Bizarre Foods America is an American television series, and a spin-off of Bizarre Foods, this time focusing on the United States rather than international travel. Andrew Zimmern travels to various cities throughout the country (as well as Canada, Colombia, and Peru) and samples local cuisines and ways of life. The show premiered on Monday January 23, 2012, at 9:00 ET on Travel Channel.
Much like in Bizarre Foods, Andrew heads to food hubs in the country. There he meets with locals and chefs to gain a better understanding of American cuisine, to explore how America has developed a reputation as a melting pot of cultures and foods, and to see what sort of foods are available in American cities.
Starting October 27, 2014 the show is returning to its original format as Bizarre Foods.
Episodes
Season 1 No. Air dates Location Notes/featured bizarre foods1 (1)January 24, 2012Twin CitiesAndrew visits a hotdish cook off, deep fried snapping turtle, elk kabobs, guinea pig confit cone, Jucy Lucy, Cajun Bluesy, duck nuts, butter burgers, making meals with meat glue, carp, Hmong cuisine including bitter bamboo soup, papaya salad at Hmongtown Marketplace.2 (2)January 30, 2012New Orleans"Swamp Food"; alligator; crawfish with "Cajun Napalm" boil; boudin; hog ponce; frogs legs; frog piquant; roux; rabbit; cracklings; Andrew participates in a New Orleans "Second Line" funeral procession; a visit to Willie Mae's Scotch House; gumbo; chicken creole; raccoon; turtle; cooking with jazz trumpeter Kermit Ruffins; a visit to the largest Vietnamese community in the South; jackfruit; boiled peanuts; b quan; tiet cahn aka Vietnamese pizza; Vietnamese hot pot. 3 (3)February 6, 2012Seattle Andrew visits the world's famous Pikes Place Fish Market, a visit to a high-tech food lab. Pea butter, everything bagel soup, rare beef stew, geoduck, a visit to Sea Breeze Farms, fresh duck blood, duck liver, cow placenta, colostrum, making coffee using century old equipment and a $20,000 espresso coffee maker called "The Slayer", kim chi rice bowl, kabuki hot dog, Chinese BBQ pork dim sum, salmon collar, lychee bubble tea, cold jellyfish, ika shiukara, herring roe. Crispy potato vine with natto, a visit to FareStart restaurant training center. Sweetbreads, lamb kidneys, ox hearts.4 (4)February 13, 2012BostonSpiny dogfish fetuses, squid ink pasta, cannoli, salumi, coppa di testa, salchicche e rapè, skate, Cambodian rice porridge, praw-hak, Yao Hun, tripe salad, toasted silkworms, oysters, a seafood boil feast, a visit to a physics class at Harvard on food science, New England summer salad with chorizo powder, Arctic char, waygu, bone marrow custard, Boston style pizza.5 (5)February 20, 2012DetroitDeep South soul food, Peking duck, caramel cake, BBQ pig head, mower mani fore meatloaf, raccoon, kofta, kataif, kunufa, a Ramadan Iftar feast in Dearborn, spicy head cheese, pig's foot jelly, lamb kidney sub, dried fish pizza, ghost pepper pizza, bean custard pie, BBQ pig snouts, terrine, pizza Bismarck 6 (6)February 27, 2012West VirginiaDeer pluck, roast and heart, pepperoni rolls, squirrel stock, burgoo, groundhog, woodchuck cacciatore, picked ramps, corn fritters, a visit to the Pocahontas County roadkill cookoff festival featuring kettle corn, corn flakes cubes, walking tacos, mink chowder, turtle stew, hare, rabbit, asparagus and wild turkey stew, goat, squirrel and rabbit gumbo, smeared hog with groundhog gravy, crow cheese, beechnuts, corncob jelly.7 (7)March 5, 2012CharlestonTail terrine, chitterlings, lima beans, osawbwa, fried chicken skins, fried pigs ear, Carolina Cagbui trotters, Charleston gold rice, blood clams, microwaved clams, quail with okra, poor man's stew, chicken feet, mac and cheese, pig's feet, shrimp and grits, chicken bog, butter beans, Hughenot torte. 8 (8)March 12, 2012SavannahSoul food Savannah-style, oxtails, red velvet cake with sour cream frosting, scuppernongs, seafood boil, a visit with Savannah's legendary The Lady Chablis, New South Kosher cuisine, pastrami and grit cakes, chopped liver and pastrami egg rolls, barbecued beef brisket blintz.
Season 2 No. Air date Location Notes/featured bizarre foods1 (9)July 9, 2012Las VegasA Hamburger that costs five thousand dollars made with Kobe beef; a sundae that costs $1,000; cupcake that costs $750; tuna cones, artisan chocolates, how buffet leftovers become a feast at a pig farm in the outskirts of Las Vegas, a seafood restaurant that has an Italian fish market flown in every day; dinner for 1,800 people at Muhammad Ali's 70th birthday.2 (10)July 16, 2012San DiegoGiant California Sea Urchin, spot prawns, Baja octopus, swordfish marrow with Yuzu and soy sauce, black cod foie gras, urchin gelato, tortas ahogadas, BBQ lamb Texcoco style, corn smut, fried crickets, pancita, a behind the scene visit to the San Diego Zoo during feeding time, Filipino comfort and street food, a visit to a camel dairy, foraging wild edible plants and abalone on the San Diego coastline .3 (11)July 23, 2012MiamiAndrew explores the iconic treasures and hidden delights that make Miami's food scene special: A visit to La Caja China box roaster factory; Zimmern samples tambala cheese; guayaba; Cuban-style chicharrones; plantains; boiled yuca; papaya juice; stone crabs; Zimmern visits the Keys fishery, he samples Japanese waygu Beef; a steak that cost $400; a six-foot long Alaskan King Crab for $600; Zimmern visits the "sexiest ice cream trucks" in South Beach; he samples oyster sandwiches; a visit to the La Purisima Griteria celebration in Sweetwater's Little Managua; vigaron; Nicaraguan tamales; lengua; Nicaraguan shaved ice with dulce de leche; fish roe; bottarga; wahoo; cobia; wreckfish; caribbean reef octopus; a visit to Cobaya at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, monstera fruit, panna cotta. 4 (12)July 30, 2012New MexicoPrairie Dog roasted with cedar, Elk stew in red chile sauce, Green Zebra Tomatoes, a visit to the Earthship colony near Taos, Buffalo Pluck, Tia Sophia's Christmas style platters with red and green chile, tacos, menudo, green chile cheeseburgers, a mantaza celebration in Los Lunas, Sanguie Stew, carne avovada, chicharrones.5 (13)August 6, 2012L.A. Pop UpAndrew creates a menu inspired by his travels around the world for a hungry dinner crowd in LA.6 (14)August 13, 2012AustinBloody Marys made with real blood, whole roasted pigeons, donuts topped with chicken and milkshakes made with bacon, venison lean tacos, scrambled pig brains, tortilla made with bacon fat, jar jar duck, lardo, trotter croquettes, wild boar tacos, Pon Haus, Texas style BBQ, food truck offerings from lamb hearts to yakitori.7 (15)August 20, 2012The Blues TrailAndrew tastes everything from southern staples like smoked baloney sandwiches, deep fried chicken livers, and pork rinds, to new spins on old staples, "Chinese chitlins", chicken skins, Chinese-style BBQ spare ribs, crawdads Cantonese, bean curd with seaweed, Venison pepper steak, pig ear sandwiches, Delta hot tamales, barbecue pork rib tips, catfish páté, "Smokes" sausage sandwiches, a visit to a Red's Blues Club & Juke Joint in Clarksdale, Mississippi.8 (16)August 27, 2012The Other FloridaFrog legs; hunting armadillos; catching alligators, mud fish, garfish, Seminole cooking including water turtle, pumpkin fry bread, Indian burgers, sofkey, swamp cabbage, fiddlehead ferns.
Season 3 No. Air date Location Notes/featured bizarre foods1 (17)February 11, 2013Washington D.C.Fresh snakehead pulled from the Potomac; pupusas at a Salvadoran restaurant; peanut butter sandwiches made with foie gras, food trucks in Capitol Hill, a visit to a restaurant which serves historical foods from America's past, kosher soul food.2 (18)February 18, 2013DenverRocky Mountain oysters at a ballpark; yak and elk served at an historic restaurant; pheasant cooked outside, Mongolian milk tea and dried curds,"Den-Mex" cuisine, Vietnamese style blood sausages, ant larva beignets. Note: this episode was dedicated to the memory of Greg "Cubby" Cabera.3 (19)February 25, 2013IowaPork brains with spring onion kimchi; a stew made from a sheep's head; roasted Iowa Swabian-Hall pigs; young Iowa Swabian-Hall pigs testicles, blood sausage; a visit to a chartreuse factory; janternice; head cheese; jellied tripe; a visit to a Sudanese neighborhood in Des Moines and participating in a Sudanese feast; ongfinch; kisra.4 (20)March 4, 2013Alaska's Inside PassageFresh sea cucumbers; salmon eggs; fish heads that are buried before they're roasted over a fire; octopus; gumboots; kelp.5 (21)March 11, 2013WisconsinScience behind what makes milk taste better; a traditional Serbian casserole made with lamb organs; emu testicles.6 (22)March 18, 2013Chicago's Cutting EdgeA fish dish made with ambergris; charcuterie that includes duck heart pate; a soup that smells like a dead body; blood mortadella: blood morti sandwich pork pie: Korean flatfish; Boondae; "The Edible Campfire"; a visit to Supreme Lobster & Seafoods: frost fish Opah; sea lettuce;plankton; jade tiger; 7 (23)March 25, 2013Baltimore and Chesapeake BayBeef tongue sandwiches; Korean style soul foods that include boiled pig stomach (hog maw), cod sperm, cod roe, stewed pork intestines and blood sausage; traditional bay foods like barbecued baked muskrat and grilled eel (Maryland surf and turf); steamed blue crabs; a visit to the J.M. Clayton seafood packing plant; lake trout (aka late trout) fermented bean paste, fried seaweed, Army based stew, Korean barbecue, spicy pork belly, baby octopus, a visit to Five Seed Farms community farm, fig leaves, rockfish, fish peppers, Maryland hams, soft shell crabs, sorrel, leeks, strawberries, Andrew works alongside the Arabber fruit vendors of Baltimore.8 (24)April 1, 2013The OzarksFried rabbit legs; redhorse and northern suckerfish, Arkansas black bear cracklin's; bacon-wrapped crow breast, Vietnamese style fish fry, sour catfish soup, fish spring rolls, a squirrel cookoff in Bentonville, Arkansas.9 (25)April 15, 2013Northern CaliforniaGrilled dove hearts; barf flavored jelly beans; monkeyface eel, California White Sage, poached dove breast, Buffalo Mozzarella, Birria de Chivo, Chicken Molé, a visit to the Jelly Belly jelly bean factory, baby wipes flavored jelly beans, red apple flavored jelly beans, rotten egg flavored jelly beans, booger flavored jelly beans, earwax flavored jelly beans, limpets, cabazon, lamb, mutton sheep heart ragout. 10 (26)April 22, 2013PortlandElk heart tartare with a raw turkey egg; bourbon smoked cherries and bone barrow; goose liver with cacao; honey made from beehives from local back yards; honey lavender ice cream; fermented salami; salt cured hogs; lardo; a visit to an exotic salt shoppe; bourbon cured pigeon crudo; wagashi; Hanabira; chocolate foie gras bars; chocolate with chicharrones and peppers; foietella; a visit to an urban farm.
Season 4