The long-running culinary hit returns with a season that’s all about the pizza pie. From Portland to Phoenix, Italy to Japan, go inside the kitchens of chefs whose creativity elevates this ordinary dish to an art form via their unique flavors, inspiring backgrounds, and passion for creating the perfect slice.
The series premieres on Netflix September 7, 2022.
Episodes Include:
Chris Bianco (Phoenix, Arizona)
Chris Bianco changed pizza in America forever. He introduced the artisanal style that has blossomed in the last thirty years, became the first pizzaiolo to win a James Beard Award, and his Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, Ariz., is the stuff of legend. Originally from the Bronx, Bianco has four restaurants in Phoenix and recently opened a Pizzeria Bianco in Downtown Los Angeles — along with Bianco DiNapoli, a tomato company recently named the best canned tomatoes in America by The New York Times.
Gabriele Bonci (Rome, Italy)
One of Italy’s most famous chefs, Gabriele Bonci has become an icon making wildly creative variations of the Roman specialty pizza al taglio — baked in a pan and cut to size with scissors — on Italian TV, where he’s spent decades enthralling audiences, and at Pizzarium, Bonci’s iconic pizzeria located near the Vatican.
Ann Kim (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
Korean-born American Ann Kim looked back at her memories of growing up an immigrant in the Midwest and wanted to share her family’s food traditions — the kimchi, doenjang and gochujang that are Korean staples. The way she did it, however, was unique: Kim created wood-fired pizzas that fused Korean flavors with the pizza-making traditions she’d admired while in school in New York City. The James Beard Award-winning chef now has four restaurants across Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Franco Pepe (Caiazzo, Italy)
Dough is in Franco Pepe’s DNA. His grandfather was a baker, his father was a pizzamaker, and he and his brothers followed in the family business. Today, Franco is regarded as one of the greatest pizzaiolos in the world, renowned for his unique, hand-kneaded dough, his creative toppings that celebrate and reinvent classic Italian recipes, and his dedication for elevating the craft of pizza-making.
Yoshihiro Imai (Kyoto, Japan)
Yoshihiro Imai cooks pizza as the central component of an avant-garde kaiseki menu at his 12-seat restaurant, Monk, in a quiet neighborhood of Kyoto. Named because Imai’s friends thought he resembled a monk, his behavior and culinary approach is as spiritual as his restaurant’s namesake. Each day he forages alongside two Michelin-starred chefs in search of the best vegetables and herbs from the Hira mountains, and cooks every bit of food directly for his customers in an act of giving and care, from a wood-fired oven that’s the centerpiece of his beautiful restaurant.
Sarah Minnick (Portland, Oregon)
Sarah Minnick’s background as an artist is on display in her beautiful, brightly colored seasonal pizzas. Using produce exclusively from Oregon farms, Sarah combines the West Coast farmers market tradition with whole-grain sourdough bread-making techniques.
The pies at her family-run pizzeria are blanketed in fresh greens, foraged flowers, wild mushrooms, and distinctive vegetables.