Featuring a motorcycle on a weekly television show is neither new nor revolutionary. But the Food Network, which is better known for sorbets and seasonings, has decided to put one of their presenters on two-wheels in search of the most traditional American meals to be found on the back country roads.

His interest in the kitchen developed early with guidance from his mother and grandmother, a budding culinary talent he skillfully used later “as a way to get dates” in college. Switching gears as an adult, Alton spent a decade working as a cinematographer and video director, but realized that he spent all his time between shoots watching cooking shows, which he found to be dull and uninformative. Convinced he could do better, Alton left the film business and moved to Vermont to train at the New England Culinary Institute.

His cookbooks give an insight to Alton Brown’s fascination for food and the science that lay behind it. The 2002 book I'm Just Here for the Food was one of the bestselling cookbooks of the year, selling over 300,000 copies, and featured a variety of recipes. His second book the following year, Alton Brown's Gear for Your Kitchen, was a homage to tools and gadgetry, an essential guide to all the “hardware” you need in the kitchen. Packed with practical advice and tips, this book takes a look at what’s needed and what isn’t, what works and what doesn’t. It even includes 25 recipes and a six-month plan to overhaul your kitchen with the most effective, innovative and even surprising culinary tools available.

 

TIME actually recently included Good Eats, along with Food Network’s Iron Chef America, in their “6 SHOWS WORTH THEIR SALT” in 2005. However, for all his culinary joie de vivre, Alton Brown is incredibly anal retentive. Watching him micromanage a meal can zap all the fun out of cooking. Sure, his recipes usually work, but he uses flow charts and slide rules to figure out serving sizes and cookie diameters.

All this makes Brown an unlikely candidate to host a food-based travelogue. But not only is he the host, the show is a fine blend of motorcycle’s, road-trip and dining ‘Americana’ style.

The show, Feasting on Asphalt is a series of specials featuring Brown and a crew of six (four on bikes, three in a pickup truck). Avoiding interstate highways and avoiding any major chain restaurants the mini-series has proven to be a culinary Easy Rider. Wanting to make the show as much of a motorcycle road-trip as it is a food program, the crew set out with camping gear fully prepared to use it if a hotel wasn’t conveniently located.
Alton begins his trip in Savannah Georgia, then winds his way through the western edge of the Great Smokey Mountains to the great blues and BBQ states of Missouri and Kansas, next crossing the great plains of Oklahoma to the hill country of Texas, then meandering southwest through New Mexico and on to the Rocky Mountains and the great pioneer state of Utah, then due west to Las Vegas and the California coast.

There is the question of why this show’s concept included a motorcycle.

“As far as I’m concerned, there’s no better way to experience the road than from the back of a bike. Being exposed to the elements presents thrills and challenges alike, most of which can’t be captured in a ‘cage’” said Alton. “Although we’ll stay in the occasional motor lodge as needed, many nights will be spent under tent or stars. For vast majority of human history, hotels didn’t exist and eating meant lighting a fire. The social aspect of sitting around that fire is one of the things our culture lost by taking most of our meals locked inside our cars.”

What main ingredients is this particular chef using for the mini-series?

When the rubber meets the road
So does the show deliver on it’s high expectations?