(subdued music) - There's always food.

It's always around us.

(subdued music) There's medicine in the plants.

Fruit trees are growing everywhere.

And chefs and forgers, just like chefs and farmers, are kind of reliant on each other.

(subdued music) There's still food growing in a cemetery, in a park.

(gentle music) Chefs need that life.

They need that connection to the land, even in an urban environment.

(gentle music) And you can find food anywhere life is growing.

(subdued music) (dramatic music) (dramatic music continues) (dramatic music continues) (gentle music) (dramatic music) Atlanta has always painted in broad strokes using vibrant colors.

(dramatic music) And local farms and ingredients give chefs an ever-changing palette to paint with.

When we are supporting local, when we're buying from local farms, I mean, not only does that affect the taste, it's also a playground for chefs.

It pushes the boundaries of creativity as well.

It's gonna inform the story that chefs tell because they're reliant on the story of the community that they're in.

(soft upbeat music) - For a while, we were held up to comparison, well, why isn't the food in Atlanta like the food in New York or like the food in Chicago, or so on and so forth?

And we had a complex about it.

Now, we're comfortable enough to say the food in Atlanta doesn't have to compare with that.

It just has to be the best version of the food in Atlanta.

(soft upbeat music) - And so, you're starting to see a lot of vastly different restaurants open, anywhere from small taco shops that have like 12 seats in them, to 40-seat fine dining restaurants.

(soft upbeat music) - So, Atlanta is now starting to feel comfortable in its own skin, as far as food is concerned.

- More chefs are cooking from their perspective instead of cooking what they think people want.

- When a community supports itself, you get all of this wide variety.

(soft upbeat music) For chef, that means you have access to all of these flavors and ultimately, it makes everyone healthier.

(soft upbeat music) Some chefs are building on tradition and forging new paths with their cuisine and it's an adventure I'm excited to take.

(dramatic music) My name is Taria Camerino.

I'm a classically French-trained chef and I experience the world through taste.

I'm in Atlanta to experience the vibrant colors of this amazing food scene.

(dramatic music) Just outside downtown Atlanta, one chef's menu paints a unique picture.

Chef Maricela Vega is at 8ARM.

(dramatic music) And 8ARM is already a pretty significant place in the food scene in Atlanta because it has always been pushing boundaries.

- She just took that restaurant, 8ARM, in a completely different direction.

(soft upbeat music) - Maricela's food is all about decolonization.

So, she is actively supporting farms that are minorities, that are women.

- She's not a vegetarian chef, but her plant-based dishes, very complex flavor, yet so harmonious.

- Her purpose is to tear down a system of slavery that's existed in our food systems for a very long time.

(soft upbeat music) - Where we will see food go, soon, we'll hopefully be providing accessibility to everybody.

- [Christiane] She's a great hope for Atlanta, for sure.

- Her plates clearly represent a completely local movement.

If there's an ingredient that she needs, she doesn't immediately try to get it from Mexico.

She tries to figure out how it can be grown here.

(soft upbeat music) We start where the food starts, on a farm on the west side of the city.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) It's an urban farm.

- I mean, this is the west end.

You look around in this neighborhood, there really isn't much.

There is a Kroger about two or three miles away, just a walk.

- Mina's Farm is feeding two different types of communities, and their hunger.

She took space that she had and she turned it into something that would feed an entire community.

Her community who is, they actually are dealing with hunger issues.

There are food deserts in that area.

- And that Kroger is notorious for getting the thirds of what's left over from the shipment.

- She's also feeding a hunger of a demographic that frankly has more money.

They have more comfort.

And so, what they're looking for is a connection to nature, a connection to their community, a connection to fresh flavors, different kind of hunger, but the same fuel, the same food is feeding both.

It's going broad because now chefs are using her produce.

- This is a very unique site.

It's gone through a lot, but I'm really excited to see what the future holds for it under the Filomena administration.

- Yeah.

(laughs) (soft jazz music) Maricela takes me east to the neighborhood of Edgewood to one of Atlanta's newest restaurants.

(soft jazz music) El Tesoro is a fantastic example of what it means to feed a neighborhood.

The neighborhood that El Tesoro is in is the Edgewood neighborhood, and it has been hungry for a very long time.

Their building that they're in was vacant for 15 years.

- Yeah, it allows for us to have economic growth, and it just, like I said, continues to build our community.

It actually connects us to our agriculture, which surprisingly enough in the South, we're not actually connected to our agriculture as you would see it in other places.

But we're getting there.

- [Taria] Every neighborhood needs a place to convene, to eat together.

- Yeah, I used to ride my bike and there was nowhere that you could stop by here.

You'd either have to bike all the way to East Atlanta or to Kirkwood on the opposite end, but there was nothing ever in between.

- [Taria] Americans are still grasping for that watering whole place.

They just don't know where to find it.

- Now, you have to understand that food is slow.

And so, if you are on the same page with being with slow food, then you're gonna be able to adapt to the changes and you're not gonna feel so inclined to stick to this like rigorous menu, I have to have these tomatoes, I have to have this.

- Right.

- It allows you to be creative and to just adapt with what's going on.

And- - I would even guess, so hard to say, it forces you to be creative.

- Mm-hmm.

- [Maricela] El Tesoro is beautiful because their success proves that that works, that that's what neighborhoods need.

And the food is incredible.

(soft jazz music) (transition sound effect) - Some restaurants are just finding that success and others have been a staple in the community for more than a decade.

So, there's a family-run restaurant and it's on Memorial Drive, and they've been there for years when there was nothing there, directly across from Oakland Cemetery, and they've been feeding the community.

They've been feeding construction workers, families, for so many years prior to all of the development that has happened.

- Yeah, Mi Barrio was always a spot before when I used to be able to afford to live in Grant Park in Summerhill area.

So, probably about four years ago.

- Mi Barrio is a Mexican restaurant that speeds working class people and they go again and again and again.

It's family-run, run by women, and they take care of you.

(upbeat music) - I spent a lot of my free time just walking here after working five days a week in the kitchen and just find some sort of comfort.

It always made me feel like, well, I'm not home, but it's close enough to home.

And I would just sit here and just think about my mom and think about the food, and think about how the mom here was cooking and had her entire team, which was all her kids helping her bring this reality to life of just like sustaining themselves and having a little piece of their culture here - Hmm.

- in the middle of the city.

So, every time we drive by, it's always like a question of like, man, are they still gonna be able to stick around and keep their sort of piece of Atlanta food history here?

And it's essential that we have these pockets because everywhere else that has like the main properties in the city, they're not necessarily owned by Mexican families or Mexican women.

- Chef Maricela is pushing some boundaries.

She's pushing against a system that really doesn't necessarily see her, support her in her full expression.

Maybe 'cause they just don't understand her.

Maricela's paintbrush is justice, her canvas, the Atlanta food scene.

But some chefs literally paint their cuisine.

(gentle music) (soft upbeat music) I've known Karen for a long time and I've watched her move into a world that is very elusive and that's the food community.

And we talk about that a lot because she's a sugar artist.

- I think of pastry as kind of the burlesque division of culinary.

Like it's a show, you go in and it's all out there, and you looking and you want, (Taria laughing) and it's classified as simple, and I'm not supposed to, but it's so tempting.

- Karen's story is so interesting because what people see is just on the outside.

It's just the show.

Nobody cares about what's on the inside because it's this beautiful show.

- [Karen] It's not necessary.

Sugar isn't necessary, - Right.

- but we crave it.

- Right.

(upbeat music) Atlanta is basically made up of a bunch of neighborhoods.

One of the neighborhoods that has been hungry for decades is Summerhill.

(dramatic music) - Well, I've lived in this neighborhood since the early '90s.

I moved away for a little while, but I came back.

And this whole neighborhood, the big thing that was happening around here was the Braves games, right?

(object slamming) But what I think was missing while the Braves stadium was here was anything to do around the stadium.

So, there's no restaurants, no bars, no hotels, there's nothing going on.

And so, now, to see this is really incredible that this is happening.

As soon as you put a restaurant in a neighborhood that's been hungry, people start to go.

Little Tart was the first retail space to open in that neighborhood.

Sara has always pushed down some boundaries just from educating Atlanta on what fine pastry is, and that it should be a regular thing.

(soft upbeat music) As soon as that proved to be successful, she opens up another place right next door.

Big Softie is Sara's ice cream place.

It's just a little venture right next door and she did it because she wanted to.

- [Karen] And it's full, the neighborhood is starving for this kind of thing.

And this is a neighborhood that supports this kind of thing.

- Yeah.

Karen has the exposure and the knowledge to call (beep) on any of the cuisines that are popping up.

(dramatic music) We head to the city of Decatur, just east of Atlanta, to try My Abuela's Pop Up at Dish Dive.

(dramatic music) And so, going to eat authentic Puerto Rican food with her in this popup setting where they're cooking the heart and soul of their family, their grandmother's food, and sharing that in such a traditional way, they're not selling out at all, and Karen can see that.

- This is pumpkin.

- Pumpkin.

- Pumpkin in the beans.

- Mm-hmm.

Yeah, so what Luis was saying was that if it's not Puerto Rican beans, if there isn't pumpkin in it, that is traditionally how that happens, I never would've known that.

- But it's like creamy.

It dissolves when you eat it - Mm-hmm.

- and you find it adds that little bit of sweetness.

I think we search for the sweetness.

(dramatic music) I do struggle with the fact that there's a limited awareness to what I'm doing here.

I've been asked to, I've taught in Jakarta multiple times, Jakarta, but I'm not teaching here as much.

I will set up a class here and teach, or I sell cakes here occasionally.

But I'm in Singapore and I'm filling up classes.

- Right.

- So, I'm hoping that opportunities like this make people think a little more broadly, experience things a little more broadly, look around their own city, 'cause I think there's a lot here for people to be proud of in their own city.

(dramatic music) - Karen's work has reached across the globe.

(soft upbeat music) However, there is a chef whose color palette continues to inspire the local fresh ingredient movement.

Chefs like Steven Satterfield helped to breathe passion into his community.

(dramatic music) - He was really one of the early important talent to open on the west side at the time where that didn't even have a west side.

(dramatic music) - Steven has probably been the one that has championed Southern cooking.

(dramatic music) - When Chef Steven Satterfield was opening Miller Union, what he was sharing with us was what was important to him.

(dramatic music) A James Beard Award winner, Steven and I meet at one of his favorite places.

(soft guitar music) - Whenever I'm traveling at, it's one of my first stops in another city, I try to find the local market and just get a sense of the community.

- Yeah.

- It's always like just such a good snapshot of what's happening in the culture of the place.

- [Taria] Chef Steven Satterfield and I met at the Grant Park Farmer's Market where he knows everybody.

(soft guitar music) - I also love that there's such a strong farmer community here and there's a great farmer chef alliance, and so we're all working with a lot of the same ingredients, but the way they're interpreted are so different.

- And I think it shows how committed he is to not just buying, but engaging with his local community.

- I'm definitely a fan of letting ingredients shine - Mm.

- and trying to let them shine without too much manipulation.

- Yeah.

- And I think that's important to me, but everyone has their own perspective.

- Yeah.

- And I grew up in Georgia and eating a plate of vegetables, especially in the summertime.

- Right.

- That could be dinner with no one, no questions asked.

Like a good plate of vegetables and some cornbread or biscuits when you're done.

(soft upbeat music) - So, after Grand Park Farmer's Market, Chef Steven and I went to Ticonderoga Club.

(upbeat music) It's in Krog Street.

Ticonderoga is like tucked in the back.

(soft upbeat music) It's darker.

It definitely doesn't feel like it belongs.

It could be just in some alley, seedy alley.

But when you walk in, you feel so invited, you feel so good because now you actually have walked into that family.

It's a food family.

- Coming here for a nightcap.

You'll see some friends.

- Yep.

- It's the cheers of our hood.

(soft upbeat music) - I think what I really noticed about the food was that it did taste fresh for me being in a bar.

Everything that they're doing, they're doing in-house.

And so, but they're feeding other chefs.

They're feeding cook.

- Elevated bar food.

It's like craveable, delicious, fun.

Some of it's like (soft upbeat music) a little sassy.

(soft upbeat music) (elated music) (dramatic music) - So then, we went to the B-Side out in Decatur, which is a sister restaurant to the deer and the dove.

(dramatic music) Eating at Terry's cafe essentially was rewarding because he's so committed to local.

(dramatic music) He's so committed to keeping his purchases within his community.

- This kind of dish is inspiring to me because 10 years ago, people weren't thinking like this.

We have such a strong growers scene here.

So many farmer's markets have popped up over the years and all the chefs in Atlanta, I feel like, are aware of the seasons where they weren't before.

- You were one of the first chefs to start this.

- Well, I think it's how we should eat and the whole idea of like farm to table being a trend is infuriating to me because it really is the way we should be eating.

- We were talking earlier, Miller Union housed a lot of the chefs that are now doing some really incredible things.

And so, I think that is really significant to point that out.

I know that you're really humble, but- - [Steven] The School of MU.

- Yes, the School of MU.

That was- - I will say I'm dogmatic about how I think about food and that it's hard to waver my opinion, that as long (Taria laughing) as you're sourcing locally and responding to the seasons, it's probably gonna be pretty great.

Just don't F it up.

- Yeah.

(both laughing) (gentle music) Opening a restaurant, I don't think people realize how difficult it is and how much money it takes.

(soft upbeat music) It requires a lot of resources.

It's a lot market.

They have been hustling hard for several years doing popups.

I mean, pretty much putting themselves out there in every single way.

(soft upbeat music) So, they're not open, but in true Talat Market style, they cooked wherever they could.

So, they're cooking on the sidewalk in front of their future restaurant that doesn't have any equipment in it and serving us their food.

(soft upbeat music) - Yeah, I think it's what keeps the conversation going that we have these different experiences in our city that you can discover.

(soft upbeat music) - They have different ranges.

You can eat Talat Market in a restaurant setting, you can eat it on a street corner, but they are always still committed to it being as authentic to them, as to what they wanna share with it.

- And as the city continues to grow and develop, we continue to see more and more of this, and it's exciting.

It really is.

- They made a beef salad with lemongrass.

And what I loved was that they were cooking the rice in the same authentic way, on this propane burner.

And they made chicken wings, but they did just flat.

And so, it was the flavors that they were using.

(upbeat music) - It's a birth of a restaurant right here in front of us.

- Yeah.

(soft upbeat music) With so many vibrant colors to paint with and three chefs with completely different styles, (dramatic music) what would it look like to see them cook together?

How large of a canvas would we need?

(dramatic music) Coming to dinner with both Chef Steven Satterfield and Maricela Vega cooking (dramatic music) was beautiful because I was able to watch them share the story of their city, of the things that they value.

(dramatic music) (dramatic music continues) - Steven had like a Georgia summer on the plate with the cucumbers, peaches, some local cheese, tomatoes.

- [Taria] It's peach and tomato season right now.

- It was really great ingredients, prepared with real intention without a lot of manipulation and just letting things be the best version of what they are.

And that's what I've always loved about Steven's cooking.

(dramatic music) He knows when to interfere and when to not interfere.

(dramatic music) - [Taria] And when they came to cook together, they were constantly playing off each other in the kitchen.

(dramatic music) - Whereas Marcella had more of like where she comes from with her mom's tamales.

(dramatic music) So, my quick salsa that she did, it was delicious.

(dramatic music) - [Zeb] That's the type of tamales that they serve, where her family comes from in Guanajuato, with ingredients run by her mother.

It's just such a neat and super flavorful representation of her point of view in food.

(dramatic music) (dramatic music continues) (dramatic music continues) - And finally, Karen brings out her cake.

(dramatic music) (dramatic music continues) - The black swan was just like completely elaborate and amazing to look at.

I just couldn't believe it was actually a cake.

(dramatic music) - I haven't seen anything quite like that, ever.

(dramatic music) - Incredible detail with the beads and the different illustrations on the skin and everything, it was amazing.

(dramatic music) - [Taria] The flavors, the textures, this canvas displayed on a table is purely in Atlanta creation.

(dramatic music) But the inspiration comes from different cultures and convictions.

(dramatic music) In summary, I guess what I was tasting was Atlanta as a bright and vibrant meal, made by the people who truly know what this city has to offer.

(dramatic music)