When Arthur Ircink asked his friend and former neighbor Kyle Cherek to get involved with Wisconsin Foodie, he couldn't have been more excited. A show and website dedicated to connecting Wisconsinites to their food? Cherek was sold and now travels the state in search of some of the best farm fresh food in the country. We talk to this Wisconsin Foodie about farmers' markets, the art of tailgating, and, last but not least, cheese.

AndrewZimmern.com:  When did you become interested in food? Did it play a big role in your childhood?

Kyle Cherek:  My interest in food has developed over time, though I was always affected by my early experiences. My Mom/Grandma, were a one-two punch from my childhood. My mother's side of the family is Hungarian, they escaped Budapest during the war and arrived in America in the 1950’s. My grandmother was a great assimilator, but also a traditionalist. She mixed ingredients, and her Eastern European palette with what America had to offer. But more than anything she saw cooking as something full of depth. Something with tangible meaning and heritage. More than anything, after the years of living as refugee during the war, every meal was understood as gift.

My mom was part of the 1st wave of America gourmands in the home, right in step with the Julia Childs/Jacques Pepin and the culinary cultural revolution they were forging at the time. Every few months she set up the table for fine dining. The silver, the china, the linens etc. all came out. She made dining an occasion, with out it being an ordeal.

When I was 10-years-old, my sister Lisa married into a farming family. I know on the coasts they think everyone in Wisconsin lives on a farm and has a cow named Elsie, but it wasn't until I was on the farm milking cows, feeding pigs, and watch them bailing hay, that I was able to grasp the importance of farming and where our food comes from. It was a formative time and taught me about what it takes to raise something. After that, I had a completely different level of respect for the industry and could not go to the grocery store without considering the back story of each product.

More recently I was affected by a friendship with a really great and generous local Milwaukee chef named Andy Spellman, who exposed me to the art of cooking. There was a group of us that used to hang out and Andy would prepare large family style meals. He would cook from the season and what excited him. It would be 11:30pm  and he would be making rack of lamb, other chefs would come over, we would all drink and laugh. That's how I learned that cooking truly was an art. Through family tradition, exposure to farming and my lessons with Andy, I understood the alchemy good food.

AZ.com: What’s the story behind Wisconsin Foodie?

KC:  We saw the need to observe the local food movement interest that was rising all over our state. Two years ago I got a call from an old neighbor Arthur Ircink (the show's creator and director) asking if I'd be interested in discussing a project. Over a drink at one of our favorite restaurants, we discussed his idea for a show that would highlight chefs, farmers, restaurant and other personalities involved with local farming and the local food scene. Arthur was committed to statewide travel and a show that was shot and edited to capture the local scene. He wanted what the Slow Food Movement calls the "convivially of the table" to come through the television screen. Two years later, here we are with a TV show and website (www.wisconsinfoodie.com) that has been extremely well received and growing in interest and authority on Wisconsin's food culture. Although operating in a small market can be financially challenging, we have assembled a cast and crew of individuals that work for the love of the project (and from time to time a great meal). Our show really focuses on storytelling with a style that is unlike anything on local television. We offer a weekly documentary with an entertainment value as well.

AZ.com:  California and New York get a lot of press when it comes to the culinary scene. What makes Wisconsin unique? Why should people pay attention to what’s going on in the Midwest?

KC:  It’s curious to many of us local eaters that we are just now getting recognition for our unique contributions to the national market. Last season on the show we featured Roland Messier, the pastry chef at the White House for 26 years. He said he was blown away with the culinary scene in Milwaukee and the resources that the Midwest has to offer. Perhaps it is our "fly over" status that sometimes keeps the press off our beaten path.

Restaurants like L’etoile in Madison have been creating exemplary dishes of the highest quality, and sourcing locally within the state of Wisconsin from over 200 farmers since 1976.Its original owner/chef Odessa Pieper is Alice Waters' doppelganger in the Midwest. There isn’t a foodie within five states that doesn’t grin with delight and reverence when you mention L’etiole. There are so many chefs, James Beard level, that cut their teeth in New York, only to return to the Midwest for the quality of life and the proximity to great ingredients. Perhaps the press misses us because we don’t wear it on our sleeve: Midwestern reserve, dignity and hard work is real stuff. We do it for ourselves here. If the world notices, they are welcome to enjoy. The world is coming around. Wisconsin Foodie is doing a bit to change that.

What we do unquestionably well is the cheese thing. The Crave Brothers, Mike Gingrich at Uplands Cheese, Wille Lehner of Bleu Mont, or Sid Cook at Carr Valley Cheese would be a couple of good examples. When Boulud, Batali, or Keller started using cheese in their courses or as desserts it was from some of those guys. Go into Murray’s in New York and just throw those names out and see what happens. We get this dairy state label, but when you have cheese makers with more awards personally then the state of Vermont, or that keep beating European cheeses in international judging year after year, I guess you have to own it.

AZ.com:  Whether it’s farms, shops or restaurants, name your top five favorite food spots in Wisconsin.

KC:  Oh this is easy, but these are not really in order of best to least, that’s a bit like ranking your favorite Beatles songs. Impossible.

Willie Leher and his sustainable farm and cheese cave called Bleu Mont. He is a maverick in the artisianal cheese world, and a warm human being and a bit of a character. He is doing things like bandaged wrapped cheddar, the way it was made pre-wax. When everyone has been talking terroir as of late, Willie created Earth Smear Cheese, that was literally aged and packed in the earth of his farm. Sounds simple, but it is the most exceptional stinky cheese my tongue has ever tasted. When I had it on the show I think I said my head was exploding with flavors- (in a good way)! The Dane County Farmer’s Market on the square in Madison. It’s the nation’s biggest, and I sincerely think the best. It is legendary to chefs. The purveyors are essentially curated. It is the most laid back weekly occurrence you will find of people who aren’t just serious about really really really good regional/seasonal, they live it.

Growing Power. This almost goes without saying, but because of Will Allen and Growing Power, Milwaukee is the unarguable ground zero for the Urban Agriculture. In a way this goes back to the last question. Wisconsin Foodie did a show on Growing Power last year, and just few months later Will Allen; Growing Power’s founder received the McArthur Genius award. I don’t think Wisconsin Foodie tipped the scales toward his MacArthur award, but for locals we have known about Growing Power all the while. Between Growing Power and now Sweet Water Organics, these two institutions in Milwaukee WI are international templates for Urban Agriculture. They literally have guests from the entire world visiting every week to see how they are doing what they do. Both have taken industrial wasteland sites and turned them into vibrant urban farms. A visit to either of them is provocative, hopeful and kind of riveting.

My restaurant pick would be Bacchus. We have very strong suit of top restaurants and chefs in Wisconsin and the Midwest. In Milwaukee alone you can dine at two James Beard winning chefs restaurants and two runners-up all in the same week. I don’t know if Chicago can even offer that right now. Bacchus is great because of it’s pristine location on Lake Michigan, it’s view of the architecture of the Milwaukee Art Museum and War Memorial, and of course the menu. Adam Siegel won the Midwest Beard accolades in 2009 and his menu at Bacchus is brilliantly simple and sophisticated all at once.  Moreover, the value is amazing. For that kind of menu, that kind of wine list, that kind of service, in a major city like San Francisco, New York or even Chicago, the prices would be near double and you would have to wait two months to pay that just get in to pay that much.

Last but not least is really not a foodie spot but a past time. You simply can’t visit Wisconsin as a foodie and not tailgate at least once, and if you are tailgating you should probably have a Johnsonville brat. Chicago has their Red Hot Chicago hot dogs, and Wisconsin has Johnsonville brats. I don’t know if we invented the fine art of tailgating, (and it is an art) but if we didn’t, we certainly perfected it. Johnsonville is great because an Austrian family started it just because they wanted a taste of home. They named it after their new Wisconsin hometown. Tailgating in Wisconsin is great because where else can you insist on soaking the brats in beer before you grill or cook them, and then stand out and drink a beer with your brat! It is not uncommon to drive past Miller Park (home of the Brewers) on an away game day, and see the lot filled with fans tailgating. Slow food may have the conviviality of the table, but Wisconsin has the conviviality of the Tailgate.

AZ.com:  The three staples in Wisconsin cuisine are sausages, cheese and beer. Where can we find the best of each category?

KC:  For an old school big brewery, you can’t beat Point Beer. The beer is brewed in Steven’s Point, WI, and when they reverted back to Wisconsin ownership in 2002, we all cheered and raised a Point.  Point is a tie to the past.  A regional brewery that has brewed good beer that people like to drink since the civil war. Sometimes it's just simple.

A bit smaller brewery is Capital out of Wisconsin’s capital Madison. The owner/brewer was a big deal Miller guy that wanted to do things a bit more craft style. Capital uses regional resources like Washington Island wheat from Door County. Our true micro brew has got to be Lakefront Brewery. The two Klish brothers Russ and Jim got the brewing bug before drinking micro brewers was cool. One is an ex-engineer, the other an ex-vice-cop. Makes sense right? They started brewing beer for themselves on a bet. They have this Frankenstein brewery cobbled together from old dead breweries from around the county. I remember when I waited tables in college and Lakefront had just started, the brothers delivered their beer in this old wood grain station wagon. They are from the ilk of the truly inventive brewers. Beers like their eponymous Klish or their Pumpkin are my favorite. The make an entirely organic beer, and had to fight off a mega-brewery for 100% organic label. The mega-brewery wanted to list 'water' as an organic ingredient. Chalk one up for the little guys.

I think one of the best places to find the cheese/sausage hook-up is West Allis Cheese in the Milwaukee Public Market. It’s like the Noah’s ark of cheese and sausage! The staff has the Midwestern politeness matched with a vast knowledge. The worst trend in artisanial cheese as of late is the cheese snob. There is non-of that at West Allis Cheese. They love you just as much for ordering the curds as the 10 year cheddar. They also have the best liverwurst sandwich a human being can hope to ever have.

AZ.com:  What's in your fridge?

KC:  I do a lot of shopping at the Milwaukee Public Market and the West Allis Farmer’s Market, so it changes week to week. Things you will always find: Spinach, Nueske’s bacon, eggs from my friends Pam and Marty’s farm, beets for roasting, Sassy Cow milk (my 3-year-old loves the stuff), dark chocolate, proseco, and few leftovers of dubious dates.

Kyle has been sitting up and taking nourishment since the Ford Administration.  He is a born-and-bred Wisconsinite and sees our great state as an amazing place full history, craftsmanship and great artisanal resources.  Wisconsin Foodie has quickly become local hit with both foodie’s and the less than culinary inclined, to become the highest rated food show in the Milwaukee television market.

His efforts to uncover the unique, the unusual or the important is never-ending. His first true foodie experience was during the summer of 2000 when a friendship with a highly lauded local chef exposed him to exceptional ingredients, the alchemy that food and friends can have on life, and cooking for the sheer pleasure of it. When not appearing on Wisconsin Foodie he is busy relishing the city in which he resides (Milwaukee), culling farmer’s markets, or patiently waiting for the chance to say "Let’s look at the desert menu, shall we?"