The Pizza Show: Los Angeles

[Music] do we have some champagne here what we have a magnum what mintage is 2006 2006 okay I think it's a good maintain it sounds good to me you know how we taste so you take the glass just like mine and you say very complex and everybody gonna think you're the biggest wine connoisseur in the world [Music] Elly's food scene is red-hot and the pizzas are no different there's all kinds of pizzas coming out of LA now I'm gonna try a little bit of everything I'm used to New York Pizza culture where there's a slice on every block in LA it's a little more subtle you have to seek it out first I'm meeting up with Chrissy mm boom of night markets he knows everything about la food I'm we're hitting up his favorite pizza spot soda where are we right now it's a weird neighborhood to describe it's like right sort of on the border of Beverly Hills in West LA it's like no-man's land but it's like an oasis you know it's a spot I've been coming to for a long time being from LA and being LA guy what is a California Pizza like mean to you it's me California pizzas a lot of things I mean being that is not from LA or it's not from California we like things our way you know and you can see so many examples you know you can see like the classic wolfgang puck like salmon pizza or like one of my favorite things is like in the 80s the pecking duck pizza at California Pizza Kitchen just like out there and you know what I mean people like Alice Waters right and like Wolfgang Puck day always embraced like the produce and all the amazing stuff they California had to offer and then it almost seemed like well why don't we take the stuff and throw it on a pizza I think that's a big part of it if you think of a pizza as a thing that you could put other things on it's like we're in the perfect place to do that why is this your favorite pizzeria in LA I know the food scene but I'm also like a creature of habit like this became quickly like my favorite spot we opened Soto almost six years ago we try to do as traditional Neapolitan style as we can Margareta with anchovies this is my favorite right here we love it that with some olive oil and that's it [Music] awesome here we go this is what we were waiting for Bob so what do we have you this is the saucy Joe this is the margarita with anchovies and then this is the errata these are the classics here I can't wait to try it smells so good mmm back in the 90s my grandma who is the original chef of my family's restaurant she hooked up with Wolfgang Puck and they made like Thai pizzas at the time he had a restaurant in Malibu that is since closed down but he usually always come into the restaurant back in the day and he said hey why don't we get some like Thai stuff it's the most outrageous thing but I like that is something that is super LA into me you know people coming together different cultures and then making this food what do you think about that like a guy like Wolfgang Puck putting a pizza on the menu you know it's pretty crazy huh Wolfgang Puck is to me the pinnacle of like la cool he sort of was doing his own thing and was way ahead of the game Hey oh it's delicious it's delicious how's it going Steve good to see you that's my go-to but this is like the sleeper hit sit around and eat beets and drink beer love it it's my favorite experience [Music] where it's Fargo right now Beverly Hills because of a Michelin star restaurant it's been a staple in Los Angeles forever well I asked for a coffee and the maitre d was sweet enough to not only bring out just a regular coffee for me but I mean they put it out in this great tray with these you know all the accoutrements to go along some cream sugar oh wow and even some extra coffee so I mean you could tell just like the way they do things here is really special I'm actually really nervous to meet Wolfgang Puck I mean this is Wolfgang Puck if this is a big deal and even the coffee's courteous our love's hey chef how are you young man pleasure to meet you thank you so much better my tattoos I think I'm gonna have to get to look at that I mean you go into this maybe I'm too young I'm really excited to hear about the story of the classic smoked salmon pizza I had as many hair as you had when I invented it you know that this is the original location this is actually the second location we have we started up on Sunset Boulevard in 1982 in January and you know I used to have to smoke someone on the menu because I bought a smoker you couldn't find good smoke someone in LA it's a I open Spargo end up in the pizza oven because we couldn't get a good pizza either so we have the dough here and we always say it has to feel like the butt of a baby I don't know if you had kids already no children yet for me the crust has to be thin and then we brush it with oil no I'd never put it on the menu at the beginning we used to be so busy people waited an hour even if you had a reservation at 8 o clock if you can see that at 9:00 you were lucky I remember feeding Lionel Richie and and Jimmy Connors and I'm gonna take anything I had no place for them to sit so I told Jimmy why don't sit on the step and have the pizza they were sitting boys on the step eating pizza likes cooking and you know if you didn't know the restaurant you didn't know about the pizza pie they say they're working to make us a smoked salmon pizza and you know it was like the secret singing became much more popular than ever alright so now we're gonna sprinkle a little onions on top put it in your right and then something's burning the floors pretty hot you can see even in one minute already look at that so it's good to have this nice bubble here is our smoked salmon an important part is you'll have to slice it really tip it up it smells delicious that's not you watch the pizza in there keep an eye back here you're the sous chef today or they serve I [Music] think we're doing great what do you tell beautiful it's right on that plate perfectly pizza was so refreshed it lips a little bit with olive oil yeah I have a mixture of creme fraiche sour cream dill shallots lemon juice and a little pepper we want the cream the cream is delicious with the bread and everything all we have to cover is with smoked salmon and just lay them and let a little bit of the border to show yeah go up a little bit it's okay some chives is always nice and then we put each piece with a little caviar well I think we find somebody with some champagne and we can eat how what you're saying that sounds good to me the pizza and the wine thank you thank you I could eat that every day really amazing this is so good well you can pull in so many people in Brooklyn it was like always we had a play by the rules you know when it came to margherita pizzas and the Sicilian pizzas but you know it was easier to do something different on the west coast why because on the East Coast you had this tradition of all this old Italian families who came from Calabria from Sicily from Naples if you gave them a pizza like that they would have thrown it after you forget it so people who are more new things because we didn't have this history from chefs to Restaurant tours Wolfgang Puck has inspired so many people in the field industry including these two men right here Larry flax and Rick Rosenfield in the 1980s these former federal prosecutors quit their jobs and decided to open up a pizzeria California Pizza Kitchen you could thank these men for popularizing chicken on pizza well we're sitting in our new restaurant bottle fish in Brentwood west side of Los Angeles yet looking directly at our sixth restaurant so right across is CPK the California Pizza Kitchen that you guys started that's right what was California like what was Beverly Hills like back then we opened our first restaurant which is still there on South Beverly Drive in a restaurant that it failed I think three or four times so it was one of those cursed spots the last it was called Zen you know we always talked big in other words we didn't think about just having one restaurant and that was gonna be it this was gonna be the start of a trust a chain of restaurants California style pizza was really in its infancy though it wasn't even really a style was it well there was and and it was created by Alice Waters up at Chez Panisse in Berkeley right there's no question she is the mother of it and the idea of the individual style pizza right and then a Wolfgang Puck it brought it down to Spago and then we decided that we would bring that to the masses and wrote that we were gonna create the third style of pizza that there was New York Pizza there was the cago pizza and we were here to create the third style of California pizza when it comes to the California Pizza Kitchen barbecue chicken that's you guys all the way no there's no question it's truly original we have to admit we didn't create it it was the barbecue chicken that even opened our mind so we had this concept of what we wanted on the pizza but when we open the first restaurant a lot of our pizzas were the punk style pizzas there was duck sausage there was rabbit sauce we really did have Cavett sauce so we brought in what happened is the original pizza chef from Spandau was our consultant he created this sparkle like menu but it had barbecue chicken feet barbecue chicken pizza has been my time we sold the company five years ago thirty years of history it was number one in every single restaurant every single day worldwide that was our always our theorem us anything that we worked good on bread would work good on a pizza last time I had barbecue chicken pizza was at CPK in 1999 at the sympathy even more Long Island I'm due for a visit I met with Brian Sullivan the head of culinary innovation for CPK so what would you say is the prototypical classic California Pizza I think it starts with the thin and tocks crust and really fresh ingredients using the crust this gives a canvas that kind of just to push them out so this is the pizza that started it all right here that's it yeah this is the original of the iconic barbecue chicken pizza that was created in 1985 at California Pizza Kitchen so we're gonna make the barbecue chicken pizza we're gonna start with our barbecue sauce this is our original barbecue sauce it's the next ingredient is smoked gouda cheese just we just put a sprinkling of that on there and this is mozzarella cheese the next ingredient is our barbecue chicken with this pizza on the original menu it was and so it hasn't changed since and that hasn't changed since it's been exactly this recipe from day one then we'll top it off with fresh red onions so that's it that's that's a simple it can be and we'll put it in the oven I will just stick it right in here and go right in the center of this what's the wackiest beat so I ended up on the menu yeah I would have to say an egg salad pizza the egg salad hot we also did a sushi pizza not a good idea - wow you guys went there and we did yes I don't think it lasts of more than like two weeks and that was absolutely okay I think already awesome it smells so good I feel like I'm back at the mall as a kid right now I like taking you back yet and then we finish it off with a little barbecue sauce I think it just kind of accentuates the flavor a little bit and then the last ingredient is fresh cilantro nice cheers cheers man looks all done hmm take you back it's sweet it's a little salty right but the bread is nice and light you know it's definitely a California style pizza you know what I mean why do you think this pizza had so much success I think that it's just flavors that people can relate to that it just it's like this perfect marriage yeah I think maybe a lot of people might have rejected at first but even in my neighborhood you walk over to our neighborhood slice pizzeria chances are there's gonna be a barbecue chicken slice there you know I think it's definitely is a testament to you guys on what you've done in the pizza industry that's pretty cool and if New Yorkers can accept that the Nets cut away their right it's a big plane I think that's a big wing just like the LA food scene as a whole there's a diverse Pizza culture here that extends further than the California style I mean you could even get a New York slice out here now so what are Fairfax in front of pine pizza a pizzeria that I created with some friends prime is sort of a New York style pizzeria in Los Angeles in my opinion on one of the blocks that feels like a New York block it's got a bunch of different stores on it it's a lot of people walking back and forth about three years ago now I got a call from you guys asking me to come help out and open up a pizzeria in three years later here we are you started us off on the right foot and it was with your initial help and your dough recipe that we really flourished into we are now I think we just found trying pizzas number one fan do I get a hug I'm interested to see what the New York slice culture is like in Los Angeles I'm gonna go on a piece of crawl with two friends that are on either side of the New York LA Pizza spectrum my boy Pauly was born and raised in Queens a true Queens kids come from Queens I can go on any major street and there's a pizza place that's the neighborhood spot so Kevin you grew up in Beverly Hills when I was growing up was just like pizza I was fun and those just like Domino's is fine you know Oh what happened if you picked up the phone and you told your mother to call Domino's back in the day I'd be sleeping you know I'll be sleeping in the backyard so we're gonna check out like three New York Pizza raised here in LA we're starting here at prime what's the pizza culture out of the airport it's bleak there really I mean you know it's not like we have in New York where we dislike pizza on every corner we're gonna get a slice real quick on the go so that right there shows you that the culture is really different like I didn't know what ranch was until I came to LA what are you dipping that in like I was like beautiful there it is oh there's a range this one looks great what's going on here this is the square that's our take on the grandma peeps I'm going with this one I'm gonna go with that ranch so even though we're in LA we still got to do the full get great Sicilian fluffy yeah you always want that fluffy still yeah no you got the last one barbecue chicken no this is what's up there's a hot penis come on the barbecue matter what I love it oh yeah really guys do a great job yeah yeah yeah yeah beautiful so we got a couple slices in us you guys ready to hit the next couple spots yeah growing up Pizza really kind of permeated like pop culture in a way that we just yeah yeah I mean I was done hello four years in a row so I know you know I was doing I was a ninja turtle it was always just fun it says he just knew that your pizza was involved it was just like you know this Saturday is gonna be real you know but you seen it in like you know growing pains or like the old show like there's no bug like Orko that the Winslow residence yeah like step on the cow would pop out with the air feeds all right our second stop today is delicious pizza and West Adams a pizzeria born from the iconic hip hop record label delicious vinyl their New York style pizza is all organic and uses a homegrown natural you starting so it's Cali influence is clear you guys have to my favorite things going on pizza and hip-hop pretty combination don't you think I think it's a fantastic company I know you're gonna start spitting for me in a minute oh you want to hear my buzz when I first walked in I had no clue that you guys were delicious vinyl I mean some great hip-hop artists had been signed to your IQ label and then years later you opened this place up this is a kind of a classic area of Los Angeles they didn't have any pizza in this area so we built this place two years ago and one of the things that keeps popping up when your pizzeria comes up is how good the dough is and how good the crust is Travis is my partner's son who's our chemist and our baker this is the man behind the dough right here Travis who created their pizza recipe can talk to you about dough for hours our dough cool fermentation control the temperatures as best you can I'm a chair has figured out how to do this way better than many factory process low and slow that's the best one nice life you guys knocked out of the park yeah real I think the pizza is like very much like a good New York slice my body goes right yeah I'm trying to figure out where your delivery cutoff [Laughter] [Music] so we're on the third leg about Pizza crawl we're at Pizza needs to downtown in the artistic of LA it's owned by an iconic pro skater it's got that feeling of community they do really awesome pizza and do some really different stuff as well we're going inside to the open Pete's Mesa in June 2011 we wanted to kind of create a place where we wouldn't want to hang out and our friends would want to hang out and I've been skateboarding my whole life since the late 70s had a great career doing that and one of the things that I've always loved about skateboarding is the camaraderie right but that's the thing you find in pizza you know embraces like every ethnic background socio-economic background different beautiful that's the meet Jesus Jesus sausage one was meat cheeseless meet jesus oh yeah right yeah the meat cheese is gnarly this is good yeah is really good something about this right now like being on the street people walking by it almost feels like I'm standing outside of Jones it's a flip out window very rare in Los Angeles this is so good man awesome veggies I really wanted to try this I love when pizzerias do like the gluten-free vegetarian of the vegan pizza it shows that they're not scared of the challenge this vegan pizzas so good man it's so different like fresh vegetables it's not canned mushrooms this place to me feels so original and its style and its formed not playing by any rules and like that's just don't right so what do you think fellas I'm full yeah that's a good pizza yeah yeah really open my eyes it's surprising the idea that LA doesn't have great pizza it's kind of wrong you know what I mean it's like this is the true definition of a neighborhood between yeah great day great day man yo thank you so much come with me absolutely I feel like yeah man we nailed it yeah yeah I'll a piece of coral 2017 yo Thank You Donatello I'm ending my la Pizza journey with the classic Casa Bianca pizza pie and Eagle Rock it's been here since 1955 it hasn't changed one bit my longtime friend Brent is joining me for a pizza a Casa Bianca Pizza Hut it's his family's favorite pizzeria and they've been coming here for years Frank looks kind of like an Italian Jonathan Gould Ned and his sister took over this business from their parents and worked hard to preserve this le classic I grew up in the business probably around 11 or 12 started doing things and helping her on and absorbing everything by osmosis this evolved so much over the years that will give people that come from New York or Chicago and they'll say it tastes like it tastes like New York or tastes like Chicago I don't put a label on it you know if it tastes good that's the bottom line [Music] yes so good this has been a favorite pizzeria our family its iconic you know where you gonna go this is one of the features that keeps coming up when we talk to people about la I think when you've been here as long as they have there's a reason so Ned what what pizza we eating right now we call this the deluxe pizza yeah sausage mushroom and bell peppers just been on the menu just has been on since day one 1955 Brent's daughter and I went to college yeah they were good friends the first place she said was Casa Bianca I saw I gave Brenna call her dad and she's been a regular for many years are there a lot of regulars that come in here people that you see I see people that have been coming here and then they're they bring their little kids here and then their kids get older and they get married and then they bring their kids yeah [Music] when you think in California that most people think it's Jaco losing the Mexican food what does it mean to be a pizza place and so iconic like you guys yeah I think that's one of the cool things about Los Angeles there's all kinds of restaurants I mean you got a place like ours which is a throwback to the 1950s and then you got other places that's the beauty of this none of this town I think we got so much to choose from the pizza journeys and in here at Casa Bianca common Los Angeles I was curious what to expect is there a pizza culture like what is the California Pizza style but in all honesty after all the places that we've been to the style is sort of there is no style the one rule is there are no rules you get to do whatever you want in California as long as the pizza tastes good everyone's gonna be happy [Music]

Channel: Munchies

Views: 3,323,597

Keywords: how to, cooking, Munchies, Munchiestv, food, drinks, eating, chef, restaurant, VICE, chef's night out, matty matheson, action bronson, documentary, documentaries, interview, interviews, culture, world, exclusive, independent, underground, travel, funny, journalism, vice, vice videos, vicevideos, the pizza show, pizza, west coast, los angeles, LA, california, malibu, west coast pizza, frank pinello, wolfgang puck, california pizza kitchen, spago's, bbq chicken pizza, pizza toppings

Id: H_hUMnmrQuI

Length: 25min 6sec (1506 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 16 2017