Marcus Samuelsson’s ‘No Passport Required’ explores immigrant communities around the U.S.

PBS’s new cooking series, “No Passports Required,” features renowned chef Marcus Samuelsson in a new six-part PBS/Eater series that takes viewers across the U.S. to explore the diverse traditions and food that has tapped into American food and culture. 

Each week Samuelsson visits a new city to discover the dynamic and creative ways a particular community has made its mark. 

In the premiere episode airing Tuesday, July 10, the chef heads to Detroit and nearby Dearborn where he visits the large Arab community to have dinner with a Syrian refugee family, to have coffee with the owner of a small cafe.  

Later in the episode, Samuelsson travels to the childhood home of a Lebanese pastry chef and her family and cooks a Lebanese dish alongside the chef’s grandmother. 

“No Passport Required” will showcase how food can bring Americans,  old and new, together around the table from Detriot to Washington D.C. and beyond. 

In New Orleans, Samuelsson learns how Vietnamese culinary traditions have fully integrated into the fabric of the city, taking center stage with long-established French and African influences. In New York, he’s shown how the Indo-Guyanese culture thrives in a small enclave of Queens, and how this one community has taken the best of its Indian, Caribbean and colonial heritage and incorporated those influences into its customs and cuisine. 

In Chicago, Marcus ventures into the city’s Mexican neighborhoods and discovers their impact on the area’s food and cultural landscape. Going beyond the borders of South Beach, he also meets with members of Miami’s proud Haitian community. 

“No Passport Required” airs Tuesdays on PBS. Check your local listings.