- Let's go back in time to an era when Peoria hosted huge rock concerts, right in the middle of the town at Glen Oak Park.

- Well, not only were they huge in size, they were huge names like Fleetwood Mac.

You gotta see this.

(upbeat music) - Speaking of Glen Oak Park, that's where you'll find the Peoria Zoo.

- Oh, that's my favorite.

I love going to visit the animals, but I do have an exception of animals I don't like, snakes.

- Don't like the snakes?

- No.

- Then you probably wouldn't wanna work there and here's why.

There's a massive Burmese Python, 17 feet long, 200 pounds.

And recently the folks who worked there had to move it from one spot to another.

That's a big snake to move.

- How do you move a big snake like that?

- Very carefully and with all hands on deck.

Everyone reaches in, picks her up and moves her.

We're gonna show you how they do that in a little while.

- You know what other critter really gives me the creeps, Asian carp.

- Oh, I get it, I get it.

They're choking the river.

They're a nuisance.

They're slimy.

They're gross, but they're delicious.

- They're what, delicious?

- Oh yeah.

There's a restaurant in Peoria that's started to serve Asian carp.

- Well, how do they get from their slimy jumpy to the restaurant?

- Well, they don't jump into the restaurant.

- Well they could.

- There's now a new fishery in east Peoria that not only has found a tasty way to prepare them for food, but he uses the whole fish for a lot of stuff.

Let's go take a look, now.

- [Julie] What's in a name?

hopefully a promising business where others have failed.

That's the idea at Sorce Freshwater, a fish processing plant along the Illinois river in East Peoria.

For 20 years, entrepreneurs have tried to harvest and sell Asian carp up and down the river with very little success.

The State is trying to help by pushing a kinder and gentler name for the fish.

But Sorce Freshwater knows the success lies, not just in marketing the fish, but eating it.

At the plant, now in its second year, owner, Roy Sorce, thinks his processing methods are cooking up a tasty future.

With restaurants giving his product a whirl.

- They are currently making a couple different items.

We have restaurants that are making burgers or sliders.

Some of 'em are making fish tacos.

Actually we have some restaurants that are actually doing nuggets or fish sticks-type things with them also.

- [Julie] More than 30 years ago, Asian carp wriggled out of fish farms down south and invaded the Illinois river.

The species are voracious with their appetite, threatening the survival of other aquatic life in the river.

And they are dangerous when spooked.

Asian carp, some as big as 110 pounds, leap out of the water when threatened and well, it threatens the wellbeing of water skiers and others on the side.

The river bulges with upwards of 50 million pounds of Asian carp, with almost a third of that in what's known as the Peoria Pool.

- It's a situation where it has the right current, the right water temperature and the right water depth.

- [Julie] Sorce says there's no way to eliminate Asian carp.

Just contain it, by harvesting and selling.

But how will Sorce Freshwater succeed where others have floundered?

For one, he has made an outreach to fishermen to assure them of a steady market.

At Sorce Freshwater, prices for Asian carp have gone from 10 cents per pound to 20 cents.

Not long ago, 13 fishermen used to make about $40,000 a year.

Now the plant supports 20 fishermen, who make upwards of $120,000 a year.

- They wanna work for us because they see this as being a market that can work and actually, as opposed to being a side job, is now a profession for them.

- [Julie] Sorce's business plan involves processing every part of the fish, organs, bones, skins, everything.

He sells those products to manufacturers who focus on fertilizer, pharmaceuticals, even fashion.

If you can believe it, Asian carp skins are being used to make some glitzy handbags.

- It's no different than what they've done with eels.

I think they're called freshwater eels or the lampreys and things like that.

They make those eel skin bags and things like that out of those.

- [Julie] Plus the local fish and flesh only, not bones and gunk, soon will be used to make dog food.

- They will be used in both feed as in, a kibble-type product, but also a jerky or a treat-type product.

- [Julie] But the Asian carp isn't intended just for dog bowls.

At the heart of Sorce Freshwater, the fish are being processed for the dinner table, at home and at restaurants.

Roy Sorce emphasizes that Asian carp are not the same as common carp, which are scavengers.

- They're not bottom feeders.

They're a heart-healthy and nutritious fish.

The only healthier fish is wild caught salmon.

- Along those lines, the State is helping by changing the image of the fish.

Rebranding it as copi.

- Copi was an original name that the state of Illinois came up with, meaning copious.

And it was a product of a marketing search and team that they put together to come up with a different name for these fish to make them more appealing to the US consumer.

- [Julie] But a new name is no magic wand.

People will have to want to eat the fish.

So for different recipes, Sorce is selling it in two ways, ground as mince fish for about $2 a pound, as strips for about $10 a pound.

Restaurants, some in Chicago, some out of State are seeing success with copi dishes.

- They all use the copi name, but they're calling them either sliders or fish tacos.

But copi is the biggest connecting force right now for that product.

- [Julie] As far as making it at home, there's only one place to get Sorce Freshwater's copi, at the plant.

3201 North Main Street in East Peoria.

But you don't have to be a chef to cook copi.

The fish is easy to cook with and has almost no taste or smell.

- [Sorce] These fish, unlike most fish you purchase or have eaten from the supermarket or other restaurants have a very mild taste in flavor.

They're a very mild white fish.

I would say that if you don't season these fish, it's gonna taste like basically ground Turkey.

- We'll get to that Asian carp restaurant in just a little bit and your taste buds, they're gonna be amazed.

- Well, I'm excited because I love new recipes, new restaurants, but really I love the old favorites like grilled cheese.

- Oh, those are delicious.

And you can get just that at Jimmy's Bar in West Peoria, but with a twist.

Instead of bread, they use a roll.

Anybody'd think, well, what's the difference there?

Well, recently they tried to go from the roll to the bread and customers went ballistic.

They said, "bring back the roll!".

- Well, let's find out what makes it such a big deal, right now.

- Hi, I'm Grace Spears.

Today I'm gonna show you how we make our Jimmy's Grilled Cheese.

So what we do is we start off with our hoagie bun.

You're gonna wanna press it out.

So it's easier to get the whole cheese melted.

Once you have it pressed out, we actually go this side down on the grill, but you're first gonna want to get some butter on there.

I do butter both sides just because I think it tastes better, but right on the grill, just lay it right there, face down, and then you're gonna want to get our cheese out.

We do a total of four pieces of cheese, we do American and Swiss.

And then once you have your cheese on, you are just gonna put a cover right on, because you're gonna wanna wait 'til the cheese melts and the bottom gets a little brown.

It will usually take about five to seven minutes, but once it starts to brown, you see it down there on the bottom.

You kind of just do a squat and kneel down and see it.

So you get your exercise in for the day too.

We started using hoagie buns because when my grandpa was cooking here, we ran outta buns one day and people really prefer the hoagie buns.

We tried to switch to Texas toast like a couple years ago and people did not like it.

We don't even like cut the bread or anything.

It's just our grilled cheese and people come in to see us for it.

So it's an easy sandwich to make.

All right, so our grilled cheese is ready to come off.

You can see the cheese was starting to fall off the sides there.

That's a good indication that everything's ready to flip her over.

I usually give it a press down, flip over on both sides to make sure that they're pretty even.

And then we just go and we do our plating.

(upbeat music) - [Group] Fun fact!

- Fun fact, the phrase, "think with your head and not with your heart", can't be applied to shrimp, since their hearts are located in their head.

(soft guitar music) - [Phil] Once upon a time, the heart of Peoria rocked.

Turn back the clock to the mid 1970s, right in the middle of the city, amid a venerable residential neighborhood, Glen Oak Park served as host for some of the biggest touring names in music.

Nazareth, Charlie Daniels, even believe it or not, Fleetwood Mac.

Almost five decades later, it all seems like almost a dream.

Maybe even an urban legend, but as promoter Jay Goldberg can testify, it really happened.

- To me, obviously, there's just so many memories.

Just sitting here talking to you, it gives me chills.

Just remembering and how fast time flies and how things, move on and change.

- [Phil] Goldberg promoted his first concerts in the early 1970s, he focused on a barn, dubbed Bailey's Barn, north of Peoria near Detweiller Park.

The 3000-seat venue was perfect for up and coming acts like Uriah Heep, The Allman Brothers and REO Speedwagon.

But as the crowds and shows grew, he needed a bigger venue.

Bradley Memorial Field House had 7,000 seats, but it got too hot in the summer.

Expo Gardens was an option, but it was often booked for agriculture shows and other events.

And the Civic Center was years from being built.

Then Goldberg took a look at Glen Oak Park.

Until then the bandshell amphitheater mostly had hosted local productions like symphonies and municipal bands along with an occasional touring singer of the mild variety, like Andy Williams.

But Goldberg envisioned big rock shows and in 1975, he convinced the Peoria Park district that he knew what he was doing.

- We were pretty excited because here I am in Peoria, Illinois, and I have an opportunity to have a amphitheater to do a show.

And I remember approaching the Park about it and I was very, very fortunate that I was pretty well networked in the industry to where I could easily prove I knew what I was doing.

And if I didn't know it, I had the people who did.

- [Phil] But there was a lot of work to do.

The amphitheater had a stage and a fence but that was about it.

The entire concert setup had to be hauled in, no easy chore.

- We did everything from, we brought in electrical power via generators.

We brought in portable bathrooms.

I mean, we brought in concessions, we obviously, security and it was a very primitive site.

Today there's so technical demands in the production levels, but back then they would work with you.

- [Phil] Today's artists probably wouldn't go for such a makeshift setup, in part because modern technology is so precise and demanding.

But in the 1970s, bands were used to the rigors of the road.

Plus that's how they made most of their money, by touring and getting exposure.

Concert tickets were purposefully cheap as a way to draw new fans who later might buy records and tapes.

- The correlation between touring and playing and selling records was so important and so organized.

And at that time, I had record stores in the market area.

We had opened up the first Budget Tapes & Records in 1971.

And I was thinking, boy, a great way to get people into my store would be is if I sold tickets to concerts.

- [Phil] And boy, did the band sell tickets.

- [Roy] We had amazing turnouts.

I mean, the shows, there was seven, 8,000 people at just about every show.

- [Phil] Meantime, that first summer at Glen Oak Park provided one of Goldberg's all time favorite concert memories.

When he landed a homecoming show by native son, Dan Fogelberg.

- Fogelberg was really a neat evening for Peoria.

A: he hadn't played Peoria and there were kind of a lot of rumors of why he left Peoria, and basically the truth of the matter was he left to become a rockstar.

- [Phil] During the show, Goldberg got a phone call.

On national TV, the Rock Music Awards had just named Fogelberg as Best New Artist.

- After Dan had done his 75, 90 minute concert set, I had the honor of running before he left the stage out onto the stage and making the grand announcement that Dan had just won this award.

And we had no, I mean, I didn't even know about this award until I got the phone call (laughing).

So all I had was a bottle of Heineken (laughing).

So we saluted with a bottle of Heineken at center stage right here, Dan Fogelberg and he went on and played another hour, hour and a half.

It was just a magical evening.

- [Phil] By the next year, in the summer of 1976, Goldberg's operation had begun to find a groove at Glen Oak Park.

That June featured an appearance by Fleetwood Mac, which had signed months earlier to play for about $7,000.

In today's dollars, that'd be about 31,000.

For a band that today actually commands hundreds of thousands of dollars per show.

And in June, 1976, Fleetwood Mac was flying high on the charts with several singles, especially Rhiannon.

Stevie Nicks and company enchanted thousands of fans who packed Glen Oak Park.

- We did a good job, I was very fortunate.

I met the right people and people loved our shows.

- [Phil] Maybe they loved the shows too much.

An August, 1976 stop by The Beach Boys brought 8,200 fans into the amphitheater.

Plus another 2,500 outside the fence.

That crowd, almost 11,000 fans, marked the highest attendance at Glen Oak Park.

For two summers, crowds had been well-behaved with very little police attention, but The Beach Boys sparked 39 noise complaints, also a high mark.

- That was the knife in the back, I guess.

We are in a neighborhood area, a lot of residential nearby.

So that was always a big concern.

And as these bands and their sound systems, their decibel levels.

We were really doing strong decibel controls, doing the best we can, but being it's a fairly natural amphitheater.

That sound goes right up and up to the sky and out into the neighborhood.

- [Phil] Goldberg would promote a smattering of concerts there over the next couple of years, but he and the Park district got tired of ongoing noise complaints.

Plus with the Peoria Civic Center set to open in 1982, Goldberg decided to say goodbye to Glen Oak Park.

But today he's grateful for lessons learned there, which would help when he started promoting the annual Summer Camp concerts in a similar primitive environment decades later, in Chillicothe.

And maybe even more so, he is grateful for Glen Oak's unique memories during a magical era of rock concerts.

- It was just a cool feeling for me to be the guy in Peoria that got to do this and be a part and make this happen in Peoria.

(upbeat music) - [Group] Fun fact!

- Fun fact, flying snakes exist.

The flying snake is a species native to Southeast Asia and climbs trees through special scales on its belly and launches itself from the top.

- [Group] Ew!

- All right, new fear officially unlocked.

- [Phil] It was moving day for one of the Peoria Zoo's longest residents.

Meet Louise, she's 17 feet long.

And as zoo employees found out, she can be quite a handful.

- The worst part to hold a snake, if you're moving a snake is the tail end.

That's where things happen.

- [Phil] Recently to give Louise more room to slither, the zoo decided to relocate her to a new and bigger enclosure.

That meant zookeepers and other employees would all lend a hand on move-in day to carry her from one spot to another.

Some people might flinch at the idea of grabbing hold of a python, especially a very large python.

After all to eat, they squeeze the life out of their prey, but all things considered, Louise is pretty chill.

- [Doug] We touch her, wake her up, make sure she knows we're there.

And then once she's awake, she's good to go.

And she really kind of just crawled away out of the exhibit.

We just kind held her and then just started transporting her down the hallway.

- [Phil] So on moving day, a zookeeper gently tapped Louise to make sure she was awake and ready to start her special day.

Louise was allowed to slide out of her old enclosure before several zoo workers calmly grabbed her.

In a two minute promenade, they slowly escorted Louise to her new home.

- [Doug] So all the keepers got involved.

We picked her up and actually carried her from her one exhibit and put her into her new exhibit.

- [Phil] From all indications at her new place, Louise is pleased.

- [Doug] She likes her new home and it's very nice.

It gives her a lot more room, gives her room to completely stretch out in a straight line.

It gives her a little bit more room to swim around and hang out in a big bathtub, basically a big water pool.

But yeah, I think she's pretty content.

(upbeat music) - Hi, I'm Jan Little with Kuchie's On The Water and I'm here with the kitchen manager, Doug Bennett, and we're gonna be showing you how to make a celebration shake today.

- First step we're gonna take by pouring our Prairie Farms milkshake in and making a mess while doing it.

Then we're gonna take one of our ice cream sandwiches, place it on top.

We'll put our flag in behind it and we're gonna take our Zebra Cake.

We're gonna skewer that on through.

Take our rice crispy treat, we're gonna skewer that on the other side, we're gonna take our cupcake, place it on top.

We're gonna take some whip topping.

- Each one of our celebration shakes is done a little bit differently, but they do all have those same basic ingredients.

They have an ice cream sandwich, a Little Debbie Zebra Cake and a cupcake.

We add all kinds of different things to them, different kinds of candies, toppings, sprinkles, anything to make it a little bit fun.

So each one, when it comes out of the kitchen is a little bit different.

Our Shipwreck bloody marys obviously have vodka.

We can include alcohol in our celebrations or any of our milkshakes.

We do a different one each month, something to keep it so it's all fresh.

But then we have our basic everyday shakes.

The celebration shake, which is this one, which is a little bit different each one, but we do that with either chocolate or vanilla.

We also do an Oreo shake and then we do a Snickers milkshake as well.

- [Julie] Asian carp, sound gross?

Well, indeed they are disgusting, especially when they're leaping out of the Illinois river and landing inside boats with a slimy splat.

But the State now calls them copi, short for copious, to better market the fish as a food.

The Sorce Freshwater in East Peoria is processing the copi into tasty possibilities.

There's strips, which run about $10 a pound and mince copi, which is about $2 a pound.

Neither version carries much scent or taste so it has plenty of cooking possibilities.

So what do you do with it?

We went to the only place in Central Illinois, serving copi.

Kelleher's Irish Pub & Eatery in Peoria.

It's not on the menu yet, but owner Pat Sullivan gives it away regularly while still tinkering with recipes.

An avid fishermen, Sullivan prides himself on being able to make just about any fish delicious.

- Not only could I catch fish, that I would cook it different ways and I learned that from my mom, who was a Depression cook.

- [Julie] From time to time over the past few years, Sullivan has gotten his hands on some Asian carp.

He gradually learned to work with the fish.

- And if you get a good carp like that out of a nice clean lake, I could fix it for you.

And you would never know it was a carp.

- [Julie] Just don't call it carp.

We learned long ago to keep that a secret, even when giving it away for free.

- I'm always having people taste my different fish that I catch or bring in and make.

And I like to try different recipes, see if it'll fit on the menu.

And I started doing this 'cause I had a bundle of it, Roy kept giving me a bunch and I kept working with it.

I've been working with it for over two years.

And we tried five recipes right here and I got more.

But to let people try it, if you told him they were gonna eat carp, they'll get up and walk away.

- [Julie] Lately he's been experimenting with copi from Sorce Freshwater, a little spice here, a little sauce there and every time customers have raved about these free samples.

Sullivan waits until they're done eating before revealing that the fish is Asian carp.

- There go, oh wow.

I can't believe it.

That's unreal, that's unreal.

- [Julie] What's Sullivan secret?

Well, he doesn't always reveal his kitchen magic, but he agreed to show us the recipe for one of the copi creations.

It has no official name yet, but it's much like a crab cake.

And this version is for the air fryer.

In a bowl, toss in some Louisiana Seasoned Coating Mix for chicken.

Add a pound of minced copi.

An entire packet of Old Bay Crab Cake Seasoning.

A few dashes of Old Bay Seasoning.

Half a cup of mayo.

- [Sullivan] A heavy duty mayo.

- [Julie] Then mix it up.

Gloves come especially in handy in this step.

- [Sullivan] Put my batter in it.

- [Julie] If the mix seems too moist, sprinkle in some more Louisiana Coating.

Form the mix into balls, then dunk the bottom of each in Louisiana Coating.

Lastly, cook the balls in the air fryer at 400 degrees for 10 minutes.

Some went into the air fryer and some went into the traditional fire.

The all came out looking yummy.

We gave it a try, it was great.

Another Sullivan success.

Sullivan plans to add copi to his menu soon.

Joining restaurants in Chicago and elsewhere nationally that are serving the fish from Sorce Freshwater in East Peoria.

Sullivan thinks copi will catch on as soon as customers give it a chance.

He thinks other restaurants in Peoria, Chicago and nationally, will soon be doing likewise.

- That's great.

- Once the restaurants get ahold of it, like we will eventually here and start letting people taste it, do appetizers, do all kinds of things with it.

People will start liking it.

- Sullivan thinks copi can become a point of pride for Peoria-area eateries.

After all you can find or eat the fish everywhere.

It's a Central Illinois thing.

And he might even sell t-shirts.

- "I ate a copi from Kelleher's", yeah (laughing).

- Lot of great stories today, especially about the fish.

- Oh, I think we've definitely been schooled.

- Man, I can definitely tell you're funny from this perch I'm on.

- Oh my gosh, I think we're floundering now, but there is something we do need to do.

- We need some more of those story ideas, so keep 'em coming and you know what we might see next time, your story on, - You Gotta See This.

(upbeat music)