California to Bentonville: The Wood-Fired Revolution

Join us inside the wood-fired heart of Bentonville, Oven & Tap, with founder Luke Wetzel. In this episode of Dining Out Bentonville, host Biju Thomas uncovers Luke’s journey from the legendary Chez Panisse in California to building a culinary cornerstone in Northwest Arkansas. 

Discover how a 36-hour fermented dough, a hand-built Italian oven, and a passion for community have shaped one of the region’s most iconic dining experiences. Plus, get a sneak peek at his upcoming venture, Townie Burgers & Bevvies and the community favorite Superfine Sweets Shoppe. This episode is a must-listen for food lovers, entrepreneurs, and anyone curious about the flavors fueling Bentonville’s rise.

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Transcript

Welcome to Oven and Tap

Biju Thomas 0:00

Dining Out Bentonville, beyond the menu behind the flavor Oop Bijou. It's great to see you, ron. Thank you so much for doing this. Welcome to Oven Tap. Thank you, sir. Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of Dining Out Bentonville with me, bijou. This podcast brought to you proudly by the lovely folks at Visa Bentonville. Today we're sitting down with Luke Wetzel of one of my favorite places here in town Oven and Tap. If you've been to Bentonville anywhere near the downtown square, you've smelled the beautiful wood-burning oven. You know pushing out pizzas and delicious food from this gorgeous spot that's been here for how many years?

Luke Wetzel 0:41

Almost 10 years now, a little over 10 years Incredible 10 years.

Biju Thomas 0:48

You've got to be one of the original of this wave of restaurants right?

Luke Wetzel 0:50

Yes, so we started in 2015, in the spring, right? I think our opening day was in the Bentonville Film Festival. Okay, so we opened up into the greatest season of chaos possible and it's such a great way to just get thrown into the fire, yeah.

Biju Thomas 1:07

Let's go. The film festival that used to be right down here, yeah.

Luke Wetzel 1:12

Yeah, they would use a lot of it downtown for the screenings and they brought so many people to town. I think we hosted one of their big parties that week and it was just such a great way to kick it off. It was a lot of fun.

Biju Thomas 1:27

It is really cool hearing about the film festival and how much impact it's had on like all the different things and people that it was able to bring into town. I've got so many questions for you. To start with, I absolutely love this restaurant for a very simple reason Obviously, your food's good. We're sitting in front of this gorgeous wood-burning oven. Food is always wonderful, but your staff is just absolutely wonderful all the time. They're so just friendly and gracious and welcoming. They're always just here to take care of the guests and I personally, having been somebody in the restaurant business for a long time, I know right away from the energy that they love being in this space. Right, they really love being here and looking after you and your guests, and that isn't something that just happens overnight. So I'm guessing you come from a long line of restaurants and having done this to be able to bring that culture. Tell me about that. Where did you start?

Luke Wetzel 2:18

Well, I mean again, it all starts with the staff and we're all here together to create an experience and really participate with the staff. And we're all here together to create a you know experience and really participate with the guests. And so, from day one, once you start here, and from day one oven and tap, we've put that holistic experience, um, you know, in front of everything else, because we understand that it's not just about the food, it's not just about the food, it's not just about the cocktails or whatever. It takes every single person every single night to make it happen. And we do our best to teach and create a culture where people are able to learn and progress in life and it just becomes this really fun, exciting place to work. And again, as you said, you feel that at the table and that's just so important to us and everyone. You know we incorporate the open kitchen. Everyone gets to be a part of it and I think that's what everyone really jives with here.

Biju Thomas 3:14

Yeah, and the minute you walk in the door you can feel it. In addition to smelling all the delicious food, you get that energy from your staff. You can see it on the faces of all the guests here, and the place is packed every night of the week, so obviously it's working. Now, for those of you who have seen the rest of our episodes, you know that at some point we're going to be making a grilled cheese. Today we're doing a little bit of a twist on it in that we're going to actively go back there and make the grilled cheese together. So make sure to stick around for that.

Biju Thomas 3:40

It's a wonderful little take on the pizzas they're already doing. It's going to be worth the wait. From that back to your background in restaurants. I don't know if a lot of the folks that come in here realize that you were part of a team at Alice Waters' restaurant, chez Panisse in San Francisco, in Berkeley, berkeley, yep In Berkeley, and Chez Panisse has shaped the entire landscape of restaurants and chefs that have come out since the 80s in the US, who all came from that California cuisine, modern American cuisine that really launched farm-to-table.

Luke Wetzel 4:18

They did yes.

Biju Thomas 4:20

What did you take away from there that you've brought to us here?

Luke Wetzel 4:23

Well, it's exactly that. What did you take away from there that you've brought to us here? Well, it's exactly that. And I think that you know you'll understand I have a mild obsession with Chez Panisse and what they mean to the restaurant or really just the food industry. Again, pioneering the local seasonal cooking was very important. It was such an eye-opening experience for me when I walked into the building and it's, you know, like that simple approach to food, with respect to the people that put the hard work in to grow it or raise it, and then celebrating on the plate. All that is harnessed here and I just found it to be such a compelling way to cook.

Luke Wetzel 4:58

And Chez Panisse was the first place I was introduced to the wood burning oven. So they had a wood burning oven, the wood burning grill, a big wood-fired hearth, and I was just enamored with that style of cooking, the challenge of it it's very intense and understanding how to use that creatively. We love to cook pizzas here and we do cook a lot of them, but we also do our wood-fired edamame in the oven. We do entrees out of the oven. So we're always trying to be creative with the wood-burning oven and that's just been one piece of that experience, but I've tried to adopt a lot of their approach to the way they treat people, they treat food and they engage their community.

Biju Thomas 5:41

That's wonderful and you can get a sense of that even as you're walking up. Obviously, we're in Bentainesville community. That's wonderful and you can get a sense of that even as you're walking up. Obviously, we're in Bentonville, arkansas, where it's always lush and green out. But you've got, you know, that very natural wood, stone, cement vibe in here. It's not overdone, it's beautiful, but it lets the food and the ingredients you use and your staff like really shine. You don't need massive chandeliers and you don't need a bunch of, you know, hulkiness to make the place feel wonderful. And you've done that with this. And if you've been here and you've looked at the oven, this might look like it just happened. But are the bricks arkansas bricks? Where do the bricks come from?

Luke Wetzel 6:18

so the bricks were were made in italy. Okay, um, and they have, um, they've been shipped over to the us and assembled in in California, not too far from the Bay Area, and it's the same brickmakers and oven company that we used at Chez Panisse. Oh, wow, and I just decided, you know, the day I left Chez Panisse, that I was going to have one somewhere. And here it is Nice, the first thing we put in the restaurant, built the rest around it, and then we introduced the tap wall shortly after. So here you go, oven and tap.

Biju Thomas 6:48

Ah, that's how you got the name. So there was an oven. You built the restaurant around the restaurant, you built the restaurant around the oven and you have the name, which is a perfect fit.

From Chez Panisse to Arkansas

Luke Wetzel 6:57

I did lose sleep over names for a while and I think I woke up one morning and just said let's call it what it is. That's fantastic. It really resonates with what we do here Simple, straightforward, artistic food and, I just think, with the local hardwoods that all our furniture is made of, and again, the ambiance to the food. There's an element of restraint which I think is a very important piece of simple food and we really, you know, hang our hat on that here.

Biju Thomas 7:28

Yeah, letting the food speak you know to what you're doing instead of having to overdo it with everything else is wonderful. I do love the hot honey pizzas that y'all make here.

Luke Wetzel 7:36

Yes, you and most other people.

Biju Thomas 7:43

That has got to be the best, one of the best things to eat. Okay on on a given night. How many pizzas are you putting out? Do you think on average?

Luke Wetzel 7:46

um, that's a great question I'm going somewhere with this. We lose, count you know, I would say um two to three hundred all right.

Biju Thomas 7:52

Two to three hundred pizzas each one is coming out of that single oven right there yes each one of those pizzas one at a time in. Uh, that takes some skill and a little bit of magic to make that happen?

Luke Wetzel 8:03

It does and it's it's an intense station and again, um, I, I really love that as a cook. Um, and you know you know cooking like that and engaging the wood oven, um, it's a, it's a challenge. Um it, it really. You know that. You know you have to dedicate a lot of your attention to it and talk about facing the challenge. I mean, you're staring at that all night. It's quick work, but it's also a lot of fun.

Biju Thomas 8:29

Yeah, and if anybody's made pizzas at home, one at a time, you know how hard it is to get one right. The temperature has to be right, so the bottom lifts and the edges and this you watch the cooks back here making pizzas. Man, there's like two guys there, you know they're just like one prepping building. One is manning the oven. It is magical to watch like how quickly and how organized and how symphonic it is to see it all happen. It's pretty cool.

Luke Wetzel 8:51

I've sat at the bar many times just watching the oven at work so well, that's what it's here for and there's, you know, as you notice, there's no knobs or, uh, you know, any gadgets, so you really have to feel the oven and, um, you, you know. If you ask me what temperature it is, I just say either it's either hot or really hot. And we engage it by throwing our hand in there for a few moments, and if your hand's in there for more than three seconds, it's too cold.

Biju Thomas 9:15

This is a good rule for home, like when you turn the oven on. That's how you say put your hand in there. Maybe don't do that.

Luke Wetzel 9:22

Leave it to the professionals.

Biju Thomas 9:23

Yeah, so how did you get to Bentonville? Are you originally from here? How did you get from San Francisco all the way to Bentonville, arkansas, to open a restaurant?

Luke Wetzel 9:32

Sure, grew up in Little Rock, arkansas, okay, and eventually moved out. I cooked for, you know, I was cooking since I was probably 15 just for cash in the pocket. And I stumbled into a restaurant in Little Rock called Boulevard Bread Company Okay, and the chef and owner of that I had spent time at Chez Panisse in California. And I heard all these stories and I decided I have to go. I have to go see what it's all about. And that's when I just really it clicked to me that I can, you know, turn being a chef into a career Nice. So I pursued that career in California with Chez Panisse and my wife and I moved out there in probably 2005 or 2006. And it was maybe six or seven years later. We were at a wedding, at my brother or my sister-in-law's wedding in Aspen, and stumbled into a conversation about Bentonville oh, wow. And where we weren't looking for a ticket back to Arkansas, necessarily. We were very happy exploring California. You know, weekends in wine country, all the great restaurants Sorry about the wobbly table, yeah, yeah, no, that was me. Even very organic floors here it adds to the charm, huh, yeah, not looking for a ticket back to Arkansas, necessarily. We love Arkansas. We still have family here, still have friends here. So eventually, you know, we always had in our minds that we would return to Arkansas. We just weren't sure when. And briefly after that experience in Aspen, we made a few phone calls and all of a sudden we're here in Bentonville.

Building Bentonville's Restaurant Scene

Luke Wetzel 11:07

Yeah, I landed with 21 Seed at the Hive to help open the Hive Restaurant. I was there for two years as the executive sous chef. Oh nice. I helped them with some other properties. They are near and dear to my heart. I love the Hive. I love all the 21Cs. I mean, every time we're into town with one we make sure to stop in there. But two years later, 2015, I made the leap to open Oven and Tap. Oh man.

Biju Thomas 11:36

So that was 2015,. 10 years ago. How does it feel now? Like I'm guessing, the crowds weren't as big when you first opened.

Luke Wetzel 11:43

No, I feel like in you know, at least relative to today, 2015, it was still, you know, the sleepy old Bentonville. It was growing. We had Crystal Bridges, we had 21C. I mean we had a lot of things happening for us, but it certainly didn't feel like it does today. And this side of Bentonville, you know, it was Oven and Tap and it was our friends next door, ramo that did the olive oil shop and we were kind of the only food and beverage south of Central and the square felt so far away those days we would look out from our deck and be like, oh my gosh, it's right there, it's right there, right like it's right there.

Luke Wetzel 12:21

But if you didn't have other businesses it would seem like a world away Totally. But we certainly had like a little FOMO of people on the square. But now that Bentonville's grown, you know, there's been such a great progression of downtown and now we feel like we're in the middle of it. So we love our spot here and it's been a wild ride.

Biju Thomas 12:40

And you're getting all the construction that's happening out here. You're getting this walkway. What is the other word for it? Promenade, promenade. There we go. That starts actually over by 21C and continues all the way across town into here. And is this becoming a park in front, where the parking lot is?

Luke Wetzel 12:56

it'll be a large green space park with promenade, with the promenade walkway and a lot of built-in um amenities, and then a small, a small stage and, you know, think about like a single or a solo artist, or up to like a trio, like a very small, small amphitheater to to accommodate some live entertainment. Whoa, and we're looking forward to it. I mean, if there's anything I would trade, you know, restaurant side parking or it's probably a beautiful green space that's going to keep people down here all day long and we look forward to to, you know, be able to participate in that and and service everyone that wants to come down that's really cool because you could just come, get carry out, go sit on, the sit in the park and have a lovely picnic right here.

Luke Wetzel 13:35

That sounds great how cool would that could just come get carry out. Go sit in the park and have a lovely picnic right here.

Biju Thomas 13:37

That sounds great. How cool would that be? Just get all of this and you get all of this. I mean it's incredible to be down here. I'm fortunate I get to live within walking distance so I can walk over anytime and enjoy all of that. So it's pretty cool. All right, Before we go to make and grill cheese, I've still got a couple more questions for you. What is your favorite go-to on the menu here? What do you absolutely love?

Luke Wetzel 13:59

I was waiting on this one and I'm still unprepared. Okay, All right, I'll rattle off a few of mine. We can go for it. I mean my initial response and it's my love of pizza and I just think the purest pizza is the margarita, or even the marinara. Okay, and so I will go to that. If I go to other pizza restaurants, I hit those just as a good baseline, but it never disappoints and so it's my go-to here.

Biju Thomas 14:26

I mean, you look fit for a guy that eats a lot of pizzas. You look like you're in good shape, so you're doing something right.

Luke Wetzel 14:31

Well, I have to try to do rule of three every year, did you? Do this weekend yeah, did you get a burrito?

Biju Thomas 14:36

no, we made that, we made this, it was burritos it was not my best day all right next, next year, um, and also the cheese here on your pizzas is lovely and it's so fresh and so stretchy. Do you make all the cheese in house with some of the cheese in house, or which?

Luke Wetzel 14:50

we don't quite have the facilities to make our cheese in house, but what we do is we source fresh mozzarella curd Nice, so it's not. If you see fresh mozzarella store, it's either shaped into a ball. But we buy the very fresh curd and we simply chop it up, season it with a little salt and that's what dolps our pizza.

Biju Thomas 15:07

Yeah, it has that softness to it and it's still stretchy, which it just feels so fresh and different than just a regular. Anyway, even really good pizza when you get really good fresh mozz, it's so good yeah we really love this mozz.

Luke Wetzel 15:19

It's got the mild sweetness and again we don't you know. And back into the simple food. We don't touch it Like we let it. We buy a great cheese and so we simply just chop it up and put on the pizza.

Biju Thomas 15:33

That's awesome and I didn't mean to cut you off that fast. The great cheese is awesome on its own.

Luke Wetzel 15:40

But for the grilled cheese I did do the hand stretch, so I took the curd and formed it into the mozzarella balls that will slice up and melt onto the sandwich.

Biju Thomas 15:49

All right, If this grilled cheese happens to be the best thing we eat today, it may have to make an appearance once in a while on a special menu. Just a suggestion. I'm just throwing that out.

Luke Wetzel 15:58

there we're always good for a few surprises here. Our menu changes often. We like to do specials, depending on what comes, you know, coming off the farm or you know, whatever it may be. We like to, we like to keep you on your toes Nice.

Biju Thomas 16:12

Do you have partners in the business? Do you have family in the business?

Luke Wetzel 16:21

How does this all work together? So I have an operational partner, Molly Mullis, or Molly Mullis Murphy. She's married now, but she's been in it with me since the start. Very cool, and we love this restaurant with all our hearts and we couldn't do it without each other.

Biju Thomas 16:30

That's fantastic, man. That's awesome because we can feel it, you can taste it, you can sense it. With that, we should go make a grilled cheese. You ready?

Creating the Ultimate Grilled Cheese

Luke Wetzel 16:37

yeah, I'm ready all right, so it's oven and tap grilled cheese time. This is a. This is the the first grilled cheese at oven and tap special request for visit bentonville viewers only at grilled cheese.

Luke Wetzel 16:49

Look at this. Yeah, so this is our pizza dough. It's a 36 hour pizza dough, fermented um over a few nights. It's ready for us. We've made a few smaller ones for these sandwiches, but I'm going to start with a stretched out pizza dough. A little olive oil, a little sea salt and then we're just going to gently fold this over. We're not going to tap it in because we're going to open it back up and build our sandwich. A little more olive oil.

Luke Wetzel 17:10

We got our oven to, like you know, kind of hot. Yeah, it's hot, no dials, but we're feeling it. So we're going to bake that until it's nice and browned and puffed up a little bit, and then we'll pull it back out and put it on some of our hand-stretched mozzarella. So we took some of that beautiful curd earlier today and we've stretched it into the mozzarella balls you might find in the supermarket. We like to do it that you know that fresh to order, because it's just so beautiful. Then we're going to garnish our or garnish our sandwich with all these cream greens. So I went to Tuckaway Farms, which is here in Bentonville yeah, um, good friends of ours and went to the farm, maybe unannounced, and picked up some greens.

Luke Wetzel 17:59

So we got all kinds of greens in here from chard, spinach and arugula, some of the radish tops, and then turned it into like a creamy spread for our mozzarella. So this will be like an ultimate grilled cheese. And then we took some of the radishes and cucumbers from the farm and made pickles for a nice bright side.

Biju Thomas 18:17

Gorgeous. How long does the oven hold heat, Like once it fires out? How long does it still stay?

Luke Wetzel 18:22

I mean these Italian bricks, whatever you know, whatever the Italians do to the bricks, yeah, when we walk in here the next morning after, you know, a dinner service, it's still at 500 degrees or so. So we recapture the heat pretty quickly and which, you know, gives us a lot, a great source of fuel. We cook a lot of our vegetables in the oven. We've even done some overnight roasting and things like braising and things like that. So we try to utilize it as much as possible. Um, and it's just, it's so efficient that we uh, you know, we just get to do all these fun things with it. But here's our, here's our sandwich dough. Sorry about the swing there. So we'll see you get some of the nice caramelization and then we'll crack it open and we have this beautiful oh man, uh pizza dough ready to go there. I'll start by slicing some of our mozzarella. You should give this a little little taste, tell me.

Luke Wetzel 19:17

Huh, so a few thin slices of that.

Biju Thomas 19:24

So in case there's a big storm blows through, like later today, power outage, you can get a few pizzas out of here, at least before you need light.

Luke Wetzel 19:33

Yes, we've done that before. A few years ago, a big storm rolled through. I think the entire square was down in power and we were chock full with all these great guests. Our staff put cans on the table. We had no light. Obviously, some of the other restaurant, the fryers were down, but we kept rolling pizzas and everyone loved it.

Biju Thomas 19:51

Man, that is awesome, that is such a cool vibe the storm shuts it down.

Luke Wetzel 19:56

It really was, and we're like you know. Hey, we're scrappy, we're going to make it through this man, look at that. But this is some of the cream, greens, so radishes, chard, spinach, all the things you know. Just, I'm not saying it's going to make it any healthier, but it'll certainly make it more delicious. Looks wonderful. So we'll do that.

Biju Thomas 20:14

We'll fold it back over and and then I see some Aleppo chilies you got some.

Luke Wetzel 20:18

So those are kind of three staple seasonings Salt, black pepper and Aleppo. We love it all. I love the Aleppo because it gives that that spicy but not spicy. Right yeah, spice but not spicy.

Biju Thomas 20:31

Lovely flavored chili flakes. Look at that ground. I use it a lot here. It's wonderful.

Luke Wetzel 20:36

It's got the great color and then again, just like a kind of a smoky spice versus the crushed red chili, fake.

Biju Thomas 20:44

This can get either hot or not hot yep, beautiful.

Luke Wetzel 20:48

So we got this back on the deck in here. We're just gonna let the cheese melt. We'll flip it a few times. I like to add a little pressure so we get that nice. Um, you know, and-.

Biju Thomas 20:57

That's an old world technique of cooking, totally Right, and it's just also the most modern way of cooking. At the same time, the best tasting food, the nicest food you get all has real flame and smoke. Look at that, yeah.

Luke Wetzel 21:13

Give it a little shot of I just love the caramelization of the dough and it'll give us a nice little crunch and chew at the same time. That's beautiful. So we can play. First I'll just throw, I'll hit us up with some of these pickles. So this is pickled radish with a little turmeric kind of a bread and butter pickle and then little cucumbers with just a little salt, sugar and vinegar and ice water, so they're so crunchy and delicious. That'll be a nice balance to this rather decadent real cheese cream.

Biju Thomas 21:41

Lovely sir, go through there, sprinkles, look at that. Okay, I was a little suspect about the greens. The leaves Is there spinach?

Luke Wetzel 21:57

in there Spinach chard, there's radish greens, there's scallions and fennel in there. That's wonderful. So it's a little bit of an updated cream spinach idea I do think it's a fun touch, though.

Biju Thomas 22:12

Okay, why 36-hour dough While I'm eating? You can explain.

Luke Wetzel 22:20

The best way to create flavor in the pizza dough is that long fermentation Long cold fermentation allows the yeast to develop fully and it gives this really delicious, sweet and again kind of like a yeasty flavor on our dough.

Biju Thomas 22:36

The dough is perfectly pillowy and soft inside, while having a nice crispy crunch outer crust. A lot of good chew. Yeah, it has structure to it. It isn't just either thin and hard or doughy, it's got a perfect bite to it. If you're sensing, I love everything that's happening here, I appreciate that. Um, so, while we're working, you know, while we're eating here too, I see a lot of construction happening. Yes, um, you got something going on next door. What's happening here?

New Ventures on the Horizon

Luke Wetzel 23:01

Yeah, that is so a lot of construction. And then we're about to see a lot of construction in the park but new restaurant Townie Burgers and Bevies. We're going to open that late summer, townie Townie. Townie Burgers and Bevies. All right, perfect. So it's a little nod to Bentonville still being a town which we you know we love Bentonville. We want to continue to support it. Yeah, and so we want it to be that neighborhood spot. You can stop in, grab a bite, grab a beverage, listen to some music, have fun with friends and then be on your way. So late summer, early fall, we're going to get there.

Biju Thomas 23:37

Is that going to be about the same size? You're going to have a big patio back here.

Luke Wetzel 23:41

About the same footprint as Oven and Tap, plus a big patio, which will be great to welcome the park, the Quilted Park's, into play. Oh man, so we're excited about that. And then we also have our Superfine Sweet Shop behind Oven and Tap.

Biju Thomas 23:54

Superfine, sweet. So if you're walking off the square, what street is that? Main street, yeah, main street right there, and you can come in through that door into almond and tap right, correct? Yeah, yeah, because I've walked. I've done that. I thought I did that accidentally because I walked out that way and it's like I think I'm in the wrong business.

Luke Wetzel 24:08

That's your. That's your own private entrance there.

Biju Thomas 24:10

That's just bg's, ah, thank you so if you're walking down main street and you see super fine sweet shop, super fine sweets, shop.

Luke Wetzel 24:19

It's bright yellow. Yeah, hop in there, cool off, grab some super premium ice cream.

Biju Thomas 24:23

You walk in through there you walk past the gorgeous oven and tap bar and you come into this magical space and get to meet this guy dude, this is wonderful uh, this is super cool. So you've got oven and tap obviously cranking super fine sweets shop townie, townie townies on deck burgers and babies townie burgers and Oven and Tap obviously.

Luke Wetzel 24:39

Crankin' Superfine Sweets Shop, townie Townie, townie's on deck, burgers and Bebbies.

Biju Thomas 24:43

Townie Burgers and Bebbies.

Luke Wetzel 24:44

Or maybe it's going to be on deck, I don't know.

Biju Thomas 24:45

A gorgeous patio, extended patio with a park that's part of the restaurant. Happening, it's all happening. You got to be for real. Look at what you did, look.

Luke Wetzel 24:57

Look at what you did. Look, yeah, totally. I mean, it's been an incredible journey and we love Bentonville and the greater northwest Arkansas area for it, All right.

Biju Thomas 25:05

This is awesome. Thank you so much. Appreciate you. Good luck with everything and can't wait to see it all continue to happen here. Bye from Visit Bentonville. Thanks so much. Thanks for joining.