Man, Fire, Food

Roger Mooking uncovers the most innovative ways to cook with fire, from small pits to giant custom-made grills.

Charleston, South Carolina is one of America's top dining destinations, but for traditional whole hog barbecue and low-country oyster roasts, Roger leaves the city and heads into the country. Hemingway is a small town located about eighty miles from Charleston, and is home to Scott's Bar-B-Q. Roger meets pit master Rodney Scott who has been cooking whole hog since he was eleven years old. The smoke-filled pit room can cook up to fourteen hogs. Rodney's mom Ella is in charge of pulling the pork and seasoning it with their secret sauce. Then in fishing town McClellanville, Roger meets Oliver Thames who invented a unique oyster roaster. Local cluster oysters are piled over a metal sheet positioned over a firebox. Blankets of wet burlap rest on top of the oysters which help them steam open.

Hawaii island Oahu is known as the "gathering place," and Roger is invited to two community gatherings abundant with local foods. On the east side of the island, local chef Mark "Gooch" Noguchi teaches Roger how to prepare a traditional Hawaiian imu. Whole pig, local starches and lau lau (packages of cubed pork and salmon) are steamed in a large underground pit lined with hot lava rocks, topped with layers of burlap and tarp, and sealed with dirt. At the farmer's market located at Kapiolani Community College, Roger meets Scott Shibuya who smokes pork, chicken, and turkey tails with guava and kiawe woods, in a unique smoker he cleverly built out of an Air Force cargo container, an airplane food cart, and a computer fan.

Roger loves a great barbecue sandwich and when the meat's cooked low and slow and kissed with just the right amount of smoke, he rolls up his sleeves and digs in. Roger heads to The Barbecue Exchange for two sinfully delicious sandwiches - one is called Heaven and the other Hell. Both are packed with pulled pork and bacon. Then it's off to Papa KayJoe's BBQ in Centerville, Tennessee where pork, pickles, slaw and hot sauce are sandwiched between crispy corn cakes.

Today it's all about Roger's favorite animal - the pig. He's hamming it up at some of the country's best suppliers of cured, smoked and aged pork. Roger heads to Edwards near historic Jamestown, Virginia to visit Sam Edwards, a third-generation "ham master" who pays tribute to old world Europe with his cured, smoked and aged country hams. Roger also stops by Benton's delicious Smoky Mountain Country Hams in Madisonville, TN., where Allan Benton has turned the dry curing of ham and bacon into a culinary art.

In the Carolinas, barbecue is not just a tradition, it's a way of life. Roger heads to North and South Carolina to visit a couple of old school restaurants that have upheld a long tradition of mouthwatering barbecue for several generations. At Sweatman's in Holly Hill, South Carolina, whole hogs are cooked low and slow and then pulled and chopped into juicy, meaty perfection. In North Carolina, Roger visits Stamey's Barbecue in Greensboro for their Lexington-style barbecue. Succulent pork shoulders are chopped and piled high on a bun, kissed with vinegar sauce, and crowned with slaw. recipes in this episode

In the Season 4 premiere, Roger explores the wonders of smoked pork shoulder as he sinks his teeth into barbecue sandwiches, during trips to Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Blount Springs, Alabama.

Alabama barbecue is in the spotlight, when Roger visits "Big Bob Gibson Bar-B-Q" in Decatur, Alabama, and learns how to make their smoked chicken, dunked in a unique white sauce. Also: pulled pork, that cooks for nearly 30 hours, is served at the "Black Pit" in Mobile, Alabama.

Roger attends two low-country cookouts in South Carolina. Included: he helps build an outdoor pit for a traditional pig pickin'; and pitches in to get ready for a classic oyster roast.

In the Season 5 premiere, Roger Mooking meets a chef who uses a unique coal-fueled contraption, called the Cross Table, to roast butterflied pork marinated in bold adiote paste; and later, he simmers a seafood paella in a massive pan. Also: a trip to the OverBird in Birmingham features a meat-lover's feast of lamb, rabbit and beef, along with seasonal veggies.

Savory and sweet flavors are found in Florida, where Roger meets a young pit-master who pulls pork with a power tool and digs into a sandwich called the Hamaburger. Later, a farmer presenting the tradition of making cane syrup is visited in Dade City.

Two Southern ladies famous in the world of barbecue. Included: smoked ribs at Mary's Old-Fashioned Pit Bar-B-Cue in Nashville; and pork shoulders, pork ribs and a whole stick of bologna cooked by a legendary pit master in Brownsville, Tennessee.

Roger Mooking gets schooled by pit masters changing the barbecue game in Charleston, SC. He visits Rodney Scott to see how he cooks hogs low and slow. Then, Roger talks to John Lewis who is beefing up the city's Tex-Mex options.

Roger Mooking heads to the Liberty Kitchen in Houston, Texas, where he and Chef Lance Fegen prepare a traditional Balinese pig roast. Then, Roger visits Chef Nate Sloan in Fairview, NC, and gets a fire-roasted farm feast.

Roger heads to two family-run institutions to see how they've done it for decades. First, he learns the ropes at Burns Original BBQ in Texas, then he samples the legendary barbecue at Poche's Market and Restaurant in Louisiana.

Roger Mooking tames the flames in outdoor kitchens fueled by wood-burning fires. He helps fire up beef ribs and grilled chickens for a ranch cookout in Solvang, CA, and cooks a hearty soup in an antique cauldron in San Diego.

Roger Mooking visits two Southern California barbecue joints open on weekends only. He meets a couple who runs a pop-up barbecue restaurant in their own backyard, and he helps a caterer cook up a trio of meats in a parking lot.

Roger Mooking meets San Francisco-based chef Thomas McNaughton for a live-fire feast of epic proportions. They roast a whole pig over hot coals and cook potatoes, onions, squash and black-skinned chickens to go with it.

The smoke signals of fiery feasts lure Roger Mooking to the Southwest, where his first stop is West Alley BBQ and Smokehouse in Chandler, Ariz. The hot spot specializes in Tennessee-style barbecue, and Roger helps founder Bardo Brantley and Pit Boss Robert "Jim Dandy" Spann load brick pits with over 300 pounds of pork. The pork butts are piled high in their signature sandwich, The Big Jim Dandy, and their fan-favorite ribs are tossed in a barbecue sauce with a heavy hit of cayenne. For his second stop, Roger gets lucky in Las Vegas, where he meets Chef Justin Kingsley Hall of The Kitchen at Atomic. His portable rig known as "The Swing Set" is anything but child's play. To build this winning jackpot of meat, Roger and Justin suspend Mediterranean spice-rubbed legs of lambs, nestle butternut squash into a bed of coals and grill carrots in a swinging basket.

Roger Mooking meets two barbecue brainiacs who have mastered the art of marrying heat and meat to turn out top-notch barbecue. Pitmaster Christopher Prieto teaches students the science of smoking and seasoning meats at Prime Barbecue in Knightdale, N.C. Roger helps Prieto season a whole hog with Puerto Rican flavors, and then they smoke it in a North Carolina-style pit using coals made from pecan, hickory and cherry woods. In Glen Allen, Va., Roger meets Tuffy Stone, a classically trained French chef, cookbook author, champion pitmaster and the owner of local barbecue chain Q Barbeque. When Tuffy's not tinkering in the kitchen, he's busy building rigs from scratch, and Roger helps fire up his latest contraption with hickory coals and then hang whole spiced and buttered chickens.

Roger Mooking goes hog-wild at two legendary barbecue restaurants located in America's Barbecue Belt. At A&R Bar-B-Que in Memphis, Roger helps owner Andrew Pillard load racks of St. Louis-style ribs into custom wood-fired pits. Andrew also shows Roger how to make Barbecue Spaghetti, a dish created in Memphis in the 1950s. In Lexington, N.C., Roger visits Bar-B-Q Center, a local institution famous for its chopped pork sandwiches and massive ice cream sundaes. Roger and co-owner Cecil Conrad fire up big brick pits with oak and hickory wood and then load salted pork shoulders to cook low and slow for ten hours before they're chopped and piled onto soft buns. And no trip to Bar-B-Q Center is complete without their famous banana split that weighs a whopping four pounds!

Roger Mooking makes two pit stops in the South for a little sizzle and a lot of smoke. He starts at Comfort Farms in Milledgeville, Ga., a nonprofit organization where retired veteran Jon Jackson helps fellow vets adjust to civilian life by teaching them how to farm, raise animals and cook. Jon often hosts cookouts to thank and feed his community, and Roger joins him to cook a whole mutton seasoned with garlicky rosemary paste and slow-roast cauliflower, broccoli, beets and onions. Roger then heads to Bob Sykes Bar-B-Q in Bessemer, Ala., for classic, open brick-pit barbecue. He learns the tricks of the trade from seasoned pitmaster Van Sykes, who has been stoking coals since he was 8 years old. They season 250 pounds of picnic pork with salt and load it into a 15-foot pit heated with hickory wood. The pork is then sliced, topped with just enough vinegar-based barbecue sauce and sandwiched inside a toasted bun with sliced pickles.

Roger Mooking cruises the Florida coastline for two fiery cookouts that bring the heat. First, he visits Chef Marcel Vizcarra, owner of modern Peruvian eatery Llama Restaurant in St. Augustine, Fla., to check out an ancient, Peruvian-style pit roast called pachamanca. Marcel invites Roger to his home, and they fire up his custom-built, above-ground pit for tubers, fava beans, lamb, chicken and pork all rubbed down with a flavorful marinade and layered in with plantain leaves. Marcel and Roger also prepare Peruvian arapaima fish fillets by wrapping them in plantain leaves and grilling them over an open fire. Roger then heads to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Georgia Pig BBQ, a legendary old-school, open-pit barbecue restaurant that has been around since 1953. The star of the menu is smoked meat cooked in the dining room's pit, and owner and pitmaster Luke Moorman shows Roger the dish that earned them rave reviews: a Bar-B-Q Chopped Pork Sandwich doused in a delicious mustard barbecue sauce.

Smoke signals lead Roger Mooking to two popular food trucks in Texas serving up delicious ethnic eats. In Grapevine, Texas, Roger meets pitmaster Trey Sanchez of Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q, who's known for combining authentic Texas-style barbecue with Mexican dishes. Roger and Trey season and smoke briskets for Birria Tacos and prep Cowboy Potatoes for a pop-up with hungry locals at Hop and Sting Brewing Co.