(Tom) This week on Arizona illustrated Tito and Pep.

All the cultures that have inhabited the Tucson Valley over the last couple of millennia, and there is one constant thread that ties into the food and that's cooking over wood.

(Tom) Compost mania.

And I want to divert my household food waste, and they sent me here to you.

We balance each other out and we try to reduce all the different types of organic waste in Tucson.

Wearable innovations.

We create devices that intimately integrate with biology, with us, with the human body (Tom) And pandemic pets Anna Jo and Agnes.

When they sit down, it seems to flow about stuff that's weighing on them.

And maybe Agnes Martin has an extra love, makes them feel more comfortable than just opening up.

Welcome to Arizona illustrated, I'm Tom McNamara.

We're here in downtown Tucson on Congress.

Like a lot of border communities, there's a constant influx of people and ideas and culinary traditions in Tucson that make the cuisine unique but hard to define.

It's not just Mexican food or Sonora and food, certainly different than what you'd find in the Midwest.

Well, John Martinez, the owner of the Midtown Bistro Tito and Pep grew up here and set out to open a restaurant that is simply Tucson.

What I really wanted to do was open a restaurant that I felt was like a Tucson restaurant in Tucson.

My name is John Martinez.

We're right here in Midtown Tucson.

Tito and Pep restaurant.

When you go back to thinking about all the cultures that have inhabited the Tucson Valley over the last couple of millennia.

You know, there is one constant thread that ties into the food and that's cookin We like to build up what we call our inferno.

Every day we roast some poblanos we roast some Anaheims.

We use a lot of roasted chilies.

It's fall right now, so we've go them all over the menu.

And like that smell of roasted chilies, that's that's something transportive for me.

Like that takes me back to like walking into my grandmother's house for, like Sunday dinner.

I grew up in Barrio San Antonio.

Kind of interesting triangle between Broadway, the railroad tracks, you know, P Avenue, Campbell.

Three shrimp.

One the carrots, the tp, add anchovies.

My mom is from Douglas.

She was born in Wilcox and grew up down there.

But my dad's family all grew up here in Tucson.

My dad's one of eight.

My grandmother was an amazing cook.

If It wasn't a birthday or a holiday, you know, we're always going together for for a meal.

Bigger parties there would be pig roast September, tamale season, green corn tamale season.

We'd set up this like row of tables and like had these assembly lines in the morning.

You know, you'd have to trim and shuck all the corn, grating the cheese, cleaning the chilies.

My grandmother would whip the Manteca by hand.

I aspire to be at the end of the line, too, like where you folded because I was like, you know, the really like job.

We'd all eat.

And then, you everybody take bags of tamales home.

Once you know, it's kind of ashed, you can take it and you got that smoke, and then you like lay that right there.

It kind of bathes whatever you're cooking and a little bit of that smoke, you get even a little bit more of that, that flavor on there.

The onions, they get some char on them and it's like, people are like "Ewwww you know, they're burnt."

But it's like, you know, they're burnt."

But it it's got a flavor of its own.

This is our grilled New York strip steak with charro beans, grilled onions, roasted chilies It's like Sunday afternoon for me growing up.

I knew I couldn't be a muppet, but I figured if I could work with like Skeeter, The Muppet Show, that'd be a good job.

Then I realized I couldn't do that, so I was like, Maybe I'll be a garbage truck, you know, guy on the back of the truck, that seemed really cool.

And then after that, I wanted to cook.

So I went to the U of A for, you know, a year or two and, got my first kitchen job just washing dishes at a place downtown to get something on a resume.

I'd spend my free time going to bookstores learning as as much as I could and knew I really wanted to pursue it professionally.

Took a trip in the summer of 2001.

That was the first time I went to New York and just being in the city and, seeing the menus there and knowing the chefs that were there, I was like, that's where I really wanted to go.

I started working for a chef by the name of John Georges Von Vongerichten.

I worked for him for for a little over nine years.

I had an opportunity to go to the Bahamas and open a restaurant for him down there.

We opened places in Vancouver, Los Cabos, Doha, Qatar.

I kind of reached a point where, you know, living out of a suitcase and being on the road 200 plus days a year just wasn't really w working for me.

You know, my wife and I started about moving back to Tucson.

I was looking for the right place, I knew I wanted to have the focus of the restaurant be Mesquite Fire Grill or mesquite fired hearth.

We really wanted to kind of tie the decor within the space to the neighborhoods where we're located.

Ideally, we want to serve the people that live closest to us.

We want them to be our regulars.

Coming in here kind of feels like you're in your own neighborhood.

The screen here in the middle of the dining room, like, you know, I saw that pattern in front of an apartment complex over here off of Alvernon and I was like, OK, this is great.

So we're making our fall roasted squash salad.

This is what we call our tomatillo vinaigrette.

Fresh tomatillos, fresh herbs no from just like a straight up salsa verde.

We have some roasted acorn squash and some roasted delicata squash.

These were tossed a little bit of olive oil, sea salt and some Santa Cruz chili powder.

Pretty much like any borderland wherever you go, right?

You know, it's culturally brackish.

So to say, you know, you have this like constant influx and mixing of people from either side of the border.

The flavors that kind of resonate here that are different than others, we really do embrace that full flavor cuisine that you get coming out of Mexico.

It's a good pickled onions.

Some toasted pumpkin seeds ties back to the squash that we're using and again, add some great texture.

Then were gonna dress the whole with some fresh lime.

Let me finish with a little bit of queso fresco.

So this is a roasted ball squash, salad tomatillo vinaigrette, queso fresco and toasted pumpkin seeds.

The story behind the name Tito and Pep was when I was a kid, my grandmother's nearest and dearest relative was her first cousin, my great nearest and dearest relative was her first cousin, my great aunt Marie My grandmother would babysit my aunt Marie, to entertain her My grandmother would make up the of these two girls.

I was a rich girl and was a poor but they're the best of friends and we have all these adventures And their names were Tito and Pep.

That's the name of the place, because I really wanted it kind of be an homage to the two of them.

My grandmother was the first person I ever really cooked with I have so many tight food memories tied to her.

My aunt Marie was somewhat of a bon vivant.

She really knew how to have a good time, even just the word Pep, having a like a lively room, a great space for people to get and have great food and drink.

You know, really kind of ties back to those two ladies who were so very special to me.

Capturing the attention of the public to deal with waste can be difficult.

Next, meet sustainably minded individuals up to the challenge and each uses a different approach, but they have the same goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from our landfills.

one uses music, a catchy dance and overalls, the other a community centered program.

I got into watching tape talks and I saw what people were doing, and I told Shota one day that we we really ought to try that and and see if we can't drum up some following.

He just kept asking me about it, and one day I was like, All right or shoot one, I got an idea.

Dulcie, why don't you introduce yourself to the last?

Is on and on and on and on and on.

There are tanks, green stuff we currently operate on about a 30 acre piece of land.

And most years we produce somewhere between 48 and 56,000 cubic yards of compost, diverting somewhere around 100 to 150,000 cubic yards of green waste from our landfills.

You know, so this is our process We do what the plant in Tucson.

VIDEO And then in those, I try and do educational fun facts that are mostly about composting and about gardening or planting.

And then occasionally we just do some fun, goofy trends, whatever they are to attract people in watching our educational content.

So does my hype, man.

I guess I am.

What is hype man?

Yeah, just one after the other.

You don't know me like that.

I just go with.

He will be forced to say, you don't know me like that.

I just go with the flow.

You can't fool me like that.

You're going to leave me a real group.

I said, Why don't you try me?

I went from not only being somebody that that just makes compost to to, I guess, being a Tik Tok star as well.

And you?

There she took a sip one in a row.

I look to the things below.

Compost basically is made up of your carbon materials or chunks, so little bits of woody pieces and then the nutrient rich or the microbial rich part is the humus, which is the real fine particle that are in the compost.

We get a lot of the material from the local landscapers and we can DIY ers will spend a couple of months composting it, and then you can take it home and make your oasis in the desert.

He's like a God.

Hello.

What number is your second letter?

You six.

46.

Awesome.

And we have £31.5 away.

OK.

Stamp it.

We'll get a lot of people who come to us saying Hey, I talked to tanks and I want to divert my household food waste, and they sent me here to you.

We balance each other out and we try to reduce all the different types of organic waste in Tucson.

He's ready to make her entrance.

5.5 pounds, Molly.

Ohhhh This is my dog, Molly.

My goal every week is to bring in more than Molly weighs in compost, hey, my to see who eats more, you would see you eat more than she's usually between like 6.5, 7 pounds Yeah, you're good.

Oh, she was the same as my compost.

She also cares about sustainability and doing something good for the planet, people and animals, so she would encourage everyone else out there.

If you don't already to sign up and compost either at the U Of A Compost Cats or another organization out there, one of our heaviest ones today was like 20, there is 31.

To get set up.

You come to our community garden, you got a bucket from us, fill it up with their food scraps throughout the week and bring it back to us.

Once it gets the community garden, our student compost specialist will weigh it, check it for contamination and then add it to our bin.

And there they spend a lot of time watering, organizing and making sure that the compost is developing properly so we can get good, nutritious soil amendment that can then be used by gardeners in the community garden or by our community.

The University of Arizona compost Cats are the only campus in operation that processes food waste in Tucson.

The commercial operation, we have a partnership with the city of Tucson Environmental Services, where we just provide big bins and then we provide on-boarding We provide training.

The action or collect this wood scraps and make it into compost is very meaningful.

I think this industry is going to keep growing.

It's one of those things that's becoming an essential service in a lot of places around the country.

It's already been mandated will become much more the norm in places.

As time progressed, and I think it would be great to reach as many people as possible about the composting industry.

It's not going anywhere.

There's no going back.

Day by day got day.

So there's there's just going to be more and more and more facilities like this.

Hey, wealthy, what are you doing here?

What for?

There's nothing in here.

but if I don't try we won't know My bestie and your bestie sit down by the fire Your bestie say she wants participating in.

Make these plans go.

Talking about here?

No.

No, I.

If you already think of your Fitbit or smartphone as an extension of your body.

Wait until you see the next generation of wearable devices that can seamlessly integrate with the human body.

UofA biomedical engineering professor Philipp Gutruf is at the forefront of technology, with 3D wearables impacting health care.

[electronic music] (Philipp) So what we start off with is a 3-D scan of you.

How large is your biceps?

What shape is your leg, for example?

What are the dimensions?

We can extract that from a 3-D scan.

Then we take this information.

You transform it into a 2D plane.

That 2D device is then printed on a 3-D printer.

Then it is assembled, which means that we just transform it into a 3D object.

If you look at at this particular device, you can see if I if I transform that into this particular shape, it allows us to, for example, form a taper.

And then we have a ready made device that can be at various locations of the body.

It can be on the arm, for example.

It can be on the leg, depending on the application.

My name is Philipp Gutruf.

I'm an assistant professor of biomedical engineering, Craig M. Berge, faculty fellow at the University of Arizona.

So my lab, what we do is we create devices that intimately integrate with biology, with us, with the human body.

We have two areas.

one is wearables and the other is implantable devices that allow us to really capture what the body is doing in detail with very high fidelity.

I think it's easier for fabrication, right?

So the Bluetooth, I expect, would be a little bit larger, maybe the size of this one with the new antenna design as well.

So for our wearable devices, specifically, what we needed to create is a device that's ultra lightweight, soft like your skin that conforms to your body really well.

And that's why we pioneered the use of 3D printing and 3D scanning to create devices that are tailor made for each individual.

Specifically, when we make these devices, we insert electronics into this and continue the printing process to completely encapsulate the electronics.

And what you will see in these devices is these repeating serpentine shapes that allow us to create electronics that stretch and bend.

There's nothing really like this out there at this point in time.

We try to make the form factor in the mechanics and the feel of the device more like biology.

Having extra information from the human body allows us to make quicker diagnosis of disease, we can get more information about somebody.

Tailor medicine to an individual person, which then allows us to, for example, give less of a drug, have less side effects, for example.

These are all things that these type of devices are really useful for.

Another application area is certainly human performance.

We can extract, for example, really small fluctuations in temperature.

We also have the capability to look at muscle deformation so we can see how much effort is put into that particular muscle of the body during exercise.

These are all this is all feedback that you don't get from conventional wearable devices, even the ones that pro athletes are using.

[electronic music] As biomedical engineers, we always try to improve the current state of technology And if you just look at the extrapolation and the speed the technology is developing, we as humans will be very quickly that the weak link.

Right.

So I think really creating a link between technology and the human body will become critical in the future.

I would really like to make an impact not only in academia.

I would like to see these devices being used by people every day.

I think that's the ultimate reward for a researcher to really see that fundamental research that then ultimately translates into a product that many people are using and gathering a lot of benefit from.

That is something that we in general are striving to achieve Hair salons are closed during the pandemic later reopened, with many clients anxious about returning to the chair.

But one stylist had the perfect remedy to ease their nerves.

Her puppy Agnes, in this second installment of Pandemic Pets, meet owner Anna Jo and her canine companion, who licked her way into the customers hearts.

[happy music] (Anna Jo) She'd been in the salon since, like October of 2019, so she was still a puppy, but just gotten better the way she gets the routine down.

She goes and greets people when they get here and people love that.

And then when people sit down in my chair sit in their lap and just give them love.

[water spraying] Especially if someone is feeling more emotional, it seems like Agnes gives them more attention.

C'mon.

[laughs] I'm Anna Jo and this is my dog, Agnes.

[music] We were closed for about a total of six months, and financially, that's really hard.

Faun Salon didn't get any help from government or any SBA loans.

Even though I filled out everything multiple times.

I just felt totally ignored [door closing] when I was able to reopen.

I was only taking a few clients a day, a few days a week, just to be safe.

So that was just really hard.

Still catching up on that, but you're just so backed up at that point, then trying to get everyone in.

It just felt like a bottleneck where I was the only one working.

It was super overwhelming and people were a little frustrated because they had to wait so long.

There still people been too afraid to come and get their hair done or do normal things still.

So still seeing people for the first time in like almost a year and a half.

Everyone had that extra depression after existential dread and everything.

But there's also a lot of people that wanted to come here specifically for the fact that I was the only one working here It was safe in that way, and they wanted to specifically see Agnes because people've been so separa from each other and isolated, from each other and isolated, not having had human contact or interaction that really weighs on your soul.

Now, she's definitely like a main feature of the salon.

People just love having that interaction.

since I started, so I'm still building my clientele It's been a couple of weeks since I started, so I'm still building my clientele I think some clients are pretty apprehensive coming to a salon, you know, looking at themselves in the mirror for sometimes up to three hours and there's a lot of attention on them, and I think the puppy will kind of snap them out of it.

And this little soul that doesn't judge you doesn't care who you are or what you do or what you look like.

Yeah, it's kind of like an add on treatment.

And when the puppy comes over and licks your hand, it kind of makes you feel like you belong.

Some people hadn't really talked a lot before, a lot more than just expressing themselves and what they've been through, and it was just good to find some common ground that we all share this, this thing.

(Client) What I'd really love is that.

is that we'll come here to feel not just to get their hair done and feel beautiful, but I get a lot of feedback from almost all of my clients who say that they've gone through years of therapy.

Come here.

They're able to just talk freely about anything with me, about really important things.

When they sit down, it seems to flow about stuff that's been weighing on them.

And maybe Agnes being here giving them extra love makes them feel more comfortable in just opening up in ways that they can't do with even their closest partners or loved ones.

[indistinct talking] doing this for a reason.

you know, I feel like I'm pretty good at this point.

You just find ways to create boundaries with people, meaning like energetically, it doesn't have to drain you.

You try to do ways of self-care on your days, off work after work and throughout the day that just to help you.

And she's very helpful.

She will do really funny things throughout the day at the right times to just like, lighten the mood.

[music] You never know when there's going to be another shutdown.

And that's really stressful, but she just makes you feel like everything is going to be OK. [laughs] [music] Before we go, here's a sneak pee (Steve) Shall we?

(Donna) So it's really cool because I'm looking at these saguaros in my pickup truck this morning and saying, Hey, guys, wait until you see what your new home is going to look like.

And it really is spectacular.

The saguaros that we rescued at the construction site, we drove them out here.

We're out at the Waterman restoration site and we're planting the three saguaros that we rescued.

And then they have new homes and they have a spectacular view of the mountains.

Thank you for joining us here on Arizona Illustrated.

I'm Tom McNamara, we'll see you next week.