Food & Living

Charles Namba and Courtney Kaplan, the couple behind Echo Park's Tsubaki, have always loved the culture of izakaya but found Los Angeles lacking in these Japanese taverns. Sonoko Sakai is a teacher with a passion for buckwheat and the near-sacred art of soba noodles, and Seiichi Yokota knows how to prepare and preserve fresh fish with a traditional Japanese technique never seen before in Los Angeles. Each aims to introduce Angelenos to the unique spirit of Japanese hospitality and the culture's deep culinary customs.

George heads to the iceberg capital of the world — Newfoundland, Canada — for an up-close look at these floating giants from above, from below, and from the very top of a frozen mountain on the move.

Banh Mi. Spring rolls. Pho. The war and its subsequent refugees. These are things most commonly associated with the Vietnamese culture and its people. But a group of chefs in Los Angeles (including Cassia’s Bryant Ng and Diep Tran of Good Girl Dinette) are hoping to demonstrate that there’s so much more than that. Featured in the episode: Cassia in Santa Monica, Good Girl Dinette in Highland Park, Red Boat Fish Sauce, and Minh Phan of Porridge & Puffs.

Chef Claudette Zepeda-Wilkins opens her new restaurant, El Jardín, in San Diego. Inspired by the traditions of generations of Mexican women and combining regional heirloom ingredients from across Mexico, Zepeda-Wilkins takes a huge risk to elevate the cuisine in her hometown.

Deep in the Amazon, George is determined to retrace Theodore Roosevelt’s legendary expedition and witness first-hand how deforestation and climate change are affecting one of the earth’s most critical ecosystems.

Ground zero for climate change and literally at risk of being wiped off the map, George is in Bangladesh during monsoon season to see how resilient and creative locals are adapting to their increasingly hostile environment.

The Jewish Delis of Los Angeles serve an important role for connecting heritage to food. Factor’s Famous Deli has been a central pillar for the community for 70 years while newcomers like Micah Wexler and Michael Kassar of Wexler’s Deli bring a fresh take to classic deli food traditions.

In San Francisco’s Chinatown, Brandon Jew walks the line between his Chinese heritage and his American upbringing with his restaurant, Mister Jiu’s. With the rapid gentrification of the neighborhood, the face of the country’s oldest Chinatown is changing while a younger generation holds on to the traditions and flavors of the past.

Off the coast of West Africa, George heads to a remote volcanic island where a river of molten lava is engulfing a mountain village. For locals, the consequences are disastrous, and it’s up to George to get as close as possible to provide emergency crews with critical information.

The world’s largest land predator is under threat, and George is heading to Canada’s far north to see how polar bears are coping with their rapidly changing climate.

Jake Myrick and Noriko Kamei have taken their love for namazake and created Sequoia Sake, a small brewery in the heart of San Francisco. Rooted in the traditions of Japanese sake brewing, they work to resurrect an heirloom rice in California and pioneer the young but growing craft sake movement in the US.

Two extraordinary women of Palestinian descent, Reem Assil and Lamees Dahbour, use food to bring their misunderstood homeland closer to Western tolerance and acceptance.

Los Angeles’ booming food scene is being shaped by a new generation of chefs. Visit almost any kitchen in Los Angeles and it is likely you will find a migrant chef combining ethnic cuisines with new flavors and techniques. And often within the food, is a story of their migration.

“The politics of migration, the labor economy, all that drama plays out in the restaurants that we go to,” says journalist and author Rubén Martínez

Hoping to determine the effect of volcanoes on climate change, George heads to the island nation of Vanuatu where he rappels into the fiery crater of one of the world’s most active volcanoes.

Jazz Singsanong of Jitlada Thai and Louis Tikaram of E.P. & L.P. transport the palate around the world with the complex flavors of Thai cuisine. These chefs work to bring balance to the complexity of flavors that reflect the mixed cultural influences of their own backgrounds and experiences.

George heads Down Under during fire season to see if climate change is slowly causing Australia to become uninhabitable. He joins a team of sophisticated firefighters in the South Australia, but what starts as a low-intensity bush fire quickly becomes a raging inferno.