'Bizarre Foods' shoots in Savannah

If you thought you spied "Bizarre Foods" host Andrew Zimmern around Savannah this weekend -- you did!

The chef, author and TV personality brought a crew from Minnesota for the several days of shooting -- which included stops in South Carolina, Daufuskie Island and Savannah. I had spent the previous week scouting locations, sending still photos to producers -- and was invited to join Andrew on camera for the "food crawl" portion of the show.


Locally, we visited Angel's BBQ, Teeple's Seafood, Polk's Produce and Marandy's Soul Food Restaurant.

The day’s shooting began with Andrew being joined over breakfast at Clary's Cafe on Abercorn Street by Lady Chablis. The Lady may be a tiny thing, but she certainly got Zimmern's attention when she ordered Hoppel Poppel -- a rib-sticking concoction of scrambled eggs, kosher sausage, onions and green peppers -- AND pancakes. He chose crab cake Eggs Benedict with a side of ham and a Georgia pecan griddle cake

Hoppin' John and pulled pork at Angel's BBQ.

She rejoined Zimmern Saturday night for dinner at Elizabeth on 37th. Among that feast was Chef Kelly Yambor's quail hash.

Charlie Teeple, a seafood industry legend.

On Tuesday, Zimmern and his crew will film a sequence on kosher foods featuring Murray Gottlieb and Matt Cohen of New South Kosher.

I didn't get to shoot food along the way. Anytime the tabletop was covered, we were eating and being taped. At Angel's, we took a fiery tour of Andrew Trice's hot sauces -- and had a full selection of his smoked brisket, pork and chicken, as well as a Faux Q sandwich, a fried bologna sandwich and Andy's mouth-watering peanut-sauced collard greens. A sweet macaroon from Chef Herve at Papillote finished our meal.

Chef Cynthia and a plate of chitlin's.

At Teeple's we cracked several crabs, sampled some sweet little Georgia shrimp and tasted nicely briny steamed oysters. I earned a gold star for not splattering the host as I cracked into a big, juicy male crab! Next door at Polk's, sweet scuppernongs kept us busy -- along with a piping hot handful of boiled peanuts.

Chef Cynthia at Marandy's served up oxtails, pork neck bones, snappy fresh butterbeans -- and her famed Red Velvet cake and sweet potato pie.

Zimmern patiently stopped several times to sign autographs, pose for pictures with fans and even embraced one young female fan who bolted across Abercorn Street yelling, "I've gotta give you a hug."
At Marandy's the guest in front of us in line turned and said to Zimmern, "Man, if you were fatter, you'd look like that guy who eats the weird stuff on TV."

I'm guessing he doesn't have "Bizarre Foods" programmed on his DVR.

Air date is slated for March 2012 -- I'll keep you posted.