Welcome to Home Grown, this show where we introduce you to the people and stories that shape the character of life in Arkansas.

I'm Dawn Scott, and today we're digging into an enticing buffet of some of the tastiest stories in the natural state.

We'll visit urban farmstead, where an organic, homegrown vision is changing the face of South Little Rock.

Then we'll catch up one of Arkansas's most well-known local food experts, Kat Robinson, as she takes on a statewide tour of one of my favorite desserts pie.

And finally, we'll visit with a little chef on a mission to bring delicious vegan Southern cooking to the state.

But let's kick things off with a scrumptious look at some small town staples.

Here's Kat Robinson on a road trip to some of Arkansas iconic dairy bars.

The Oxford Dictionary defines a dairy bar as a snack bar that sells ice cream and other refreshments.

Here in Arkansas, it describes a whole selection of restaurants we love.

Come travel with me to every corner of Arkansas to seek out delectable dishes and the stories behind the folks that make them on a culinary itinerary of Arkansas dairy bars.

I'm in Hot Springs, where I'm on my way to Bailey's Dairy Treat.

It's been in operation in one form or another since 1952.

That's when beauties opened on this spot.

Over time, Dippers became the polar bar, then the original location of Iraqi's quarter in the 1990, as it came under the name Bailey's Dairy Treats.

And under the ownership of Lee and Morphew, he and his wife still own and operate the location.

Today.

It is just the two of you.

Yes.

Yes, two of us.

I came here from Vietnam, 1910.

I'm nothing.

My American family, Leon, was just 18 at the time.

He graduated from Hot Springs High School.

He's grown a network of regulars who visit often some weekly, some daily.

What keeps people coming back?

We are friendly.

We.

We take any money yet?

Like family.

It's also the quality of the product.

I make my own patty fresh hamburger meat.

How many pounds of hamburger do you go through each day?

About 30.

40 a day.

That's quite a lot.

Yes.

Baileys is different from other dairy bars in several respects.

Its art deco building is on the historic register for its sleek, efficient and gorgeous lines.

It also offers something I haven't found on other dairy bar menus Real Chicken Friday and beef steak, fried rice and fried rice Echo.

I only want to have my fried rice just for anybody.

How are we going to try something new?

And then there's the ice cream.

We have a vanilla ice cream only, but we have a light banana split sundae and shake.

So you make your banana splits different?

Yes, ma'am.

We make the cup.

Not in a boat.

Chocolate, strawberry and pineapple.

Face out with banana.

Hey, Lynn, I want to give us a spin.

Yes, we know what you want.

Let's this year.

I know.

I may give me finger like that.

I know what they want.

That is best customer is himself.

I love my cook, so I like everything.

Maybe.

Lynn, why did you go there?

Well, my pretty good, too.

So I go to somewhere neat.

So I eat my own food here.

His most famous customer once helped out behind the counter.

Bill Clinton at a school for friend family.

So he worked with the family here at this location, yet may have any idea what it was.

Favorite dish was a charity bargain just for Leon Morphew.

There's just one secret to keeping Baileys dairy tree going.

They came here to their house.

We will Hart.

And then when they come, we smile and.

And drink them again.

Like family.

they.

As long as we remain hungry for late eats, tasty treats and good fellowship, Arkansas's dairy bars should continue to thrive.

So let's go out there and find ourselves a good dairy bar to share.

Small eateries like this one, or Kat's favorite dairy bars give a community a warm place to gather and share memories.

Food and community go hand in hand and often in the most interesting of ways.

For the last several years, Margie Raimondo has led the Urbana Farmstead in South Little Rock, growing and packaging her own organic herbs and vegetables, as well as leading cooking classes to anyone who will come.

Margie is adding her own unique flavor to the taste of Arkansas to give the kids tickets.

Tickets for the kids?

Yes, I know it's morning and I have some goodies for you.

You go.

If I had to put it any way at all, I would say my passion, my gift is helping people connect to their food.

And it's through heritage.

So when I designed Urbana Farmstead, I wanted to incorporate all aspects from the planting to the harvesting to the distribution.

That's what you have here.

So urban farm that has the farm and then the market, and then also the kitchen.

It's all part of one farmstead, which is really important because if you're at home and it's a homestead, that's what you would be doing.

When I plant something I have in mind, what am I going to do with it afterwards?

And I try to do 40 to 50% of everything I grow that I actually sell inside the market.

The whole property is one acre, but we're actually only farming on less than one quarter.

We have a pretty good high yield because we're using the space wisely.

We do everything vertical.

So vertical gardening is where you plant in the ground or in our case, we're using five gallon buckets and some of our planning and you remove the leaves going up the stem, which forces and causes that plant to grow up, and then you stabilize it with a string.

And so you have really less ground you're using.

But also it keeps away the bugs.

It helps you for watering.

So there's a lot of really good reasons why you want to do vertical farming.

I think it's important for all of us know, you know, again, more about our own self and how do we feed not just our bodies, but our souls.

So this is part of what I'm doing here.

I'm feeding my body, but I'm also feeding my soul.

And I try to share that.

There's so many people come to my market and they'll walk around my farm and they'll say, Wow, I wish I could do this.

And I'm like, You can.

You can have an entire herb garden in one little pot.

You can have a tomato, you can have a cucumber, you can grow things if you want to in your apartment, on your balcony, you know, on a patio.

It's very possible to do that economically.

Is really important for people to grow their own food.

Second of all, there's just nothing from a taste perspective.

A tomato in a garden.

Did you pick off that vine?

Taste like a tomato?

Smells like a tomato.

And of course, it looks like a tomato.

Some of the things you buy in a grocery store, they've had to pick them so green that they don't smell or taste like whatever they were supposed to be.

So here on the property, you can buy it fresh, you can buy it already canned, which I do for you, or you can come and learn how to canned yourself in my canning club if you want, you can come and learn how to cook it into Parmesan or whatever, because I have cooking classes as well.

In addition, I'm trying to teach people value add, which is the preservation piece of it.

So I take things in.

So the cucumbers in example, and I take it in and I preserve it by making pickles, but I also make relish.

But I also use that.

So I can add that to other things and make a chutney.

So you can use those things by creating multiple things out of that one cucumber.

It all roots back to Italy.

Both my mom and my dad's family are from Italy, Sicily in the Naples, and then they eventually moved to south part of L.A., where I actually grew up.

We lived in an urban community with a very small house and they ripped out the lawns and they planted in this urban house our garden.

So we lived like this.

We lived sustainably.

Everybody did something.

You know, you always learned how to plant and of course, harvest and you learn how to pluck a chicken so you could have the chicken.

We raised rabbits for food.

We absolutely did those things.

And I learned a lot of it from that.

But then the real training came when I went and lived abroad.

I went to Italy and the southern part of Spain for 18 months and I lived with families and I did this far away program where I was working in the fields for 6 hours.

And then I worked in the kitchen for 6 hours.

And that's where I really learned the techniques because I learned some things as a child.

But this is where it really came into practice.

I decided I wanted to go back to Italy and to discover more about my roots.

It was really great to be able to see myself and to, you know, look at things that were happening in my life and to say this makes sense now.

I jumped from the farming world of, you know, just trying to live as a poor family.

And then I went off and got my education and I went into high tech.

Even when I was doing that job, I was always looking for an opportunity to go and take cooking classes and learn other new cuisines.

During 911, there were a lot of major things that happened to the world and me personally as well.

I had a ticket in my possession where I was supposed to be on the plane that took themselves down, and I decided at the very last minute that to not go on that trip, I was saying, What?

What would life look like now?

What should it look like?

What does it need to be to fill my soul?

One of my friends said, Why don't you go check out Arkansas?

It's exactly what you're looking for.

So I took a car and I actually went through the Boston Mountains and the Ozarks, and I spent a weekend and I fell in love.

I said, This is exactly where I want to be.

I felt like, Hey, I can do this because I've learned the techniques.

While I was in Italy and I lived the experience of doing urban farming as a child.

And that's what urban farmstead is Urbana for urban.

And then farmstead is a place where you can grow everything you need to live sustainably.

That's where I'm at in my life, is to give back, show people how to use this wonderful produce that they can grow in their yard or that I'm growing either one and, you know, just change their lives a little bit.

There just seems to be something magical about Urbana Farmstead and the passion and vision that Margie brings to her garden and her classes.

Since we recorded that story, Margie's magic has spread well beyond her farmstead.

In 2022, Margie wrote and published Margie Amo, a collection of her family recipes.

She also produced the award winning short documentary The Soul as Cicely Margie even returned to Arkansas PBS to be featured in our own full length documentary, Dirt, which is about sustainable farming practices.

Clearly, the tastemakers of Arkansas are keeping busy, and none more so than ill. Nora Wesley, as the owner and chef at the Little Rock eatery House of Mental Elle, Nora is forging her own culinary path.

She spoke to Arkansas, PBS's Big Piff about what she affectionately calls grandma style vegan soul food.

Now, let's get one thing clear.

Food over everything.

If I had my choice every episode in this series would end with me getting fed.

That's why I'm speaking with Eleanor Weston from the House of Metal.

She easily became my favorite guest.

Yeah, I said it.

Now let's get into the enough to celebrate.

I celebrate.

I celebrate.

I celebrate.

I celebrate.

I celebrate.

I celebrate.

I celebrate.

Celebrate work.

Brother, Don't.

Don't celebrate what we're about to go for.

All stars are going to go to hate war component base.

But the ain't too proud.

No celebrate.

People don't pay much attention to food.

But what you eat is revolutionary and it makes you able to stand next day.

All the pressure you have on a lot of pressure in life comes from just not eating like.

And how would you describe a house of let grandma style vegan soul food restaurant, grandma style, vegan, soulful restaurant?

Okay, I like those adjectives right there.

So let's let's break that down first.

Of course, the biggest one, Why vegan?

For one, there aren't very many vegan options out here, so we need one.

And then more so for health purposes, for especially in the African-American community, a lot of diseases that we have are preventable.

So you feel through food and nutrition with the help monitor and keep doing nutrition, get that preventable Gotcha.

Yeah.

So that's why the choice was being.

And just to be clear.

Veganism is defined as abstaining from any and all foods derived from animals in terms of cooking with the people in your life who enjoy the cooking or who are the biggest influences, even maybe before you were vegan?

Well, my mom my mom cook so you could just seasoning usually from your mom.

And food is about knowing how to prepare.

But, you know, it's mostly about the season and how you season it.

So my mom cooks.

She could season.

So I got it from her.

She got it from my great great grandmother.

And I just take that take those things that I've learned and just being nice.

It's important that we prioritize.

People who know me, know my life is food.

We eat food over everything.

So let's talk about some of your specialties real quick.

We have cauliflower chicken wings, and that shows the greens and yams.

Top of the Mac.

We have chimichangas.

They've been a new favorite.

Let me let me stop you a quick so because you mentioned those foods, but like, how do you make good the macaroni and cheese?

I went, how do you go ahead and make that stuff?

So I have macaroni and cheese my whole life.

Is there like a secret that you can share?

Like, I don't want you to get rid of the special.

Make sure if you can use nuts, use cashews, put them in there.

It adds to the richness.

So when you're making your vegan cheese, use the cashews you can.

When you play with enough vegetables, you'll feel good at.

Yeah.

So cauliflower, chicken wings, grains, macaroni and cheese, what else?

And then we got to getting ready for get ready spaghetti.

Just regular, you know, because at first I started making it and it would I would use the grain noodles and everything.

And then customers will come in and be like, I just want some regular spaghetti.

I'm like, okay, you know, I'm want to help behind you want regular?

This is the cheese.

Go ahead.

And this is what I. Mac Yeah, the basis of that.

And we go mac and cheese food over every day or whatever.

Can you break down We've got going off.

All right.

What we've got here is example of a vegan mac and cheese.

Mac.

Well, cheese and and those are the ingredients I'm giving you are the main ingredients in it.

Cashews, potatoes, carrots and you have your spices and seasonings.

Garlic.

Guys, we have going on over here.

Here.

That is your department.

You're Nacho.

Gotcha.

So you're going to fix and we have a tail style cheese our vegan.

good.

One other thing that I've heard so much about these.

Yeah.

So, yeah, Yams are our house favorite.

So I'm like, I'm just going to get a little sample, a few things for people which are out of my hands for the culture moment to show how much is cheese on it.

And I'll tell you, that's nice.

I mean, before it does, don't taste as good as good when you ground them with potatoes, carrots.

Besides that, you add a few spots nuts out here.

Fine boy.

Who know man.

Yeah.

We have a lot of people who are lactose intolerant.

So that type of Mac defeats out.

And the M&Ms.

yeah.

Mando.

Yeah.

So help me out.

Like, what would be the vision from here?

Like, is it just kind of have the restaurant or do you have like a larger vision or goal?

And right now we're working on a future.

We'd like to get a food truck so we can be mobile, so we can get the food to people who need it most, the people who are having these health problems and don't know how to combat them, that they don't know that what they're eating is killing them.

So we got a food truck.

We will be able to reach more people, guys, even though now kind of like the feel of a brick and mortar because you can't have your cultural products there.

You can't have your music.

You can say the same.

Right.

And I like hip hop, so I want to play music somewhere for people, Right?

Right.

Yeah.

It's kind of creating the whole experience.

God, you don't have to act.

Because if it wasn't good, I had to go, this is, you know.

Wow.

Yeah.

That's just like when people ask me about the mixtape already.

Yeah, like people asking about music, but.

yeah.

You rapping?

I hear you rapping.

You got to you got to say a whole bunch of general things that don't mean, this music.

I hear your music.

That's me.

Food and music.

I'm not going to tell a story.

So mental sequence is I'm rap, man.

So when we talk about the House of Man, I just when I go thrift shop and we call it the House of Man, I saw the name pretty much transitioned over.

It was like, it will make this work because a good house title might be meant to be the downfall of what you what you eat, what you drink, how you speak.

So as a mental.

Well, no, I'm glad we finally met.

Also, I've enjoyed the food that you serve, so I'm really glad to hear it.

Part of a community.

So thanks for being part of the glow and I appreciate it and thank you for coming.

So Right.

I'm so I'm so appreciate.

Thank you.

Unfortunately, in many black communities, food deserts and unhealthy teachings have resulted in subpar nutrition.

This is negative.

The impact on our health and life expectancy at alarming rates.

Now, I'm not going to say I'm going fully vegan, but I will say I know inspire me to make better choices with my food.

Plus, if it always taste as good as the house of metal, that glow is forever appreciated.

Plus, I would not have thought vegan mac and cheese was possible, but El Nora and her team at House of Mental are resetting expectations and delivering on their vegan soul food promise.

So Kat Robinson is back with something a little more slice of life.

She toured the Arkansas Pie Trail in search of the tastiest pie in the state.

I'm Kat Robinson, and I preach the gospel of Arkansas Food.

No, really?

No.

In this, not for more than a decade, I've been traveling the state.

Good morning.

Searching out our culinary roots and every great little restaurant and food story I can find.

What I've discovered is that Arkansas has a passion for pie oil.

At 6:00 in the morning.

And it takes every minute, we are chasing the clock every day.

It's proprietor Charlotte Bowles has gained a reputation for creating some of the most beloved pies in the South.

She, her daughters and her extended family of employees begin baking before sunrise five days a week in this packed kitchen.

We make all our bars homemade, so we have a lot today.

Charlotte's regularly offers caramel, chocolate and coconut cream pies.

Other pies, such as egg custard and lemon meringue are based on particular days.

I made 37 pies the other day.

We're in Charlotte's kitchen and it smells phenomenal.

She's currently working on putting the meringue on the chocolate and coconut meringue pies as great pies are coming out of the oven.

It is just truly remarkable.

And then there's this pie.

And this pie is singular around the state.

I've never found another one like it.

This is a caramel meringue pie.

It is a burnt sugar custard pie.

And it is utterly to die for.

The shop only opens for lunch, and by 11 each morning, customers are waiting.

Some are locals.

Others come from further afield, drawn in by tales of great pie.

They will get here and of course they want to get the path.

Hours ordered the pie first.

You know, if you don't eat my style, everybody's worried about getting their power.

I can see them working in here and they will get like warns nothing's going to be there.

Chicken salad on wheat.

And then when they see their food coming out, brighten up like you wouldn't believe.

I had no idea.

I never even thought about having a restaurant.

I just wanted a little pie shot.

Why, Keno?

Well, they like the pies where I'm at out here, they have to come from everywhere to keep my business going.

And I do.

And she tries this all her life.

We're her family, and we truly love her.

And she loves us.

And I think people can feel that when they come in here.

We're all like big family.

What do you think people remember about you and about Charlotte?

I wanted them to experience something that is kind of been lost.

They come in here and have dessert and come to the kitchen and tell me sometimes they're crying and then I'm upset because they found something that was just like their mother was, you know, just like their mom was.

And I get satisfaction out of that and they get a blessing out of my cooking.

They're recipes handed down for generations or created with a special pinch of talent and love in their own kitchens.

We're glad we made room for pie.

Aren't you?

What an incredible tasting menu of Arkansas culinary creations from Urbana Farms.

Ted's Do it yourself cooking classes to House of Mentors, vegan cuisine, and all the dairy bars in between.

Our table overflows with the Taste of Arkansas.

And that's it for this episode of Homegrown.

Thank you for sharing your time with us.

And please take a moment to appreciate the people whose hard work has gone into making this show.

See you next time ever.

We'll get to get you.

And there's nothing else you're crazy about.

All day.

All right.