Smokin’ Oak Wood-Fired Pizza and Taproom- Ben Roberts

On this week’s edition of the Flavors of Northwest Arkansas podcast, we’re in Uptown Fayetteville at Smokin Oak Pizza interviewing the proprietor Ben Roberts as we were surrounded by the self-pour tap-wall there... we’ll get into it in a sec, but first, food news!!

The folks that own and operate Tusk & Trotter and Brother’s Meethouse are hosting their 14th annual Christmas Eve free community brunch. Of course, it’s happening on December 24th from 10am to 2pm at Tusk and Trotter in downtown Rogers and at Brother’s Meethouse in Bentonville.

Some big news for Grow NWA recently. Microgreen Queen Katie Helams of Grow NWA now offers a monthly microgreen subscription for only $20. You can see all about it at their beautiful new website, grow-dash-nwa.com. They’re also always stocked at Bentonville Provisions and at the Turnbuckle Farmstand in Bentonville.

A few new winter/holiday cocktail menus are out. Mezzaluna Pasteria in downtown Bentonville is one of them, and I’m eyeing the Boozy Hot Chocolate- it has Callebaut whole bean roasted Belgian dark chocolate, Grand Marnier, and Averna cinnamon whipped cream (yum). It comes garnished with Markham & Fitz artisanal chocolate shavings and a vanilla toasted marshmallow.

Black Apple in Springdale also has one, and I’m looking at a drink called Reindeer Games- it has gin, licor 43, orange, and cranberry juniper cider. Also eyeing that Irish coffee.

And finally, Episode 3 of Bien the Know came out Sunday and comes out every month on the 15th. If you’re not familiar with it, Bienvenue Owner and Executive Chef William Mauk and I interview someone on a topic and Chef Will also answers recipe questions from you. You can email him at chef@bienvenuerestaurant.com. This month, we talked with Chef Carrie Burse from Bentonville Provisions about kitchen items that actually work and make great holiday gifts. You have 2 chefs giving you their 2 cents on this! Check out Bien the Know, available wherever you get podcasts...

And now to Smokin Oak Pizza. Owner Ben Roberts has had several businesses over the years and also works in the marketing and tech sectors, but as a kid, he started in the restaurant business and did it into college.

When looking for a new venture, he went back to his roots and got back into the restaurant business and he’ll tell us why, and why he picked pizza.

They opened after covid and felt the effects of it while working to get the restaurant built out. There was some quick pivoting that had to be done.

And they’re Arkansas’ first legal self-pour tap wall. In fact, they helped get a bill passed so that they could be Arkansas’ first self-pour tap wall after a mix-up with the powers-that-be. It’s quite the story, check it out!