Vietnamese joint
in Rogers, Arkansas.
It's delicious, man. It really is.
Where I get to take on pho's biggest challenger.
It does look like pho gone wild. "Pho-get" about it.
2 All right, I made it here early.
I'm telling you, there's gonna be a line at this place any minute.
So I'm here to check out a joint in Rogers, Arkansas.
Today is their ten-year anniversary.
This family-run joint, man, they've got a great story.
The dad retired from his business, brought his sons
back from their businesses, and decided to open up
this family restaurant.
Really wanted to have a legacy for his kids.
And they're doing Vietnamese street food.
And I'll tell you what, ten-year anniversary is happening.
Place is gonna get packed. I'm here first.
This is Saiwok.
Bubba large for table three.
Get over here, Guy, and try some of this food.
Dude, it's so good.
[server] Pork belly fries for Jordy.
The best Vietnamese food I've had outside of LA.
-Really? -[customer #1] It's always good when food can be both familiar
and new at the same time. -It's a special place.
-You can just feel it when you're here. -OK.
And timing was everything for Bryan Nguyen, because for him,
closing the door on one career was the perfect window to bring
his sons, Vuong and Van, back home
to start a new adventure.
He was like, "Hey, I'm about to retire.
"I wanted to invest in our family.
Let's open a restaurant."
That's what you did with all your savings?
Yeah.
Pretty big commitment.
I told my dad, we gotta do your traditional side,
but also keep elevating their palate.
I got the crispy pork imperial with our nuoc cham sauce.
The imperial rolls are really, really good.
You dip it into this sweet sauce.
It's like a little flavor bomb.
So this is our imperial egg rolls.
Carrot, cabbage, a little salt.
-Give it a little massage. -Yes.
We're gonna let it sit for at least an hour.
So this one's had a chance to sweat.
[Vuong] Put it in the cheesecloth.
-I'm gonna wring it out. -[Guy] Got it.
This is what my dad was passed on from his mom.
-[Guy] Rice noodle? -[Vuong] Bean thread.
Onions. Green onions.
The sugar in. Potato starch.
Black pepper. Minced garlic.
-[Guy] Granulated garlic? -[Vuong] Yes.
The oyster sauce.
The egg works as a binder to hold it together.
[Vuong] Put the pork in. Massage it one more time.
-Let it rest overnight is best. -[Guy] OK.
We're gonna make our nuoc cham sauce.
Start off with sugar, water, fish sauce.
-White vinegar. -Lime juice.
Sambal. Minced garlic.
And as long as the sugar dissolves,
we're in good shape. -[Vuong] That's right.
[Guy] And what kind of wrapper are we gonna be putting this in?
Spring roll. Place it right in the bottom.
-Pull it back just to get that press. -[Guy] Right.
'Cause if it's not locked in
and that thing explodes in that fryer.
[Vuong] A little bit of the yolk just to lock it in.
-[Guy] We're gonna deep fry it? -[Vuong] Yes, 375.
You ready? They're gonna be piping hot.
Serve it with a bed of spring mix, some cabbage,
and pickled veggies.
And here's our nuoc cham that comes with it.
[food crunches]
I'm hearing like flutes and magical sounds right now,
like the orchestra in Flavortown.
The ingredients do all the talking inside of there.
The right amount of pork. It's not super heavy.
The nuoc cham is delicious.
It's got enough punch, enough acid.
And I love the lettuce piece to it.
I like the fresh, a little bit of the fried, like that
juxtaposed hot and cold.
You come to Saiwok,
first thing you better get, that's the bomb.
[Vuong] And the imperials are coming out.
-What do you think? -I think it's really delicious.
The sauce is good. They are super crispy.
You can hear that [imitates crunch] when you bite into it.
They're outstanding.
Authentic fresh ingredients.
Makes all the difference in the world.
How many do you think you could put down?
-Two dozen, easily. -[Guy] All right, come on.
[Vuong] Two char siu pork.
The great thing is, is you're
coming into an Asian street food joint.
You're getting a little mix of everything.
I mean, you got french fries and a fried egg.
And a fried egg. Your favorite.
I like the brisket banh mi, and they give you a little cup
of the pho to dip it in. -What do you normally have?
-I usually have the pho beef. -Bun bo hue large for Patrick.
My favorite thing, honestly, is the bun bo hue.
It's got brisket in there. It's got some pork.
And you get a little basket of herbs and bean sprouts to put
on top of it. It's kind of a showstopper.
People have a battle between if you're a pho person
or you're a bun bo hue person.
Bun bo hue way is
spicier and more... -Aromatic.
We're going to just make the stock.
-Put the brisket in first. -Just boiling water?
Yes. Add in shank.
Boil for two hours.
Pull the meat out so we can chill it.
Slice and hold it for service.
Now we're going to sauté some aromatics.
Some oil, onions, garlic, a chili spice.
Wait, wait, wait, wait. Package?
Yeah. Has the best ingredients.
Paprika, onions, ginger, chili. Transfer it into the pot.
Bun bo hue seasoning. Rock sugar.
[Guy] Just regular white sugar? OK.
The lemongrass. Fermented shrimp paste.
-Oh. -Go for two hours.
We're not gonna strain.
I'm getting the lemongrass with the plastic bag
tied around it? -Yes.
You got to have great ladle work.
When in Rome.
We're going to sauté the brisket.
-Oil, garlic, sugar. -Fish sauce.
[Vuong] And Oriental spice.
[Guy] What are we doing with the gloves?
I'm not wearing them. Just telling you right now.
Add in the meat. Gotta go in with our hands.
[Guy] You're giving it a little massage.
Yes. Turn the heat up.
Finish the cooking. Kill the heat and chill it.
There is so much I do not understand.
Now we're gonna create your bowl.
-Thick vermicelli noodle. -Rice or wheat noodle?
[Vuong] We stick to rice.
Some of that meat that we just --
Now that's not even hot.
So we're gonna go in with the shank, some cha lua.
It's just like a pork sausage, pork bologna.
-[Guy] Got it. -Yellow onions on top.
-White part of the scallion. -Yes.
And then the green part of the scallion.
-Get this hot broth. -Oh boy.
It does look like pho gone wild. "Pho-get" about it.
[Vuong] More of the green just for color.
You can put Thai basil, put lime in there,
cilantro, jalapeño, bean sprout.
[Guy] I live dangerously.
The bun bo hue is the way to go.
There's a lot of flavors going on here.
A little bit of heat right off the bat.
I love the fresh veggies in it.
A lot of different textures from the shank to the brisket
to the crazy pork bologna thing.
[Vuong] When you are able to pick it up and slurp it,
it's a sign of respect. -It's delicious, man.
-It really is. -Thank you.
-[server] I got the bun bo hue. -The broth is fantastic.
-The noodles are really tender. -I see a little sweat.
Yeah, do you see the sweat?
And then you have to put all this in here, sir.
-[customer #1] That goes in there, too? -There you go.
-I'm here to help. -[indistinct].
Saiwok is a place that
you should come and try out for sure.
You're gonna come back all the time.
[Guy] Not only is the food great, the story is great.
Your parents are brave coming to this country,
working all those years.
And I have nothing but respect.
When you have that much heart and energy and passion
and appreciation for what you do,
it comes out in the food.
Congratulations on the ten-year anniversary.
Good luck to you, man. Thanks for having me.
Bryan, peace out, dawg.
So that's it for this trip, but don't worry, there's plenty
more Triple D joints all over the country.
I'll be looking for you next week on
"Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives."
Don't worry about this.
We're fine. Nothing to look at here.
-Everything's OK. -[laughter]