After 38 years in the food industry, David Andert is checking one goal off his bucket list.
The executive chef at Shorty’s Pizza and Smoked Meats is making his national debut on the Food Network’s top-rated Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives hosted by Guy Fieri on Friday night.
“You really felt like you were standing in a movie setting the whole time,” Andert said of shooting the foodie favorite in mid-July. “You almost felt like you weren’t in your own place.”
He said when the crew was in the kitchen doing what they called hand shots or beauty shots, if he had outstretched his arms even partially, he would have been hitting microphones, cameras or lights.
“It was absolutely one of my dreams to be on Food Network and be on a show that I’ve probably watched every single series of,” Andert said. “I finally met Guy - it was on my bucket list. He is exactly the same person on set that he is off set.”
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After the shoot wrapped up, Andert said he and Fieri - both gun enthusiasts - perused local gun shops together.
“He’s just a normal guy,” said Shorty’s owner Brian Noel. “There’s no air about him.”
It isn’t just Fieri that left an impression. Andert said he’s still in touch with a couple of the members of the “phenomenal crew” that produces the show.
“It was exciting,” Andert said. However, he said it was a very technical, detailed process.
From day to day, for example, he said if he had salt in a cup, he had to use the exact same cup, sitting in the exact same position. Andert said one of the producers told him that it takes about 24 hours of film to produce a six-minute segment of the show.
“Now you know why those movies in Hollywood cost like $80 million to make,” Noel said. “You watch a two hour movie and you don’t understand there’s probably thousands of hours of tape. It’s tedious.”
Despite being an exacting process, Andert said it was fun to be involved in the filming.
It wasn’t something Noel or Andert had expected either when they got the initial call to do from the show’s producers, and the wait to find out if they would be on the show - after hours of interviews - was a long one, Noel said.
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“We were apprehensive about doing it,” Andert said, “but the minute they came through the door, that got wiped clean. It was just like you’ve known these guys forever.”
Noel said it was akin to a blind date and discovering the date wasn’t your worst fears.
In addition to shooting the show at the restaurant, Noel said the crew went around the area to shoot as well, and he’s hopeful it will bring recognition to the area.
“We haven’t seen the finished product, but the lady who called us up to let it know when it was airing … said that it came out really well,” Noel said.
And he’s inviting the community to share in the debut Friday.
“What we’re going to do that particular night is give out raffle tickets - no charge of course,” Noel said. “At 8:30, we’ll start drawing about half the tickets. At 9 o’clock the show will air, then after the show we’ll raffle off the rest of the stuff.”
Before the mid-July shoot, Noel bought all the Guy Fieri books available at Barnes and Noble. Signed copies go to a dozen patrons the night of debut. Noel also had replicas of a poster Fieri signed, and customers throughout the weekend will receive an 11- by 17-inch copy of the poster.
“That’s whether they are here in the day, the night, Friday, Saturday or Sunday,” Noel said. “We’re going to give that to every customer so at least they leave with something. We’ll also have some other prizes from distributors, but I think the books are the highlight. I can authenticate them. I was here when he signed them.”
