The Food Chain

Is it possible to taste a place? A listener wonders whether the French concept of ‘terroir’ can apply to food and, if so, what the science behind it is.

Ruth Alexander goes in search of the answer, exploring how growing conditions and practices can develop flavours unique to a location.

She also hears about why the value you give to certain flavours might also be cultural.

Ruth speaks to a honey expert who is mapping the flavours of the sweet syrup across the world, a barley geneticist working with a high-end whisky brand and visits a vertical farm in Liverpool, UK, to see if foods grown in a closed environment still taste just as good.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Hannah Bewley

(Image: A barley field under a setting sun. Credit: Getty Images)

Fancy starting a food truck? It can be a way to trial new food concepts and see if your business has potential before committing to a restaurant premises.

Ruth Alexander finds out what its really like running a food truck or van. She meets customers queuing for over an hour for the SpudBros van in Preston, north-west England, where brothers Harley and Jacob Nelson have drummed up business for their jacket potatoes on social media. Ruth speaks to Anna Brand who runs a vegan food van Vege Bang Bang in Auckland New Zealand, and sisters Natalie and Samantha Mwedekeli who started Mama Rocks, a food van selling gourmet burgers in Nairobi, Kenya in 2015.

Today they have five premises and its time to sell the van that started it all. And Karan Malik talks about his food van SuperSuckers in Delhi, India. He saw the trend take off, but tells Ruth why he decided to get out of the business.

If you would like to contact the programme email [email protected].

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producer: Beatrice Pickup Researcher: Henry Liston

(Image: Brothers Jacob and Harley Nelson in their food van selling jacket potatoes in Preston north-west England. Credit: BBC)

An Indian curry house is one of the most popular places to go out for a meal in the UK, and is part of British life. But many people do not know their origins lie in what is now Bangladesh, after a wave of migration from there in the 1970s.

Devina Gupta traces their history and flavours on Brick Lane in east London, where many people settled and started restaurants. Many have closed over the years, but their legacy lives on. And now more diverse and authentic flavours are becoming popular in the capital and elsewhere.

Presenter: Devina Gupta Producer: Hannah Bewley

(Photo: Brick Lane sign with Bangla language version underneath. Credit: BBC)

Ruth Alexander learns about ‘forever’ foods - stocks, soups and sourdough starters that can be replenished again and again and used for weeks, months or even years.

Ruth hears about a beef soup in Bangkok that has been maintained for 50 years, and she bakes a loaf of sourdough bread using a 69-year-old starter that has been kept going by Hobbs House Bakery in the south-west of England.

Cookbook writer Fuchsia Dunlop in London, UK, talks about the tradition of cooking with an ‘everlasting’ broth in Chinese cuisine.

Annie Ruewerda in New York in the US was charmed by the idea of a perpetual stew, she kept hers going for two months and it became an online hit – bringing hundreds of strangers to her local park to try the stew and add ingredients.

Lee-Ann Jaykus, distinguished professor emeritus and food microbiologist at North Carolina State University in the US explains the food safety rules you need to know if you want to try a perpetual dish at home.

Martha Carlin, distinguished professor of history at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in the US helps unravel the claimed historical origins of perpetual stew.

And our thanks to World Service listeners David Shirley and Mark Wood for telling us about the oldest dishes they have eaten.

Producer: Rumella Dasgupta and Beatrice Pickup Additional reporting by the BBC’s Ryn Jirenuwat in Bangkok, Thailand

(Photo: A huge pot of beef soup in that has been added to over 50 years at a restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand. Credit: David Shirley/BBC)

Social media is awash with videos of people trying out new recipes at home and exploring the best hidden foodie gems in cities around the world.

The stream of content seems endless – so how do the people making these videos keep up?

Ruth Alexander speaks to three people in the UK, USA and Vietnam about having six meals before 10am, the relentless pressure to keep up with viral trends, and what they cook for themselves when the camera is off.

Tod Inskip, Lylla Nha Vy and Jackie Gebel share the highs and lows of being a “content creator” and why they don’t like the term influencer.

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producers: Hannah Bewley and Elisabeth Mahy

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Image: Lylla Nha Vy, Tod Inskip and Jackie Gebel. Credit: Composite BBC)

If you’re a light or moderate drinker, the World Health Organization wants you to know that no level of alcohol is safe for your health.

But just how big is that risk and might it be one you’re willing to take? And what happened to the idea that a glass of red wine might be good for you?

In this programme Ruth Alexander finds out about the studies the guidance has been based on, and the statistical risk of dying from alcohol-related disease.

Dr Tim Stockwell, Scientist at the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research, is the author of a meta-analysis of 107 studies that look at the links between ill health and alcohol. Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter is Emeritus Professor of Statistics at the University of Cambridge in the UK, he explains how we can make sense of risk as individuals.

And Anna Tait in the UK, Amelie Hauenstein in Germany, David Matayabas in the US and Bill Quinn in Australia talk about how much alcohol they drink, and what moderation looks like to them.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(image: four hands raising pints of beer in a ‘cheers’ gesture. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Is it worth taking collagen? With cosmetic companies and A-listers claiming it can slow the effects of ageing, the market for collagen supplements is booming. How sure is the science though?

Ruth Alexander speaks to experts about what we do and don’t know about what these powders, gels and capsules are doing inside our bodies.

She hears from a personal trainer and runner in her 50s about why she takes it daily, and speaks to the CEO of a company selling collagen products in this increasingly competitive market.

New avenues of research are opening up as well, with sports scientists investigating whether an increase in collagen production can help athletes recover from injury more quickly.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Hannah Bewley

(Image: A serving of supplement powder. Credit: Getty Images)

Have you visited a food hall recently? It’s a venue bringing together multiple independent food and drink businesses, often with communal seating.

We look at the ways in which food halls are being used to bring consumers and spend to new areas, raising the value of surrounding offices, apartments and other businesses.

In this programme Devina Gupta visits Society food hall in Manchester in the UK, where she meets Julia Martinelli, who manages the pizza offering from Noi Quattro restaurant and Reece Gibson, operations manager for Vocation Brewery which runs the bar.

Mariko Oi in Singapore reports from the Maxwell Hawker Centre in Singapore, to explore how today’s food halls have evolved from street food traders.

Frode Rønne Malmo from Mathallen in Oslo, Norway and Spiros Loukopoulos, from Reffen in Copenhagen, Denmark talk about the ways in which their food halls have brought people to the surrounding area. Food hall consultant Philip Colicchio in New York in the US explains why this business model has been so popular.

Presented by Devina Gupta.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Mariko Oi.

(Image: a man and a woman enjoying plates of food in a food hall. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Strawberries at the airport when meeting your future husband for the first time, finally tasting world famous fish and chips and wondering why on earth the pasta is green.

These are some of this week’s stories of first impressions of food in a new country.

Devina Gupta visits a multilingual cooking class in Manchester, UK, to find out how language, culture and food help people find a home in a new part of the world..

She speaks to a chef who fled Ukraine when the war started and now runs a restaurant in the Netherlands. Nathalia adapted to life there very quickly, but still can’t comprehend why the Dutch eat toast for every meal.

Mariyam and Marius share their love story from across continents, and talk about the dishes – and those strawberries - which brought them together when they finally met.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Devina Gupta Producer: Hannah Bewley Translation: Irena Taranyuk (Image: Devina Gupta has afternoon tea. Credit: BBC)

Have you heard of ‘super sweet’ sweetcorn?

If you’ve purchased fresh, frozen or tinned sweetcorn in the last few decades there’s a good chance its the super sweet variety. It’s an example of how our fruit and vegetables have been bred over time to make them sweeter, or less bitter. Its partly about appealing to consumer tastes, but can have other advantages such as better storage and reducing food waste.

In this programme Ruth Alexander finds out how and why the taste of our fresh produce is changing, and asks if we’re gaining sweetness, what are we losing?

Ruth visits Barfoots farm on the south coast of England, the biggest supplier of fresh sweetcorn in the UK, all of it super sweet varieties. Plant breeder Dr Michael Mazourek at Cornell University in the United States explains how selective breeding works, and what sort of characteristics have been prioritised by the food industry. Dr Sarah Frith, vet at Melbourne Zoo in Australia explains why they’ve stopped giving fruit to the animals. And Dr Gabriella Morini, chemist at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Italy explains the latest research on bitter flavours, and why they might be good for us.

If you’d like to contact the programme email [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: corn on the cob in the husk, with a background image of a field of sweetcorn plants. Credit: BBC)

Three million bananas; 600-800 baguettes a day; 47,000 plates...as the world’s elite sportsmen and women arrive in Paris, a huge catering operation awaits them.

Ruth Alexander finds out what it takes to keep the athletes happy and fuel a medal-winning performance.

Team GB pole vaulter Holly Bradshaw talks about her relationship with food during her years as an athlete, and why she’s looking forward to retirement after Paris 2024.

Alicia Glass, senior dietician for Team USA, gives an insight in to how a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at the right time can make a big difference.

Reporter Michael Kaloki in Nairobi drops in on Kenya’s sprinters while they’re having lunch to find out what’s on their plates.

And the head of catering for the London 2012 Games Jan Matthews offers advice for the team in Paris this year on how to keep athletes who need a lot of fuel happy.

This programme includes conversations about losing and gaining weight, goal weights and difficult relationships with food that some listeners might find upsetting.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producers: Hannah Bewley, Elisabeth Mahy and Michael Kaloki

(Image: Holly Bradshaw, Team GB pole vaulter, wins bronze at Tokyo 2020. Credit: Reuters)

Why do we cook? To create flavour, to aid digestion and to release nutrients from our food.

Every time we fry, steam, boil, or bake a series of chemical reactions take place that are key to a dish’s success.

In this programme Ruth Alexander puts questions from the BBC World Service audience to Dr Stuart Farrimond in the UK, author of ‘The Science of Cooking’. Susannah and Aaron Rickard in Australia tell Ruth about the chemical reactions they discovered when researching their cookbook ‘Cooking with Alcohol’. And Krish Ashok in India, author of ‘Masala Lab: The Science of Indian Cooking’, explains the science behind the culinary wisdom of your parents and grandparents.

If you’d like to contact the programme email [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: two young girls wearing goggles and aprons conducting a science experiment. Credit: Getty Images/ BBC)

Of the tens of millions of people around the world with autism or down syndrome, only a tiny fraction is in paid employment.

But cooking, making drinks and waiting tables is work where people with learning disabilities can shine.

John Laurenson takes us to a Café Joyeux (Happy Café) in Paris, one of a fast-growing chain of cafe-restaurants where most of the staff have autism or down syndrome and where the croque monsieur comes with a smile.

We also hear from a cafe in Mumbai launched by the mother whose daughter has autism and, in Turkey, the KFCs with a difference.

Find out how café work can transform the lives of employees and owners.

Presenter/Producer: John Laurenson

(Image: Louis, Laura, Anne-France and Arnaud. Credit: BBC)

Taste, it turns out, is not a matter of opinion. Scientists have discovered that your perception of taste is informed by your genetics.

When we eat or drink something, we may be having an entirely different experience to the person we’re sharing a meal with, or the chef who has prepared it, or the critic who has recommended it.

In this programme Ruth Alexander explores her likes and dislikes and how they might be informed by biology.

Ruth meets Laura Kent of the Yorkshire Wine School in the UK who helps her learn about her sensitivity to acidic and bitter flavours. Ruth speaks to Anne Fadiman, writer and Professor of creative writing at Yale University in the US, who dislikes wine, despite her wine critic father loving it. Danielle Reed, Chief Science Officer at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, US, explains the science. Tim Hanni, Master of Wine, and author of ‘Why You Like The Wine You Like’ argues that the wine industry is not paying enough attention to individual tastes. Where does this new science leave wine competitions? David Kermode, judge at the IWSC, International Wine and Spirits Competition, makes the case for the experts.

If you'd like to contact the programme, please contact [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander. Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: three people tasting wine. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

More of us are living in cities and urban farming is on the rise. Can you be sure the city soil you’re growing in is clean enough?

Industry and traffic can contaminate land, but there are ways to deal with the problem.

Ruth Alexander finds out how to test soil, how to clean it, and which fruit and vegetables are the safest to grow on former industrial and commercial sites.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: A garden trowel with some soil on it)

Producer: Hannah Bewley

What’s it like spending 24 hours a day together? Ruth Alexander speaks to couples who run restaurants. She hears how they met, what they argue about and why being a couple might be good for business.

Ruth visits Andrea Follador and Jazz Navin at ‘The Perfect Match’ restaurant in Sale, in the North West of England. Jazz is the chef and Andrea is the sommelier, the two met working at Gordan Ramsay’s ‘The Savoy Grill’ in London. Ruth speaks to Francisco Araya and Fernanda Guerrero, chefs who have lived and worked together in their native Chile, China, and now Singapore where they run fine dining ‘Araya’ restaurant. Rita Sodi and wife Jody Williams ran a restaurant each, and then decided to open one together, 'Via Carota' in New York, United States. Today they run five bars and restaurants together in the city.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: Andrea Follador and Jazz Navin who run ‘The Perfect Match’ restaurant together in North West England. Credit: BBC)

In a world where ingredients cost more due to war and inflation how is easy is it to make and sell our daily bread?

Ruth Alexander speaks to three bakers about how they started in the industry, the highs and lows and economic pressures in their part of the world.

Alex Oke is the owner of XO Boutique Bakery in Lagos, Nigeria, Tracey Muzzolini is the owner of Christies Mayfair Bakery in Saskatoon, Canada and Samer Chamoun is the owner of The Lebanese Bakery, a chain of 12 branches including Beirut, Cairo and London.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Rumella Dasgupta.

(Image: Alex Oke holding a loaf of Nigerian agege bread and Tracey Muzzolini holding a loaf of sourdough bread. Credit: Donna Martins/Chelsea Walton/BBC)

Ruth Alexander speaks to patients about their experiences of weight-loss drugs.

The new class of drugs impact appetite, making you feel full sooner, and slowing the rate at which your stomach empties. Known as GLP-1 medications, studies suggest that patients can lose 10% or even up to 25% of their body weight depending on which drug they use. For many who have struggled with obesity and obesity related disease the drugs have the potential to transform their health.

However some patients have struggled with the side effects of the drugs and the manufacturers’ own studies indicate that if people stopping taking them, much of the weight lost is regained, making them drugs for life for some.

Ruth Alexander speaks to Professor of Cardiometabolic Medicine, Naveed Sattar, at Glasgow University who is Chair of the UK government’s obesity mission. He explains how these drugs work and the potentials costs and savings for the National Health Service, or NHS. Adrienne Bitar, historian at Cornell University in New York, is the author of ‘Diet and the Disease of Civilization’, a study of diet books of the 20th century. She explains the ideas diet culture is built on. And Ruth asks Gary Foster, Chief Scientific Officer at WeightWatchers, what these weight-loss drugs will mean for the multi-billion-dollar diet industry.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Image: Michelle Herum in Denmark who currently uses a weight loss drug. Credit: Hanne Juul/BBC)

Devina Gupta takes a food tour of her home city of Delhi to see how people are adapting to rising summer temperatures.

In May this year the city saw a record temperature of almost 50C, and knowing what to eat in such heat can be a challenge.

The changing climate is sparking innovative recipes in restaurant kitchens and bringing traditional practices back to people’s kitchens.

Devina tries old favourites at street markets, a modern twist on a classic drink at a high end restaurant and is (almost) convinced that a vegetable she has hated since childhood might work wonders in the heat.

She hears from public health expert Dr Samar Husayn about why the cold, sweet treats you might reach for on a hot day aren’t always the best.

And she sees the difference between how those who have air-conditioned homes and those who don’t are coping.

Presenter: Devina Gupta

Producer: Hannah Bewley

(Image: A bowl of gourd dip with restaurant workers in the heat in the background. Credit: BBC)

Ruth Alexander explores the origins and evolution of the humble grab-and-go food the burrito, which started life in northern Mexico, before crossing over into the US and becoming a hit around the world.

Versions of the spicy wrap can be enjoyed in restaurants, street food shacks and supermarket home meal kits all over the world.

We explore the burrito’s contested origins, find out why some Mexican food purists dislike the popular menu item and ask what the future holds for it, and the cuisine more broadly.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: a burrito in a restaurant in Juarez, Mexico. Credit: Vianey Alderete Contreras/BBC)

Presented by Ruth Alexander. Produced by Sam Clack. Additional reporting by Vianey Alderete Contreras in Juarez, Mexico and El Paso, United States.

Cows emit greenhouse gases when they eat, which contributes to global warming. But is it possible to produce meat in a climate-friendly way?

Grace Livingstone visits a carbon neutral certified ranch in Uruguay, where farm manager Sebastian Olaso shows her around. She also meets Javier Secadas, a small farmer who raises cattle on natural grasslands, and agronomist Ignacio Paparamborda, from the University of the Republic in Montevideo.

Grace hears from Pete Smith, Professor of Soils and Global Change at the University of Aberdeen, and Dominik Wisser, Livestock Policy Officer, from the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation.

She tries to find out if it is possible to produce meat in a way that is both good for nature and the climate. Or whether we need to stop eating meat to cut emissions.

Presenter/Producer: Grace Livingstone (Image: Cows grazing in Uruguay. Credit: Getty Images)

Why eat with your hands?

Many food cultures around the world eat using hands, and most of us use our hands some of the time. Do we really need cutlery or chopsticks to eat a salad, peas or rice? And if you were to tackle soup or stew with your hands, how would you go about it?

Michael Kaloki reports from Nairobi, Kenya, where the staple dish ugali, made from maize flour, is traditionally eaten by hand. Michael has observed that people increasingly use cutlery to eat the dish, and he speaks to restaurateurs and customers about why that might be, and what might be lost.

Ruth Alexander learns about the etiquette of eating by hand with food writer and consultant Karen Anand in India. And Ruth explores whether food might be more enjoyable, and even taste better, when eaten by hand. Psychologist Professor Charles Spence from Oxford University, and chef Jozef Youssef of Kitchen Theory in the UK share their research.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Reporting by Michael Kaloki in Nairobi, Kenya.

(Image: a man’s hands, pulling apart a sweet cake wrapped in dough, with sauce on his hands. Credit: Getty Images/ BBC)

Stunning cakes, colourful salads and intricate garnishes use flowers to entice customers, but there’s more to this trend than just beautiful social media pictures.

Many cultures around the world have eaten flowers for centuries, and some of them pack a serious punch.

Devina Gupta explores the history of edible flowers and visits a site in the UK where they’re grown all year round. She gets quite a shock when trying one particular variety.

We find out why flowers are used on food nowadays, and how generations of knowledge about their use and properties were lost when they were brought to Western countries.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email [email protected].

Presented by Devina Gupta

Produced by Julia Paul and Beatrice Pickup

(Image: A nasturtium flower growing. Credit: BBC)

Do you know how much salt you should be eating?

And if I tell you it’s less than 5 grams a day, do you know how much that is?

Ruth Alexander explores the wonder of salt and why chefs think their job would be pointless without it and why the impact it’s having on the food might surprise you.

Professor Paul Breslin tells us about the “magical” chemical reaction happening on your tongue when you eat salt, and why your brain responds to that.

We hear about what eating too much salt can do to you from an expert in Australia, as well as a mother in Kazakhstan who cut out salt almost completely – in a country which has one of the highest consumptions in the world.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander

Produced by Hannah Bewley

(Image: A chef sprinkles salt on a pan of food. Credit: BBC)

Over two million people work in the international shipping trade, and they are often at sea for months at a time.

That’s a lot of meals being made by the cook on board, and their work is crucial for keeping the crew happy.

Ruth Alexander hears from seafarers about why that makes “cookie” the most important person on board a ship and why, in some cases, crew members are going hungry.

A former captain of merchant vessels tells us how food is used for so-called “facilitation payments” to corrupt officials, and why crews can sometimes be powerless to stop port officials filling up suitcases with food from the ship’s stores.

We also hear about international efforts to try to tackle corruption in ports and increase welfare standards for seafarers.

If you would like to share your own experience, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producers: Izzy Greenfield and Hannah Bewley

(Image: A container ship at sea. Credit: Getty Images)

What’s the secret behind the on-screen chemistry shared by some TV chef duos?

The recent death of Dave Myers, one half of ‘The Hairy Bikers’ with Si King, has prompted this programme celebrating successful food friendships. Dave and Si made food shows and cookbooks that took their fans all over the world, and off-screen they were close friends.

In this programme Ruth Alexander speaks to two chefs who have found success in food with a good friend.

Ruth Rogers, co-founder of The River Cafe restaurant in London, talks about her partnership with the late Rose Gray, who died in 2010. Together they presented ‘The Italian Kitchen’ for Channel 4 in the UK in 1998.

Italian chef Gennaro Contaldo talks about his long friendship and work with the late chef Antonio Carluccio, and the TV series they made together for the BBC, ‘Two Greedy Italians’ in 2011 and 2012. Gennaro also talks about his friendship with the chef Jamie Oliver to whom he’s been a mentor.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: Ruth Rogers and Rose Gray plating dishes at The River Cafe restaurant in London. Credit: Maurice ROUGEMONT/Getty Images/ BBC)

These are tough times for restaurants. If the pandemic's rolling lockdowns were not bad enough, independent eateries now find themselves caught on a conveyor belt of crises: inflation, labour shortages and high rents. That is without mentioning the post-Covid agoraphobic “hermit consumer", who prefers to hunker down indoors than splash the cash on going out.

If the stats are to be believed 60% of restaurants fail in the first year, 80% after five. And yet despite the long odds many are still seduced by TV dramas like The Bear into turning their passion for cooking into a business. We hear from some of the best in the business for a steer on how to keep this labour of love alive.

David Reid speaks to leading restaurant critic Jay Rayner, culinary specialist Ashley Godfrey, top chef Joseph Otway and restaurant operations manager, Sam Wheatley as they lift the lid on the trade secrets they have accumulated from years on the restaurant front-line. The programme also asks what a world without independent restaurants would be like and what we as strapped consumers can do to save the flagging middle of the restaurant market from going under.

Presenter/producer: David Reid

(Image: A waitress lays a table in a restaurant. Credit: Getty Images)

Step inside the chocolate factory to hear the secrets of what it’s like to invent sweet treats for a living.

Find out why chocolatiers think the raw material is like a “needy child”, but can also bring great joy to people’s lives.

And hear the family story of the invention of one of the best-known British chocolate bars, with a trip to an archive of hidden stories from the confectionary industry – and some well-preserved sweets.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Hannah Bewley

(Image: Chocolate bars on a colourful background. Credit: Getty)

Fasting has been a religious and cultural practice for thousands of years, why do people do it? What happens to your body when you fast? The Food Chain speaks to a British family breaking their fast during Ramadan, a woman in India completing a day long fast for Mahashivratri and explores why the practices around Lent have changed over the years. An expert on intermittent fasting talks us through what is happening to our bodies, and why it might have hidden benefits.

In this programme, Rumella Dasgupta explores the tradition of religious fasting with what to eat and what not to eat in three major faiths.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email [email protected].

Presented by Rumella Dasgupta.

(Image: a family in Manchester breaks their fast together with dishes spread out on a cloth on the floor. Credit: BBC)

Dumplings feature prominently in cuisines around the world.

Some, like the Ghanaian kenkey, or the Irish dumpling, are balls of dough. But in many countries they’re filled with other ingredients.

From the Russian pelmeni, to the Japanese gyoza, for centuries we’ve been putting meat, vegetables or cheese in small pouches of pastry, and making delicious snacks.

So where did this idea originate? And are all these differently named dumplings connected?

Ruth Alexander explores the history of this humble comfort food and hears how different dumplings are made.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email [email protected].

Presenter: Ruth Alexander. Producers: Julia Paul and Rumella Dasgupta (Image: Dumplings and bowls of dipping sauce. Credit: BBC)

Sweet, sour, salty, bitter and... umami. Have you heard of the fifth taste?

Umami, meaning ‘delicious flavour’ in Japanese, was discovered by a chemist in Japan in 1908 but it took nearly 100 years for it to be recognised as a fifth distinct taste. It is described by many as a savoury or meaty taste.

In this programme Ruth Alexander learns about the chemist who first discovered umami, and the industrially produced version he created – monosodium glutamate, or MSG. It’s a food additive that’s been the subject of health scares, but today it’s one of the most tested additives in our food and considered to be safe for consumption.

Yukari Sakamoto, trained chef and food tour leader in Tokyo explains how umami features in Japanese cuisine; she says miso soup is one of the best examples of maximum umami flavour. Professor Barry Smith, Director of the Centre for the Study of the Senses in the UK, explains the science behind umami and MSG. Calvin Eng, chef and owner of Bonnie’s restaurant in Brooklyn New York, is one of a number of chefs trying to rehabilitate MSG’s reputation – he uses it not just in savoury dishes, but also desserts and drinks.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a bowl of miso soup, containing tofu and spring onions. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Three school chefs tell Ruth Alexander what it’s like serving up canteen food every day.

Find out how they manage hundreds of hungry child customers, what pro tips they have for making vegetables seem delicious, and why they all find the job so satisfying.

We hear from the USA, Liverpool in the UK and a school chef in the far north of Finland about the challenges of cooking mountains of meatballs, how to cope when the vegetable biriyani goes all over the ceiling, and why it’s one of the most rewarding – but probably overlooked – professions.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Producers: Hannah Bewley and Rumella Dasgupta

(Image: a plastic lunch tray with meat, vegetables and gravy, fruit and a plastic cup. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Have you heard of ultra processed food?

In 2010 a group of Brazilian scientists said we should be focusing less on the nutritional content of food, and more on the form of processing it undergoes. They created the Nova system, a way of categorising foods based on how processed they are. It identifies ultra processed foods as generally industrially manufactured, containing ingredients such as emulsifiers, stabilisers and other additives that would not be found in an average home kitchen.

A growing body of scientific research suggests a link between this category of ultra processed foods and ill health, although there’s still some uncertainty around why this could be.

In this programme we look at what ultra processed food is, how you spot it, and how practical it is to avoid it, should you wish to.

Ruth Alexander speaks to listener Jen Sherman in California who is trying to reduce the amount of ultra processed food her family eats. Ruth also hears from one of the public health scientists behind the Nova classification, Jean-Claude Moubarac at the University of Montreal in Canada, and from Pierre Slamich, co-founder of the Open Food Facts app and website, a database of foods that can help you identify products that are ultra processed. Kate Halliwell, Chief Scientific Officer at the Food and Drink Federation in the UK, which represents manufacturers, says evidence of harm from ultra processed foods is not yet strong enough.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Jane Chambers in Chile.

What do you and your family chat about at dinner? We eavesdrop on conversations over food all over the world, hearing about poetry, politics, what is on TV and how Morag’s leg is recovering.

Whether you gossip or have more philosophical debates find out how integral good communication is while we are eating, often marking the only point in the day or week when a family gathers together.

We learn why a matchmaker thinks a dinner date might not be such a good idea after all if you want the conversation to flow. And, psychotherapist Philippa Perry tells us how to keep the peace with the family over Sunday lunch.

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producer: Hannah Bewley and Rumella Dasgupta

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Image: Family and friends sit around the dinner table. Credit: BBC)

The city of Detroit in the United States has a lot of vacant space – as much as a quarter of residential, commercial and industrial sites lie unused today.

In this programme Ruth Alexander meets the people who are growing food in their neighbourhoods, creating urban farms and community gardens where houses once stood. Mark Covington is the founder of Georgia Street Community Collective, and Tyson Gersh is the co-founder of the Michigan Urban Farming Initiative.

Ruth learns why so much land stands empty from the city’s official historian Jamon Jordan. Jamon explains the role of the automobile industry in bringing jobs and people to Detroit in the early 1900s, and the circumstances that led to decades of population decline, job losses and debt for the city government, culminating in bankruptcy in 2013.

Tepfirah Rushdan is the newly appointed, first Director of Urban Agriculture for the city of Detroit. She explains how she hopes to bring urban farmers and politicians together to find a way for food to be grown alongside new developments as investment returns to the city.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: the Michigan Urban Farming Initiative a farm in downtown Detroit, surrounded by roads and buildings. Credit: Michelle and Chris Gerard/BBC)

In February 2023, two earthquakes devastated parts of Turkey. The disaster claimed the lives of nearly 60,000 people in southern Turkey and northern Syria.

In this programme Victoria Craig travels to the city of Antakya, part of Hatay Province, close to the border with Syria. It’s a region long famed for its cuisine, and even has special UNESCO recognition for its gastronomy. Since the earthquake a year ago much of the local population has left the badly damaged area, and food businesses in the historic bazaar are waiting for rebuilding work to begin. Victoria hears from the people of Antakya why food is such an important part of their culture and community.

Produced and presented by Victoria Craig.

If you'd like to contact the programme, you can email [email protected].

(Image: tray kebab from the bazaar in Antakya. Credit: Victoria Craig/BBC)

Chinese food is popular and successful around the world. But is it afforded the respect it deserves?

In some countries Chinese food has been seen as something tasty, but ultimately cheap and not very healthy, despite it being a cuisine with a focus on health, seasonality and gastronomic skill for centuries.

In this programme Ruth Alexander meets Fuchsia Dunlop, a British food writer who has spent a career studying Chinese cuisine. She argues that the food has long been undervalued in the West, and it’s time for that to change.

Ruth also meets chef Andrew Wong, whose restaurant A.Wong in London holds two Michelin stars, the first Chinese restaurant outside of Asia to receive that accolade. A.Wong operates on the same site as Andrew’s parents’ Chinese restaurant in the 1980s and he talks about how the business, and Chinese food in the UK, has evolved.

And she hears from Rica Leon, CEO of ‘Chifa’, a restaurant in LA that celebrates her family’s Chinese and Peruvian heritage. Rica explains how Chinese flavours and ingredients have influenced Peruvian food.

If you’d like to contact the programme, you can email the [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: A table of tofu dishes prepared by Fuchsia Dunlop, including mapo tofu, smoked tofu salad, shredded tofu leather, silken tofu with avocado, an imitation roast duck dish made from layers of tofu, and deep fried tofu served in a soup. Credit: Fuchsia Dunlop/BBC)

Have you ever wondered why the apple you bite in to is so crisp and juicy? And why it’s available all year round?

Apples originated in the mountains of Central Asia, and made their way along trade routes to Europe and then on to the rest of the world. They are now one of the most widely consumed fruit worldwide.

An apple seed will produce a completely different fruit to the tree it came from – so new varieties have to be bred and cultivated.

In this week’s episode Ruth Alexander finds out about the science behind finding that perfect crunch, how long it takes to be able to taste an apple you’ve spent years planning and how to grab consumers’ attention with a new breed.

Ruth also visits a wassail near Manchester in England to experience an ancient tradition involving cider, hanging toast on a tree and lots of singing to encourage a good apple harvest for the year ahead.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Hannah Bewley

(Image: A bright red apple on a green background. Credit: Getty Images)

Humans have preserved food to make it last longer for thousands of years. In this programme Ruth Alexander learns about different methods of food preservation used around the world, including pickling, dehydrating and canning.

Food historian and writer Darra Goldstein in the US explains the history of this art. Yukari Sakamoto is a trained chef and sommelier who leads food tours in Tokyo, she explains why people in Japan take the idea of a well stocked pantry seriously. And Usha Prabakaran in Chennai, India talks about her love of the Indian pickle and its role in Indian cuisine.

There are some important safety considerations if you want food to last longer, particularly if you want to store it at room temperature. There is a risk of botulism if food is not heated to the correct temperature for the correct amount of time, particularly for foods that are low in acid. Ruth hears about the laboratory testing done by Carla Schwan, Director at the National Home Food Preservation Centre based in Georgia, United States which tests recipes that can be used safely for home preserves.

Canning – storing food in glass jars and heating it – has seen a resurgence recently. Some enthusiasts refer to themselves as ‘rebel canners’, which in general refers to people wanting to use recipes other than those that have been lab tested and approved. The ‘Canning Diva’, Diane Devereaux a food preservation educator and blogger in the United States explains what motivates rebel canners, and the recipes she thinks are missing for consumers.

If you’d like to contact the programme, you can email [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a selection of foods preserved in jars of different shapes and sizes. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Ruth Alexander talks to two families displaced by the war in Ukraine, as they reflect on their second year away from home.

They discuss the difficulties of being away from loved ones and the solace home cooking can provide.

Ruth speaks to Natalia Lomonosova, who’d had to flee her home in Kyiv with her teenage daughter and has set up a new life in Berlin, Germany; and she visits Mariya Dmytrenko and her family, who are living with their hosts Brian and Julie Lamb, in Blackburn, England.

If you’d like to contact the programme, please email [email protected].

Producer: Beatrice Pickup

(Image: Mariya Dmytrenko and family with their hosts Brian and Julie Lamb. Credit: BBC)

We take a trip around the world with BBC World Service presenters and listeners, finding out which are their favourite foods when a celebration is in order.

A porridge which is hidden around the house to ward off spirits, sweet and delicious pilau shared with neighbours and an ornate box filled with as many as 50 types of food in Japan – we hear about what’s on the menu at this time of year.

Ruth Alexander has help from her enthusiastic three-year-old son to make a traditional Christmas cake for the first time and BBC World Service business presenter Devina Gupta gets stuck washing up after a delicious Diwali feast with her family in Delhi.

Producers: Hannah Bewley, Beatrice Pickup and Rumella Dasgupta

Image: Ruth and her son making Christmas cake, Credit: BBC

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Our brains require 20% of our body’s energy intake, despite making up, on average, only 2% of our body weight.

There are nutrients that are needed for brain health and development, yet many of us don’t think about specifically eating for our brains.

In this programme Ruth Alexander learns about the relationship between our gut and our brain, and the impact food can have on your alertness, mood and memory.

And just why oily fish, and other foods containing omega 3 fatty acids are so good for your brain.

Ruth speaks to Dr Reeta Achari, a neurologist specialising in nutrition in Texas, United States and Dr Uma Naidoo a nutritional psychiatrist and author of ‘Calm Your Mind With Food’, in Massachusetts, United States. They are joined by Michelle Munt in the United Kingdom, whose blog ‘Jumbled Brain’ talks about recovering from a brain injury following a car accident in 2014.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Julia Paul and Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a selection of foods collected in the shape of a brain. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

It’s estimated that more than 2 billion people use polluting stoves - with severe consequences for their health.

The World Health Organisation says 3.2 million people die each year as a result of the household air pollution they cause.

Ruth Alexander finds out why this problem – which also harms the environment – is so difficult to solve.

She speaks to Dr Fatih Birol of the International Energy Agency in Paris; Sophie Odupoy from Koko Networks in Kenya; Naramath Lucas Kariongi from the Rural Communities Support Organisation in Tanzania; and Dr Mike Clifford of Nottingham University’s engineering department in the UK.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected].

Producers: Hannah Bewley and Rumella Dasgupta.

(Picture: a clay stove with a wood fire lit. Credit: BBC)

Many countries allow the manufacture and export of pesticides that are banned for use in their own countries.

Recently France and Belgium have introduced laws preventing the export of such agrochemicals if their use is banned in the European Union. The European Commission is currently considering whether to introduce similar laws.

Grace Livingstone reports from Paraguay where some small farmers living near soya plantations say heavy pesticide spraying is affecting their health and livelihoods.

We hear from the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Toxics, Marcos Orellana, who says that global pesticide regulations should be tougher.

And we speak to Emily Rees of CropLife International, which represents the agrochemical industry, who says different climates and soil conditions require different pesticides.

Produced and presented by Grace Livingstone.

(Image: a tractor spraying soybean crops. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Seaweed soup, aniseed sprinkles on toast, pig trotter soup and fried chicken.

In this episode Ruth Alexander learns about what your body needs postpartum, and hears different food traditions for that time, from around the world.

Chinese-American author Heng Ou tells us about her differing experiences after the birth of her three children, and how an auntie making dumplings non-stop helped her.

Allison Oman Lawi from the World Food Programme explains the nutritional needs for the body in the weeks after giving birth and talks about how cultural traditions often get it just right.

Mengqi Wang in China tells us about her experience in a postpartum clinic and how she managed to break the strict dietary rules a few times.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander. Produced by Hannah Bewley and Rumella Dasgupta.

(Image: A woman holds her new baby. Credit: Getty Images)

The European Union wants to introduce one system for scoring the sustainability of food products. The new requirements are likely to be introduced in 2024.

Currently there are a number of different labels and symbols used on food packaging across Europe, and there is concern that this can lead to confusion for consumers and can be open to exploitation.

Russell Padmore travels across Ireland, hearing about the pros and cons from farmers, food producers, restaurants and consumers.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email [email protected]

Produced and presented by Russell Padmore.

(Image: a woman looking at the label on a can of food, holding a shopping basket. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Pan fried, artisanal, gourmet: there's a fashion for foodie words. Why?

In this episode, Ruth Alexander finds out how restaurants use language, psychology and behavioural economics to whet your appetite and increase their profits.

Linguist Dr Keri Matwick of Nanyang Technological University in Singapore explains the research that shows the longer the description of a dish, the more expensive on average it is.

Chef Caroline Martins of Sampa at Blossom Street Social Wine Bar in Manchester, England talks about the mistakes she made when she first designed her menus.

Sean Willard of Menu Engineers in California gives us an insight into the power of using a box on the menu.

And thanks to listener Simon in London who emailed [email protected] with the idea for the programme. Neither he nor we will look at a menu in the same way again.

Presented by Ruth Alexander. Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a woman holding a menu in front of her face. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Wherever humans go, whatever we do, we need to eat.

In this programme, we meet the people cooking at the extremes.

We hear about the chefs serving up three-course meals on Africa’s highest peak; the elaborate puddings created on stormy seas with a cruise ship pastry chef; the art of cramming enough food to feed 100 hungry sailors on board a nuclear submarine with a US Navy submarine culinary specialist, and tapas nights in the Antarctic with the chef at Rothera research station.

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producers: Rumella Dasgupta and Izzy Greenfield

(Image: Mount Lister in Antarctica, covered in snow and ice. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Ghana’s inflation rate is one of the highest in the world, much of it driven by rising food prices.

In this programme Ruth Alexander asks how Ghana went from being the world’s fastest growing economy in 2019, to financial crisis today.

Economist John Asafu-Adjaye, at the African Center for Economic Transformation based in Ghana, explains why much of the country’s food is imported.

Lydia Amenyaglo explains why historically cocoa has not been made into chocolate in Ghana, instead shipped elsewhere to be manufactured. Her family has farmed cocoa for decades, but she’s struggled to start a new business creating cocoa products at home in Ghana.

Ruth hears about the impact of rising food prices on school meals in Ghana. Might Kojo Abreh, at the Institute for Educational Planning and Administration in Ghana, explains the findings from a survey of caterers, schools and students which found that some children are going hungry.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producer: Beatrice Pickup

(Image: A woman with a child on her back purchasing food. Credit: Getty Images)

This week, Ruth Alexander is exploring the growing market for professional home cooking and asking whether you’re guaranteed the luxury experience you’re paying for.

She speaks to private chef Juliana White, also known as Plate in Progress, about what it's like to cook for the rich and famous in The Hamptons, a summer destination for affluent New York residents.

Kate Emery, founder of Amandine International Chef Placement in the south of France, tells Ruth how she handles the big personalities of chef and client, and discusses the demand for private chefs from the middle classes.

We talk to one of the newer types of customers, John Holt, about why he's happy to spend handsomely to hire a private chef for an evening, and why it isn't always a success.

Italian-born Marcello Ghiretti treats Ruth to some breakfast, and explains the issues surrounding private chefs and professional standards.

More than half of us globally now live in cities. The United Nations estimates that by 2050, that number will be closer to seven out of ten of us.

How can growing cities feed their populations?

In this programme Ruth Alexander finds out about the history of how cities grew to their current scale, and some potential solutions to meeting their food needs.

Carolyn Steel, architect and author of ‘Hungry City’ meets Ruth in London, United Kingdom, to talk about the role of transport and markets in making London the city it is today. Ruth hears about Tokyo, Japan, a city that has spread around ancient farmland rather than build on it. She speaks to Yu Tominaga and Mayumi Kawaguchi who own Hasune farm in central Tokyo, and Professor Makoto Yokohari who studies urban farming at the University of Tokyo.

In Namibia, our reporter Frauke Jensen Röschlau reports on the role of informal food vendors on the streets of Windhoek, she interviews Professor Ndeyapo Nickanor, an expert in food security at the University of Namibia.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Frauke Jensen Röschlau.

(Image: commuters walking on a street in Tokyo. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

What if you could reach a great age through your dietary choices? Imagine – that the food you eat has a direct effect on how long you live. An appealing concept, but can it be backed up by research?

In this programme, Ruth Alexander explores the dietary habits of centenarians, to find out if there are any similarities in what they eat and whether their diets have had a bearing on their longevity.

She speaks to 100-year-old Betty Webb, to find out how much food has played a role in reaching a century, and discovers more about “Blue Zones” – geographical areas where some researchers claim people live longer than average lifespans.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: An older woman holding a slice of watermelon. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Bonnie Garmus, author of the bestselling novel Lessons in Chemistry, shares the story of her life through five dishes.

Ruth Alexander meets Bonnie in her London home, to talk about the food influences in her debut novel about a female chemist turned TV cookery show host in the 1950s and 60s.

She’ll hear about Bonnie’s childhood growing up in California, her own personal experiences of sexism in the workplace, the adoption of her Chinese daughters and her relationship with her husband David.

Bonnie will bake a dish that features in her novel, ‘desperation brownies’.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: Bonnie Garmus in her London home with a brownie that she has baked. Credit: BBC)

Many dishes have become famous national symbols both at home and abroad, for example Italian pizza, or British fish and chips.

Whilst such dishes can create a sense of unity and identity, they can also be used to fuel nationalism, or to push a political agenda.

In this edition of The Food Chain, Izzy Greenfield hears the stories behind some of the most famous national foods, some based more on myth or marketing than historical fact.

She speaks to Anya Von Bremzen, author of 'National Dish', in which Anya investigates the origins of foods such as Italian pizza, Japanese noodles, Spanish tapas and Mexican tortillas. The Secretary of the Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage at UNESCO, Tim Curtis, explains why some dishes are recognised for the community practices that surround them. Andrew Crook, President of the National Federation of Fish Fryers in the UK, and food historian Professor Panikos Panayi from DeMontfort University in Leicester, England, explain the complex history behind fish and chips.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email [email protected]

Presented by Izzy Greenfield. Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image:takeaway fish and chips with a union jack flag on a cocktail stick. Credit: BBC)

Consumers have the buying power but how much are they considered when a brand decides to make a change?

In this edition of The Food Chain Ruth Alexander takes a look at what goes into developing some of the products we know and love.

We travel to the northwest of England to a consumer taste testing facility, Wirral Sensory Services. Such businesses would have been few and far between just decades ago but now they’re a big part of the research process when brands look to launch new products or make changes to existing ones.

Consumer expert Dr Sara Jaeger tells us about the benefits and the limitations of these tests and business consultant Samuel West talks us through some of the most well know failures in food.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Hannah Mullane

(Image: a woman blindfolded, sat in front of a pizza. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

As India welcomes the world’s biggest economies for the G20 meeting this September, we look at the role that food might play in top level discussions.

Food diplomacy is increasingly seen as a form of ‘soft power’ that can help build bridges and find common ground.

In this programme Devina Gupta speaks to chef Arun Sundaraj, who is leading the catering teams at the Taj Palace Hotel in Delhi which is hosting many of the G20 delegates. She visits the Colombian embassy in London to hear from the country’s ambassador about the role food played during vital peace negotiations between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC. Devina also travels to Glasgow in Scotland to share a plate of haggis with Scotland’s national chef, Gary Maclean and Lauren Bernstein, founder and CEO of The Culinary Diplomacy Project in the United States, explains why governments are looking to hire culinary experts to aid in diplomacy.

Presented by Devina Gupta.

Produced by Rumella Dasgupta.

(Image: Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden raise two wine glasses in a toast. Credit: Getty Images/ The Washington Post/ BBC).

Weaning refers to the process of introducing your baby to solid foods, alongside breast milk or formula. In the UK, the NHS suggests this normally happens at around six months old.

In this programme Rick Kelsey starts the weaning journey with his baby boy Albie, and finds out about some of the different approaches including ‘spoon fed’ and ‘baby led’ weaning. He also gets advice on how to deal with allergies and choking.

Rick Kelsey is joined by Katie Shelton from ‘Scrummy Tummies’, Dr Sarika Kapoor who posts online as ‘The Weaning GP’, and Rachel Childs, nutritionist at First Steps Nutrition Trust, a public health charity in the UK.

Produced and presented by Rick Kelsey.

You can contact the programme by emailing [email protected]

(Image: a baby being spoon fed, with food around its mouth. Credit: Getty Images/ BBC)

This edition was updated on 02/10/2023.

Imagine not being able to sit and eat at the dinner table with your family without feeling furious.

The little-known condition of Misophonia, often called “sound rage”, is a lower tolerance to certain sounds. Although sufferers can react to several types of repetitive noises, many are particularly triggered by eating sounds.

Misophonia has not been classified as a clinical disorder, and there have only been a few studies into it, which means many doctors have never heard of the condition.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander meets three people with Misophonia who are trying to raise awareness: Dr Jane Gregory, a doctoral research fellow at Oxford University; Adeel Ahmad, the host of a misophonia-themed podcast in the US, and Olana Tansley-Hancock, a clinical researcher based in the UK.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email [email protected]

(Image: Young man and woman next to each other, woman biting into apple. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Produced by Julia Paul

The banh mi is a staple street food in Vietnam and increasingly popular around the world. But how did it come to be a global sensation?

In this edition of The Food Chain, Ruth Alexander discovers how the signature sandwich - invented during the French occupation of Vietnam in the 1950s - went on to become popular around the world after the end of the Vietnam war.

Ruth explores the traces of French history and politics found in the sandwich ingredients with former French diplomat to Vietnam Dr Bertrand Hartingh; and she discovers how it’s made at Manchester restaurant, Pho Cue.

And as Dr Quan Tran of Yale University explains, it's a tale of ingenuity, adaptation and family love.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: A banh mi sandwich)

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producers: Sam Clack and Rumella Dasgupta

Italian food is one of the most popular cuisines in the world, but how did it first make its way out of Italy?

In this edition of The Food Chain, Ruth Alexander uncovers stories of migration, food culture and legacy in the Italian diaspora.

Academic Donna Gabaccia explains why millions of Italians left their home country in the 1800s, creating new communities around the world that came to be known as ‘Little Italy’.

Ruth visits one of them, in London’s Clerkenwell, to discover its history and how a delicatessen founded in the late 1800s – still busy today – sparked a love for Italian cuisine.

We hear from an Italian restaurant owner in Buenos Aires, whose Genoese ancestors put their stamp on the local food scene more than 90 years ago.

And reporter Kizzy Cox takes a trip around some eateries in the world-famous Little Italy in New York City to see how the local community is moving with the times.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Five contributors in the programme, from left to right: Lou di Palo, Luca Fadda, Hugo Banchero, Giorgia Fadda and Nico Paganelli, in front of a Little Italy sign. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producer: Elisabeth Mahy Reporter: Kizzy Cox Additional production: Veronica Smink and Matías Zibell Garcia

At what age should you start teaching children to cook, and why should you?

In this programme, Ruth Alexander meets children and young people who are talented in the kitchen, making the case for why it might be worth the time and the mess to trust them to make dinner.

We travel to the north-west of England to Sefton Carers Centre to meet Paige Jones, aged nine, who cares and cooks for her mum, Rachel, who has a health condition.

Food writer Jenny Chandler, who has authored two cookbooks for children, gives Ruth some tips about how she can get her three-year-old son engaged in the kitchen.

And Ruth meets the young cooking enthusiasts sharing their skills with others: Keffa Liona in Nairobi, Kenya, makes cooking videos with his younger brother, Kisali, which they post online; and Julian Frederick in Texas, United States, is - aged 15 - the CEO of Stepstool Chef, which provides video tutorials presented by children for children.

Presented by Ruth Alexander Produced by Beatrice Pickup

(Image: Child stood on a stool in a kitchen, making houmous.)

Immersive dining has become something of a culinary craze in recent years. As well as serving food, restaurants are providing multi-sensory experiences for customers; transforming their dining spaces into places where people can escape. In this edition of The Food Chain, we take a look at immersive dining establishments around the world, exploring why customers are increasingly choosing to be entertained while they eat, and asking – is this dining trend a bit of a fad, or is it the future of eating out?

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Diners eating at tables surrounded by flowing water, at Labassin Waterfall restaurant in the Philippines)

Presenter: Izzy Greenfield Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

The African continent is seeing one of the fastest rates of urbanisation in the world.

As people move to cities, and lifestyles change, so do diets. Many indigenous ingredients and dishes become hard to source and prepare. Others become associated with rural or village ways of life and are no longer seen as sufficiently aspirational.

In this programme, Michael Kaloki finds out about traditional dishes at risk of being forgotten. He cooks with his Aunty Naomi to learn about dishes from his own Kamba tribe in Kenya. He also visits Dr Kathleen Anangwe, Lecturer in the Department of Sociology, Social Work and African Women Studies at the University of Nairobi, as she prepares a traditional dish from her own tribe, the Luhya in Western Kenya. He speaks to chef Selassie Atadika, who is showcasing indigenous ingredients and methods of cooking in her pop-up nomadic dinners in Accra, Ghana.

If you'd like to contact the programme email - [email protected]

Presented by Michael Kaloki.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: women transporting millet in baskets on their head. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Going to a wedding this year?

Spare a thought for the caterers - expected to put on ever-more elaborate feasts in ever-more challenging conditions.

In this episode, three wedding caterers - in India, the US and the UK - share anecdotes about demanding guests, make-shift hillside kitchens and emergency trips to hospital.

Warning: if you’re a bride- or groom-to-be, this programme might just give you a case of the jitters.

You can share your tales of wedding banquet triumphs and disasters by emailing [email protected]

(Picture: Bride and groom blowing out a candle on a cake. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Out of necessity, in adversity, or for the fun of it - how, and why did you learn to cook?

Ruth Alexander hears the stories behind people’s kitchen skills - the highs, the lows, the challenges overcome, and the connections made – and discovers there’s often more than just dinner at stake.

Growing up in Germany to Japanese parents, chef Nina Matsunaga remembers having to step up to the stove when her mother was taken ill; the eldest of three boys in Cameroon, Timah Julius Nyambod made breakfast and dinner for his brothers while his mother worked as a food vendor; Janet Pollock describes teaching herself to cook as a young child inspired by cookery shows in Nashville, USA; and Rahul Raina is holding on to his Kashmiri heritage in Oxford, England, thanks to the recipes and know-how of his mother and grandmother.

You can contact the programme by emailing – [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander

Produced by Beatrice Pickup and Rumella Dasgupta

(Image: Rahul Raina cooking chicken yakhni, a Kashmiri dish, with his mother Sunanda Dhar. Credit: BBC)

Salt has been a staple ingredient in cooking and preserving food for thousands of years.

It adds flavour to food, preserves it, and keeps our bodies functioning.

In recent years, gourmet brands have emerged and some consumers have been willing to pay higher prices for rock and sea salts.

Ruth Alexander finds out how this trend started and asks whether there’s anything special about speciality salts.

She speaks to Jess Lea-Wilson, Ronan Burns and Rob Jardine about how Halen Mon seasalt is made in Anglesey, Wales; Craig Cormack, ‘The Salt Chef’, about the salt tasting sessions he runs in South Africa; and Rajesh Shah of Vikas Center for Development about how technology is improving conditions and profits for salt workers in the Indian state of Gujarat.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Julia Paul.

(Image: a spoonful of salt. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Could our office, apartment and public buildings also be farms?

In this programme, Ruth Alexander meets the pioneers of rooftop farming, turning concrete into green spaces where fruit and vegetables are grown.

We find out about the logistics, the challenges, and whether it has the potential to feed city populations.

In Barcelona, Spain, she meets Joan Carulla, who recently celebrated his 100th birthday. Joan has been tending his private rooftop vegetable garden for fifty years with the help of his son, Toni. They’re joined by friend and fellow rooftop gardener, Robert Strauss.

Ruth speaks to Kotchakorn Voraakhom, a landscape architect in Bangkok, Thailand. She designed a farm on the roof of a university in 2019, the largest in Asia at that time.

And Mohamed Hage, co-founder and CEO of Lufa Farms in Montreal, Canada explains how they are farming rooftops on a commercial scale. To date the company has four rooftop greenhouses and an indoor farm, which produces enough food to feed about 2 per cent of the city’s population.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: Joan Carulla sat on a bench in his rooftop garden in Barcelona, Spain. Credit: BBC)

Tabasco sauce, Lea and Perrins, Angostura Bitters. Those are a few of a very select number of sauces, condiments and tipples that have weathered changing tastes and trends over the years, even outliving their founders.

How do some brands manage to survive for 100, 150 or 200 years?

In this programme, David Reid lifts the lid on some of these store cupboard stalwarts to reveal the secrets of their longevity, heritage appeal, and what happens when a company tries to ‘tweak’ a winning recipe.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email – [email protected]

(Picture: Tabasco sauce bottles)

Presented and produced by David Reid

Television cookery competitions are big business – drawing audiences in their millions over multiple series. How did they become such a successful format?

In this programme we go behind the scenes with competitors and judges. Ruth Alexander speaks to chef Simon Wood, who won the BBC’s 'Masterchef' in 2015 and today runs two restaurants of his own in the United Kingdom; New York based chef Marcus Samuelsson, who has both competed in and appeared as a judge in multiple different shows including 'Top Chef', 'Iron Chef' and 'Chopped'; and food writer Gail Simmons, judge on 'Top Chef' in the United States for all twenty seasons to date.

Tasha Oren is Associate Professor and Director of the Film and Media Studies Programe at Tufts University in Massachusetts, United States. She describes how food television has evolved over decades.

And Ruth speaks to World Service listeners Mutinkhe Kaunda in Zambia and Andrew Laverghetta in the US about what they look for in a TV cooking competition.

Clips from 'Iron Chef Japan' used courtesy of Fuji Television Network, Inc.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email – [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a hand holding up a trophy. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

A lunch break can tell you quite a lot about a country’s work culture; ranging from two-hour, luxuriant pauses in some parts of the world, to a couple of minutes, snack-in-hand at a desk, in others.

For decades, people have built up camaraderie by meeting informally and in person, but technology and the pandemic have changed that.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander goes in search of the meaning and purpose of the lunch break; from power lunches in the heady world of international finance, to a simple snack and a chat with a colleague, and asks, what do we stand to lose if we don’t take a proper break?

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Two female colleagues, laughing over a meal. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Why go to culinary school when you could learn on the job?

Three trained chefs-turned teachers make the case for learning the basics and getting a qualification that could open doors in a competitive world.

In this programme Ruth Alexander hears what it takes to be a great culinary teacher. She speaks to Gary Maclean, Executive Chef at City of Glasgow College in the UK, he’s Scotland’s national chef and won the BBC’s Masterchef the Professionals in 2016; Suzanne Storms, Assistant Professor at the Technological and Higher Education Institute of Hong Kong where she manages the culinary arts and management degree; and Alexandra Didier, Chef Instructor at Le Cordon Bleu Paris.

If you’d like to contact the programme you can email us – [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a chef instructs a student in a kitchen classroom. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

How can you be sure you’re eating what you think you’re eating? In most cases, food fraud won’t make you ill, but you won’t be getting quite what you’re paying for. In this programme, Ruth Alexander hears why high food prices and the war in Ukraine mean food fraud is more likely to happen. She visits a laboratory in Belfast in Northern Ireland, where food products are analysed to sort what’s real and what’s fake, and she speaks to a food fraud investigator who tells us just how difficult it is to stop the criminals. And we hear from a spice market in Delhi where vendors and shoppers tell us how they try to avoid fake products.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

(Image: A row of jars of spices, but the one in the middle is highlighted. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

The world’s first octopus farm is being planned by a Spanish seafood multinational.

The intelligent creatures are difficult to rear in captivity, but numerous companies around the world have been trying and Nueva Pescanova has announced it’s close to making an octopus farm a reality.

Scientists and animal welfare groups have objected to the plans.

Nueva Pescanova says the company’s priority is to guarantee animal welfare by applying to the cultivation process the conditions of the species in the wild.

Ruth Alexander finds out more about both sides of the debate with the BBC’s Environment and Rural Affairs correspondent, Claire Marshall, who has been closely following the story from the beginning.

She speaks to Dr Heather Browning, Lecturer in Philosophy at Southampton University in the UK and former zoo-keeper, about the capacity of octopuses to experience feelings; and how we form our opinions about what we should and shouldn’t farm.

And she finds out why octopus is central to Japanese cuisine with food writer and host of Japan Eats! podcast, Akiko Katayama.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: an octopus with curling tentacles. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

The crowning of a British monarch calls for an official dish. In 1953, for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, it was a curry and mayonnaise chicken dish. This time around, King Charles III has selected a quiche - the principle of the shareable tart being to inspire the public to join in a celebratory lunch.

It may sound fairly simple, but as Ruth Alexander discovers in this programme, a lot lies behind the commemorative dish.

Ruth asks why the new King wants his crowning moment to be marked with home-baking, what opportunities royal-inspired food offers, and what the monarch’s culinary choice might tell us about this moment in time.

She visits a farm shop in Warwickshire, in the British Midlands, where owner Michelle Edkins has been baking and serving up a spread of dishes to mark the big occasion.

Muhammed Ali, the owner of an Indian restaurant in the neighbouring county of Staffordshire, tells Ruth about a new Coronation-themed curry he’s put on his menu to capture the moment.

Food historian, Dr Rachel Rich, puts the official quiche into historical context.

And Dame Prue Leith, South African-British celebrity cook and judge, gives her verdict on the dish and considers whether its simplicity and choice of ingredients signal something about the new monarch.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: King Charles III having tea. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Genetically-modified food has long been a subject of debate. It was first introduced to market in the United States in the mid 90s.

Since then, some governments have approved the cultivation and sale of GM food, whilst others have had bans in place.

In this programme, we look at attempts by India and Kenya to approve genetically-modified food crops, and ask if lessons can be learnt from the United States where GM foods have been consumed for decades.

Today there are lots of different genetic-engineering techniques in use. Generally, genetic modification refers to organisms created with particular characteristics, using some genetic material from a different organism.

Ruth Alexander is joined by Devina Gupta, from Business Daily on the BBC World Service, who can explain the latest developments in India, where the government wants farmers to plant genetically-modified mustard.

Ruth also speaks to Roy Mugiira, chief executive of the National Bio Safety Authority Kenya, the government appointed regulator for GM products. In Kenya, the government has lifted a 10-year ban on GM, and approved the use of GM maize, a staple crop.

And Professor Jennifer Kuzma, co-director of the Genetic Engineering and Society Center at North Carolina State University, talks about how labelling can help give consumers choice over whether they eat GM.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: field of corn. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Every day, humans make multiple choices about what to eat. Some of those decisions will be better for our health than others - but what if we allowed a machine to decide for us?

In this programme, Adam Shaw explores what would happen if we let artificial intelligence (AI) design our diets and whether that might improve our health.

Adam visits a laboratory in the UK to meet AI researcher Dr James Neil, from the Centre for Nutrition Education & Lifestyle Management, whose company is developing machine-learning systems to create personalised diets.

He speaks to dietician Pennie McCoy, to find out how a digital therapist called ‘Hope’ is learning to help Australians stay on track with their weight-loss goals.

Dr Mariette Abrahams, dietician and CEO of Qina, a company in Portugal which offers strategic advice on the personalised nutritional market, tells Adam about the potential and the pitfalls of the new tools.

And Dr Eric Topol, professor of molecular medicine and executive vice president of Scripps Research in the US, considers whether AI-driven diets will be used for a small group of people, or whether the technology could fundamentally change everyone’s approach to food.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: A robot hand and a human hand both reaching out to grab an apple. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Presenter: Adam Shaw Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

The British "caff" - slang for café, and home of the breakfast fry up, or "full english" - is under threat. Many have closed, struggling to compete with changing tastes and the success of chains.

Many of Britain’s historic caffs opened in the 1940s and 50s, run by Italian migrants. Some of these original caffs are still trading, run by second and third generation Italian families.

In this programme Ruth Alexander hears stories of the famous caffs that have closed for good, and goes in search of caffs still going. She’s joined by actor Michael Simkins, who has relied on hearty caff fare during a 40-year career in the theatres of London’s West End, and meets actor and director Mark Gatiss, who is finding it increasingly hard to find a good cup of tea in the capital.

Ruth visits cafes that have been operating for decades – Bar Bruno in Soho, and Dino’s Café in east London, to learn exactly what their customers love so much about the traditional British caff.

Restaurant sector consultant James Hacon describes the changes seen in the hospitality industry in the last twenty years, and why caffs now face such stiff competition.

If you would like to get in touch with the programme, email - [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: Ernie Fiori proprietor of Dino’s Café at New Spitalfields Market, East London, holding up his tea pot. Credit: BBC)

What’s the best way to produce affordable food, that’s good for the planet, and can feed us all? Is it even possible to have all three?

In this programme, Grace Livingstone visits small and large farms in England and Argentina. She hears the case made for organic farming, and asks if it’s feasible for organic farms to produce enough food to feed a country.

At a larger farm, she hears about why farmers rely on fertilisers and herbicides to produce large volumes of affordable food. Is it possible to farm in a way that increases biodiversity and protects the environment, whilst also remaining competitive?

And what can we do as consumers to encourage and support greener farming?

(Picture: Farmers Lizzie and Rob Walrond standing by a farm gate)

Presented and produced by Grace Livingstone

Dark kitchens are the multi-block commercial units allowing virtual brands and events companies to prepare and deliver food. They’ve got a mysterious reputation, sometimes also called ghost kitchens, so The Food Chain wanted to see how they have expanded since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In this episode, presenter Rick Kelsey speaks to chefs who buy a place in them, and to the owners who build them. Gini and Eccie Newton run Karma Kitchen, one of the fastest growing dark kitchens in Europe. They describe how much it costs to move in, how the model has changed, and respond to the restrictions put in by local governments on the kitchens in Barcelona, France and the Netherlands.

Peter Cook is someone who knows the owners of the biggest dark kitchens in the world. He has recently returned from Amsterdam where he ran the Ghost Kitchen conference, and explains how PR around the kitchens is improving as they become more open spaces.

And Yousif Kurdi runs Your Kitchen across the Netherlands, including in Amsterdam. He tells Rick how working with the locals is always good for business.

(Picture: A woman packing a paper delivery bag. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Presented and produced by Rick Kelsey

Long days, unsociable hours, a hectic and pressurised workload – the working environment for health care staff is full of challenges. Maintaining a healthy diet in those conditions is tough.

Two shift workers talk honestly about what they eat on the job, and get advice from a dietician.

Ruth Alexander speaks to Scott Christmas, who’s on his eighth year of overnight shifts, to Tom Gibbons, a paramedic, and to Dr Linia Patel, dietician and performance nutritionist.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: A pair of hands holding a stethoscope and an apple. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Anyone who has taken a photo of their plate in a restaurant knows how hard it is to make food look good on camera.

An industry is dedicated to advertising food products on TV, online and in print. What does it take to make a burger look delicious, desirable and realistic? And, most importantly, is any of the food in adverts real?

In this programme, Ruth Alexander meets a food stylist, a food photographer, and a director of food commercials, who share their industry’s tips and tricks. She’s joined by stylist Claire Ferrandi Smythe in Johannesburg, South Africa, photographer Sue Atkinson in London, United Kingdom and food commercials director Steve Giralt in New York, United States, who has made a name for himself with flying food and robots.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: A hand lifting a slice from a pizza with cheese, peppers, mushrooms and meat. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Facing the trauma of having to abandon your home because of war or climate change, how do you find solace in food that is no longer your own?

There are 10 million registered refugees in the world – probably many more - who are living this reality.

In this episode, Ruth Alexander speaks to two families – one Afghan, one Ukrainian - who know what it’s like to lose their food; and to Allison Oman Lawi, deputy director of nutrition at the World Food Programme.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Rumella Dasgupta.

(Image: a selection of dishes enjoyed by an Afghan family living in the UK. Credit: BBC)

Humans have been accidentally feeding wild birds for millennia; any leftover food scraps to be scooped up by opportunistic, feathered friends.

The deliberate feeding of birds, however - placing seeds out on a feeder in the garden, taking crumbs to a nearby park or lake – is a more recent, cultural phenomenon. In some countries, it has deep significance and one of the most popular ways humans interact with wild animals – and it’s big business. In other places, it’s practically unheard of.

So, why do humans feed wild birds?

In this programme, Ruth Alexander delves into the many aspects of this human-animal interaction and asks the question; who’s benefiting more, the birds or us? Ruth speaks to urban ecologist, Dr Darryl Jones, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and to keen bird feeders Dan DeBaun, in Minnesota, US; Fung Sing Wong in Singapore; Bylgja Valtýsdóttir in Reykjavík, Iceland; and Antony Tiernan, in Surrey, UK.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Blue tit on garden feeder. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

How do you make Michelin Star-level food, for hundreds of people, in a kitchen you just built in someone’s garden, and with no access to cooking gas? That’s just a typical scenario facing chefs in the world of high end mass catering.

In this episode, we hear from John Downey, the Catering Manager at the Web Summit tech conference, on the pressures of feeding high profile figures, and VIPs who've spent $26,000 on a ticket.

We also hear from Matt and Ted Lee, authors of the book Hot Box: Inside catering, the food world's riskiest business. They tell us about the stresses and often extraordinary challenges of providing high end food, at scale, at some of the USA’s most fancy weddings and galas.

Presenter: Marie Keyworth Producer: Sarah Treanor

(Picture: A chef's hand, putting the final touches to some dishes. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Food banks have operated for decades in North America and Europe. They are generally operated as non profits, connecting food businesses that have waste with individuals, families and charities that need food.

In 2006 there was just one African food bank in Egypt. A second opened in South Africa in 2009. Today there are around twenty five across the continent.

In this programme we look at how African countries have adapted food banks to their needs, and hear how they address criticisms that the food bank model itself is flawed when it comes to addressing food poverty.

We ask Nairobi based reporter Michael Kaloki to spend a day with Food Banking Kenya, and its founder and CEO John Gathungu. Michael visits their warehouse storage, meets small holder farmers donating surplus food, and speaks to women living in some of Nairobi’s informal settlements that rely on food donations.

Ruth Alexander speaks to Elijah Addo, who founded one of Africa’s first food banks in 2015, Food for All Africa in Ghana. Gaby Kafarhire at The Global FoodBanking Network, based in Chicago in the United States, talks about the particular challenges African food banks face. And researcher Gareth Haysom at the African Centre for Cities at the University of Cape Town shares his concerns about the current system.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Michael Kaloki in Nairobi.

(Image: a food bank worker lifting a crate of vegetables onto a truck. Credit: BBC)

Spaghetti, penne, farfalle, gnocchi, lasagna – just a few of the 300-plus shapes of pasta in existence. And there are some very strong opinions about them.

This Italian staple is one of the world’s most popular foods and one of the most versatile.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander delves into the history, culture and passions of pasta-making to ask a controversial question – what is the best pasta shape?

She speaks to restaurateur Elisa Cavigliasso and chef Giulia Martinelli, from The Pasta Factory in Manchester, UK; pasta historian Luca Cesari, in Bologna, Italy; pasta shape inventor and host of the Sporkful podcast, Dan Pashman, in New York; and Andrea Butti, co-owner of Dominioni Pasta, a pasta machine manufacturer near Como, Italy.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Nine small piles of different pasta shapes. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Noma – considered by some to be the ‘world’s best restaurant’ - has announced it will close in 2024. The news has prompted headlines around the world and a renewed discussion about the culture of fine dining, and whether it is sustainable as a business model.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander asks ‘what’s the big deal about fine dining?’. Is it an industry that exists only for the very wealthy, or do its innovations and trends affect how we all eat?

Ruth is joined by Pete Wells, restaurant critic for The New York Times, who ate at Noma in Copenhagen in 2018. Food historian Dr Rachel Rich at Leeds Beckett University in the UK talks about the history of fine dining, and the celebrity chefs of the 19th century. Chef Sarah Francis knows what it is like to be at the top of your game but want to do something different – in 2018 she and her partner gave back the Michelin star awarded to their restaurant The Checkers in Wales. And BBC World Service listeners and self-confessed ‘foodies’, Casey Griffiths in the UK and Pamela Garelick in Greece, tell Ruth about their best and worst fine dining experiences.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

To feed a child is fundamental to a parent, it’s instinct. But what if your baby can’t swallow?

After receiving lots of emails to a programme we made on dysphagia – or swallowing difficulties – we were asked to explore the condition as it affects children.

In this edition, Ruth Alexander speaks to parents Kelly Rose, in the UK, and Melanie and Sean Hoffman in Canada, about how they manage their children's conditions and their relationship with food; and to a doctor, Professor Hamdy El-Hakim, who is on a mission to ensure dysphagia is better understood.

And we hear from the children themselves. Three-year-old Bodhi and five-year-old Ophelia share their thoughts about food.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Bodhi and his mother Kelly Rose. Credit: Kelly Rose/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Who wrote the cook books on your kitchen shelves? For many celebrity chefs, a cook book, or several, is an obvious way to extend their brand. But if they don’t have the time or the skills to write one, they may hire a ghost writer or co-author to work with them.

It’s not just writing, the work can involve project management, recipe testing, meeting deadlines and handling some big egos. Sometimes writers are credited on the cover of the book, sometimes in the introduction, sometimes not at all.

In this programme Ruth Alexander meets two people who have worked as ghost writers on cookbooks. JJ Goode lives in New York in the United States; he’s credited on the cover of many celeb chef cookbooks, and recently won a prestigious James Beard award for the book he wrote with Gregory Gourdet, ‘Everyone’s Table: Global Recipes for Modern Health’. Signe Johansen is a Norwegian American trained chef and food writer living in London; she worked as a ghost writer on cookbooks early in her career before publishing her own, such as ‘Solo: The Joy of Cooking for One’.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: ghostly-looking open book. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Opera is viewed as something of an endurance sport in the musical world. Hours spent on stage, in costume, doing a very physical job far away from home comforts can take its toll on the body if it’s not adequately fuelled.

As Ruth Alexander discovers in this programme, diet is of paramount importance to a professional singer.

Sopranos Rachel Nicholls and Lucy Schaufer, and Fred Plotkin - opera and food writer and friend of Luciano Pavarotti – share the secrets of the relationship between singing and sustenance, and what foods can help achieve a star performance.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

The piece of music at the start and end of this programme is If Music be the Food of Love, by Henry Purcell. Performed by Rachel Nicholls.

(Picture: Pavarotti eating from a spoon. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Working as a chef can be creative and rewarding when people love your food, but it can also be demanding, requiring long and antisocial hours.

In this programme we hear about the highs and lows of working in some of the world’s best kitchens, and why it ultimately isn’t right for everyone.

Ruth Alexander speaks to three chefs who chose to leave the profession. Former head chef Philip Barantini in the UK is now a TV and film director, his film Boiling Point, released in 2021 is about a chef struggling to run a successful restaurant. Genevieve Yam left behind Michelin starred restaurants in New York to become a food writer, she’s currently culinary editor at the website Serious Eats. Riley Redfern was a pastry chef in Michelin starred restaurants in San Francisco and New York, having lost her job in the pandemic, today she has a new career as a software developer.

If you’ve been affected by any of the issues raised in this programme, such as alcohol and drug dependance, you can access support via the BBC Action Line page - https://www.bbc.co.uk/actionline/

Excerpts from Boiling Point used courtesy of Vertigo Releasing.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: chef cooking with open flame in frying pan in a professional kitchen. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Why hold on to an old clay pot, a worn-out metal spoon, or a plain glass bowl?

Earlier this year, we made a programme celebrating old and cherished cookware and received a huge response from World Service listeners.

So, in this edition, Ruth Alexander hears your stories of the poignance that can be found in the most unassuming kitchen utensil, and explores a few other tales we’ve uncovered of cooking with love.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy Researcher: Siobhan O'Connell

Ukrainian cookbook writer Olia Hercules reflects on why it's important to mark this festive season, and the traditional dishes she’ll be serving at the Christmas table in London this year. Ruth Alexander speaks to Olia and her Russian born friend and fellow food writer, Alissa Timoshkina, to discuss how these food traditions have developed and how relatives and friends will be marking Christmas in the war-torn country, ten months on from Russia’s invasion. Ruth also sits down with a Ukrainian family of refugees and their British hosts in Blackburn in the North of England to find out what will be on their Christmas table this year, and what it’s like to be separated from loved ones at this time. For Mariya Dmytrenko and her children, Krystina and Artem, and their hosts Brian and Julie Lamb, food has provided opportunities to bond and learn about each other’s cultures as they share a home. If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected] Presented by Ruth Alexander Produced by Beatrice Pickup (Image: Mariya Dmytrenko and her children Krystina and Artem in Brian and Julie Lamb’s kitchen in Blackburn England. Credit: BBC)

Can you imagine what you would miss if you lost the ability to eat?

Swallowing is something most of us take for granted, but around 8% of the general population are believed to experience some difficulty swallowing – known as dysphagia.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander talks to one of the estimated hundreds of millions of people who have struggled with swallowing food and drink, and to those who are trying to make the condition better understood.

She speaks to California-based Sonia Blue, who lost the ability to swallow after having surgery; chef Niamh Condon, in Cork, Ireland; and Professor Bronwyn Hemsley, head of speech pathology at the University of Technology Sydney, Australia.

Always seek advice from a qualified health care professional with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Pureed apple on a spoon. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

2022 has seen record food prices. Many African countries have been badly hit because they import their staples – wheat, rice and oil. A lack of infrastructure and capacity in some countries means that food grown in Africa is often not processed into packaged food products, instead those items are imported from outside of the continent.

In this programme we speak to two women who run food businesses in Zambia and Ghana, to talk about the impact of rising food costs, and whether this year’s food crisis could be the impetus for Africa to be more self-sufficient. Ruth Alexander is joined by Monica Musonda, founder and CEO of Java Foods, which manufactures fortified noodles and cereal products in Zambia and Yvette Ansah who owns two restaurants, Café Kwae and Kwae Terrace in Accra, Ghana, BBC West Africa business reporter Nkechi Ogbonna joins from Nigeria, Africa’s biggest economy by gross domestic product to talk about the impact of rising food costs there.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: aerial view of a large ship transporting rice, unloading cargo onto smaller ships. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Eggs – a nutritious and affordable source of protein.

Or they were. The cost of a box of eggs has been rocketing around the world. And in some places, where it’s long been common to start the day on an egg – supplies are under pressure.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander explores the challenges egg producers are facing - including what can be done about the seemingly ever-present threat of avian influenza.

She speaks to Amanda Mdodana, a poultry farmer in Mpumalanga, South Africa; Phillip Crawley, a poultry farmer in Leicestershire, UK; Mark Jacob, poultry and egg economist in Arkansas, US; and Professor Munir Iqbal, head of the Avian Influenza Virus group at the Pirbright Institute, UK.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: A chicken standing next to an egg. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Samuel Ikua is championing urban farming in his city, Nairobi in Kenya.

Samuel undertook an urban farming course in 2015, run by a local NGO called the Mazingira Institute. Seven years later Samuel is the project coordinator at the institute, training other members of his community in urban farming skills.

In this programme Ruth Alexander hears about the challenges Samuel faces, a lack of space and land, and local attitudes to farming in a big city.

Samuel’s commitment to food security in Nairobi saw him chosen by a panel of international judges as the winner of The Food Chain Global Youth Champion Award 2022.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Michael Kaloki in Nairobi.

(Image: Sameul Ikua. Credit: Timothy Ivusah/ BBC)

Food behind bars is not intended to be a Michelin-starred affair. But prison food reformers claim some of it is so bad that it could be hampering the rehabilitation of inmates. Nutritious and tasty meals, they argue, can improve the physical and mental health of those serving prison sentences and therefore cut reoffending rates. And food skills; like cookery, baking and farming, could help in the rehabilitation process too.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander speaks to three people with detailed knowledge of food in prison environments to explore the good, the bad and the ugly of eating in incarceration, and the power of food.

Ruth speaks to Alex Busansky, head of research centre Impact Justice; Lucy Vincent, founder of the charity Food Behind Bars; and ex-offender, now consultant on prison reform, Sophie Barton-Hawkins.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Prisoner harvests a cabbage grown on prison land. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

How does sound influence the way we eat, drink and taste? We discover our hearing makes a bigger contribution to flavour than we think.

Mike Johnson explores the concept of 'sonic seasoning' - the idea that different sounds can accentuate the sweetness, bitterness or spiciness of food. Chef Jozef Youssef, founder of the multi-sensory dining experience Kitchen Theory, serves up a musical food experiment, and Charles Spence, professor of experimental psychology at Oxford University, gives his track recommendations.

From the crunch of a crisp to the background music in a restaurant, we examine the science that links our ears and taste buds with a journey into the brain flavour network.

Plus, how the food and drink industry is cashing in on the selling power of sound - we speak to branding expert Martin Lindstrom about his painstaking work with some of the world's biggest fizzy drink manufacturers.

Also, could the concept of sonic seasoning be used in the battle against diabetes and obesity?

(Photo: Apple and headphones. Credit: LdF, Thinkstock. Soundscapes credit: Condiment Junkie)

In this programme we explore the realities of island diets. Ruth Alexander hears how diets are changing, and what this means for population health.

Indigenous diets were limited to what grew in the native soil or could be raised or caught in the limited space available. Today imported, often processed foods are becoming increasingly popular.

We start in the Faroe Islands, in the North Atlantic Ocean between Iceland and the United Kingdom. Traditionally the Faroese diet is protein heavy, fermented wind dried lamb is a staple and the poor soil makes growing a wide range of vegetables challenging. Reporter Tim Ecott travelled to the Faroe Islands for this programme to report on how diets there have changed.

We then look South to the Pacific Islands, starting with the coral atoll nation of Kiribati. The coral ground makes it difficult to grow food to supplement the diet of seafood. Ruth speaks to dietitian and public health nutritionist Dr Libby Swanepoel from the Australian Centre for Pacific Islands Research based at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Libby makes the case for seaweed cultivation to supplement diets and incomes.

In contrast the nation of Fiji in the Pacific Ocean has volcanic soils, and an array of fruit and vegetables can be grown. Despite this communities have increasingly turned to imported processed foods, contributing to a health crisis. Sashi Kiran, founder of FRIEND Fiji - the Foundation for Rural Integrated Enterprises and Development – talks about how this can be addressed.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: part of the Kiribati island nation, palm tree covered island surrounded by blue sea. Credit: Getty/BBC)

All-you-can-eat restaurants are popular, as are high-end buffets at big weddings and posh hotels.

But what’s the trick to making money out of them, and what happens to the leftovers?

Ruth Alexander finds out the tricks of the trade with John Wood of catering software company Kitchen Cut, Sandeep Sreedharan of Goa, and Michael Brown of Cosmo, in Manchester, UK.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Hands of someone serving out chicken at a buffet. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Today’s Sephardic Jewish community has its roots in Spain and Portugal. The Hispanic Jews lived for many centuries in those countries but faced increasing persecution in the 13th and 15th Centuries.

Many were forced to convert to Christianity, but some secretly continued their Jewish faith and practices.

In 1478, the Spanish Christian royalty created the Inquisition, a series of trials aimed at identifying those who had not converted. Food and methods of food preparation are frequently cited as evidence against Jewish people in Spanish Inquisition trial records.

Ultimately the Jews were expelled from Spain and they fled to other countries. This was the beginning of a diaspora which carried its Spanish food traditions with it.

Ruth Alexander meets three women who have published Sephardic cookbooks reflecting on this turbulent past. Hélène Jawhara Piñer is a French historian and chef, she studied Spanish Inquisition trial records for her book Sephardi: Cooking the History. Stella Hanan Cohen lives in Zimbabwe; in her book Stella’s Sephardic Table she records the cuisine of the Sephardic community that settled on the island of Rhodes, now part of Greece. Genie Milgrom was born in Cuba and lives in Florida in the United States, she found handwritten recipes that had been passed down by generations of women in her family, which she published as ‘The Recipes of My 15 Grandmothers’.

Presenter: Ruth Alexander Producer: Beatrice Pickup

(Photo: A dish of swiss chard and chickpeas cooked by Ruth Alexander. Credit: BBC)

What are the nutritional challenges, and the highs and lows of food in space? As NASA looks at creating a lunar habitat, and even launching a mission to Mars, how can the right food be prepared and transported to keep astronauts both healthy, and happy? Marie Keyworth speaks to veteran astronaut Nicole Stott, and NASA’s top nutrition expert Scott Smith, who leads the Nutritional Biochemistry Laboratory at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, in Houston, Texas. Marie finds out what it’s really like to eat in zero gravity, and how nutrition is being used to counteract the extreme health impacts of spaceflight on the human body. Studying astronaut diets in space might even help our understanding of nutrition here on earth.

Presented by Marie Keyworth. Produced by Sarah Treanor.

(Image: astronaut in space holding a burger. Credit: Getty / BBC)

Global food prices reached record highs this year due to a combination of factors including the war in Ukraine, rising energy prices and poor harvests. Prices are now falling, but remain higher than last year.

In this programme Ruth Alexander talks to three farmers on three different continents, to discuss if they’re profiting from these higher prices, the impact of higher costs, and whether farmers ultimately have any influence over the price we pay in the shops.

Ruth is joined by Anne Gitau, a poultry farmer in Nairobi Kenya; John Kelly, a dairy farmer in Country Wicklow Ireland; and Bob Lowe, a beef and barley farmer in Alberta, Canada. The BBC’s Global Trade Correspondent Dharshini David joins the discussion to explain what is happening in global feed and fertiliser markets.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: trays of meat on a butcher’s counter with prices. Credit: Getty/BBC)

We may be living in a disposable age, but many of us probably own at least one hand-me-down pot, pan or kitchen utensil. They can be heavy and cumbersome to use but promise quality and reliability - a steadfast companion in the kitchen. They hold sentimental value too: memories of home, of loved ones who have passed, and ancestral traditions.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander explores the history of some of these pieces, the sentimental and practical value to their owners, and the stories contained within.

She speaks to three amateur cooks: Steven Hopper from Mississippi in the US, Alice Smith from South Wales in the UK, and Amrita Amesur in Hyderabad, India.

We would love to hear about your precious pots and pans - please email your stories and pictures to [email protected]

(Picture: An old saucepan. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Today’s seed industry is dominated by a handful of companies. Approximately 60% of the market is controlled by just four companies.

Many of the seeds planted by farmers are controlled by international property rights or patents, that limit how they can be used. Court cases have centred around whether farmers have the right to save and reuse seeds for future harvests.

In this programme we’ll chart the history of the seed industry, from the 19th century, when the United States government sent seeds in the post to farmers for free, to the growth of genetics in the 20th century which set the foundations for today’s market.

Ruth Alexander is joined by Courtney Fullilove, Associate Professor of History at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, United States, and author of ‘Profit of the Earth: the global seeds of American Agriculture'; Frank Terhorst, Head of Strategy and Sustainability in the Crop Sciences Division of Bayer Global, the biggest seed company in the world; Michael Fakhri, the United Nation’s Special Rapporteur on the right to food, and Professor at the Oregon University School of Law in the United States; and Dr Tamene Yohannes, from the Ethiopian Biodiversity Institute in Ethiopia, which works with community seed banks around the country.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

(Image: a man holding a pile of seeds in two hands. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Mental health is a hugely complex issue with many causes. There’s no simple answer, then, when it comes to therapies for conditions like anxiety and depression. But a growing body of research is now supporting a connection between nutrition and mental health - that what you eat can have a role to play in reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety.

It’s an emerging field, but dietary recommendations for patients are already being made in clinical settings. Jordan Dunbar explores the scientific evidence for this, and what a ‘happier diet’ might look like.

He speaks to Professor Felice Jacka, Director of the Food and Mood Centre at Deakin University in Australia; US psychiatrist Dr Emily Deans; UK-based chef, Daniel Edwards, and nutritionist Dr Nada Benajiba, who’s based in Saudi Arabia.

If you've been affected by the content of this programme, information and support is available via the BBC Action Line. Go to https://www.bbc.co.uk/actionline

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Woman holding a pot of mixed berries. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Meet the flavourists – the people who bring together art and science to create the flavours in our food. Each crisp, soft drink, or toothpaste flavour has been concocted by someone in a lab who has spent years studying why things taste good.

In this programme, Ruth Alexander visits the International Flavour Research Centre at the University of Nottingham in the UK, where flavour chemist Professor Ian Fisk demonstrates machines that can act as an artificial nose and tongue. Historian Dr Nadia Berenstein explains how this profession began and evolved alongside the boom in consumer goods in the 20th century. And we meet a master flavourist at the top of their field – Yukiko Ando Ovesen from Japan, who works for the international flavour and fragrance firm, Firmenich.

Presented by Ruth Alexander

Produced by Beatrice Pickup

(Image: girl eating doughnut with brightly coloured sprinkles. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Food contamination is a serious public health problem around the world. The World Health Organisation estimates that 600 million – almost 1 in 10 people in the world – fall ill after eating contaminated food and 420,000 die every year.

In this episode, Ruth Alexander speaks to some of the people whose lives have been shaped by serious food safety breaches and how they are working to ensure food safety and strengthen our food systems.

She speaks to US food policy campaigner, Darin Detwiler, whose son Riley died following an E. coli outbreak in 1993, food safety consultant Lone Jespersen, and Tina Potter, head of incidents at the Food Standards Agency for England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Scientist inspecting meat sample in laboratory. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Climate change means that, in many parts of the world, the way we farm is no longer working.

We need a larger, more diverse range of crops that perform even when the rains don’t come or, as can also be the case, when too much rain comes.

Currently, just 15 crops make up 90% of our energy intake, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization.

In this programme, we’re meeting people who are trying to develop food crops that might thrive in our changing world.

Ruth Alexander visits the Millennium Seed Bank ran by the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew in the UK, where Dr Chris Cockel explains their work collecting and storing seeds from the wild relatives of our staple crops. Tessa Peters, Director of Crop Stewardship at The Land Institute in Kansas, US, makes the case for creating perennial versions of our crops, in order to preserve soil health. And Dr Rebbie Harawa, regional director, Eastern and Southern Africa at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi Arid-Tropics talks about why a currently underutilised crop – millet – could be help struggling farmers in dry areas. Picture: Close up of millet growing in a field; Credit: BBC/Getty

Running a restaurant is hard enough, but what if there’s family involved? In this episode, Felicity Hannah explores the highs and the lows of family-run eateries; their history, food culture, family dynamics and how they deal with the cut and thrust of business.

She heads to Liverpool in the UK, to Europe’s oldest Chinatown, where she meets Terry and Theresa Lim, the owners of the city’s oldest Chinese restaurant. And she pays a visit to a local Italian establishment, to meet brother and sister Paolo and Maria Cillo who, with their other siblings and extended family, are building a burgeoning family food empire in the city.

It’s an interesting time for these two restaurants. Italian and Chinese are two of the most exported cuisines in the world, but with growing competition from other popular food cultures, as well as global economic challenges, how are they adapting to changing times?

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Paolo and Maria Cillo, and Terry and Theresa Lim with their daughter and two grandchildren. Credit: BBC)

Vegetable oil is one of many foods that has seen big price rises in the last year.

Not only is it used for cooking and frying, but it’s also in many processed foods such as ready meals, sauces and even desserts.

Ukraine and Russia represent the majority of the world’s sunflower oil production, whilst unpredictable weather, poor harvests and lack of labour have led to higher prices in palm, soybean and rape seed oil at the same time.

In this programme we hear from food businesses struggling with the price of oil, starting with street food traders in Delhi, India. Felicity Hannah is joined by Kathryn Robinson, Head of Development at FBDC, a UK based company that helps food businesses reformulate their recipes; David Laborde, a French analyst at the International Food Policy Research Institute based in Washington DC, and David Wagner, Executive Chef at the City Line Bar and Grill Restaurant in Albany, New York.

Presented by Felicity Hannah.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Anish Ahluwalia.

(Image: chips cooking in oil in a deep fat fryer. Credit: Getty)

Water shortages are getting worse with climate change. In the Horn of Africa, long periods without a rainy season have created a dire situation. The World Food Programme says up to 20 million people in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia could be pushed into hunger by the end of the year. Somalia, which has already witnessed decades of conflict, extreme weather and disease outbreaks, is being particularly hard-hit.

Experts believe droughts will become more frequent, longer and more intense, so what can be done to reduce their impact and the damage they inflict? Could there be a global solution to this global problem?

Ruth Alexander speaks to Michael Dunford, the United Nations World Food Programme’s regional director for East Africa; Dr Balgis Osman-Elasha, a climate change and green growth expert and regional co-ordinator for the African Development Bank, in Tunisia; and emeritus professor at the University of Nebraska Lincoln, Donald Wilhite, who founded the National Drought Mitigation Center in the United States.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: A woman standing next to her water containers and bottles of water. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Meet the artists tasked with creating pictures that look good enough to eat.

If it wasn’t for them, you might not have bought that particular tin of tomatoes or that bottle of wine.

Enya Todd, a Chinese illustrator living in the UK, and Rocío Egío, a Spanish illustrator living in Switzerland tell Ruth Alexander how they translate a love of food into irresistible images on a page; while award-winning British botanical illustrator Bridget Gillespie reveals the ups and downs of capturing every exact detail of a fruit or vegetable. Just don’t ask her to paint you a strawberry.

Presented by Ruth Alexander Produced by Beatrice Pickup

(Picture: an illustration of a dish of paella on a tablecloth, designed by contributor Rocío Egío. Credit: Paella by Rocío Egío)

Good quality nutrition is key to sporting success. But while plenty of research exists on the impact of nutrition on performance, most of it has been done on male athletes. That’s despite female athletes now making up nearly 50% of participants in professional sport.

In the case of female footballers, research shows they could be consuming only half the carbohydrates they need. Not eating enough – or under-fuelling – as it’s known in footballing circles – is thought to be endemic in the women’s game. Experts believe much of that is down to a lack of available information.

As the Women's Euros 2022 tournament raises the profile of women's football around the world, Ruth Alexander explores what it takes to fuel a female footballer and how focusing on the particular nutritional needs of sportswomen could make a huge difference to performance. She speaks to professional footballer, Ode Fulutudilu, a forward for the South Africa women’s national team, Aimee O’Keefe, performance nutritionist at Manchester United Women, Dr José Areta, lecturer in sports nutrition at Liverpool John Moore’s University in the UK, and Abbie Smith-Ryan, exercise physiologist and sports nutrition researcher at the University of North Carolina in the US.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Two women playing football in an arena. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

The deadline for nominations for the award referenced at the end of this podcast has been extended to 23:00 GMT on Thursday 18th August 2022. *Page updated 28 July 2022 due to entry window extension.

Biofuels are a way to make our cars, lorries and even planes run on renewable fuel. They’re often made from food crops.

Globally 7% of cereal crops and 15% of vegetable oil crops are used to make biofuel – according to data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

As pressure on food prices and supply chains increase, some people are questioning why we turn food into fuel.

In this programme we’ll be looking at the history of biofuels, why food crops have been used, and what alternatives may exist. Joining us are Daniel Kammen, Professor of Energy at University of California, Berkeley, who is currently serving as a senior advisor for energy and innovation in the Biden administration in the United States; Bernardo Gradin, the founder and CEO of Gran Bio, a company that produces biofuel made from sugar cane waste in Brazil; and Sailaja Nori, Chief Scientific Officer at Sea6 Energy, a company investigating the possibilities of biofuel made from seaweed in India and Indonesia.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Additional reporting by Ashish Shama.

The deadline for nominations for the award referenced at the end of this podcast has been extended to 23:00 GMT on Thursday 18th August 2022. *Page updated 28 July 2022 due to entry window extension.

(Image: Field of rapeseed crops behind picture of fuel nozzle. Rapeseed image credit: BBC. Fuel nozzle credit: Matthew Fearn/PA)

From tackling poverty and hunger, to maggot farming, to harnessing the power of seaweed - since 2017, The Food Chain has been celebrating and rewarding innovation in food. This year, as part of the BBC Food and Farming Awards, we're looking for a new champion who is trying to change the way we deal with our food.

With the launch of our 2022 award, Ruth Alexander catches up with two previous winners, school meals project the Akshaya Patra Foundation, and Gabriella D’Cruz, marine conservationist, to find out how their work has progressed and how they are navigating huge global challenges like climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic and rising food prices.

Do you know a remarkable person aged 18-30 who’s challenging the way we think about food? Nominate them for our Global Youth Champion Award 2022.

Find out more and read our terms and privacy notice here: bbc.com/foodchain

The deadline for nominations has been extended to 23:00 GMT on Thursday, 18th August 2022. *Page updated 28 July 2022 due to entry window extension

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Picture: Woman holding a plant growing in soil (Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

It’s not just fauna and flora, there’s a third, much overlooked kingdom of life – fungi.

Fungi are essential for plant and soil health, and therefore our own survival.

It’s not just the mushrooms that we eat, in this programme we celebrate fungi in all its forms. Fungi already play important roles in our food production and medicine, scientists are now investigating fungi based solutions for environmental pollution and waste disposal.

We’re joined by biologist Merlin Sheldrake in the United Kingdom, author of ‘Entangled Life’, Giuliana Furci, mycologist and founder of the Fungi Foundation, the world’s first non-governmental organisation for the protection of fungi, based in Chile and Danielle Stevenson, a mycologist looking at soil toxicity in the United States.

(Picture: fungi growing on a log. Credit: BBC)

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

The internationally acclaimed poet and playwright Lemn Sissay OBE shares the story of his life by recalling five memorable dishes.

His is an extraordinary story of family, and identity, lost and found.

Born to an Ethiopian mother in the north of England and quickly placed into long-term foster care, Lemn was, for years, deprived of any knowledge of his heritage. His traumatic upbringing and subsequent search for his family and identity have informed much of his award-winning writing.

In this programme, he tells Ruth Alexander about five memorable dishes that act as “positioning points” in his life to date.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Lemn Sissay holding a cup of coffee. Credit: BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Researcher: Siobhan O’Connell

The menopause can cause all sorts of changes in your body – weight gain, hot flushes, sleeplessness and joint pain amongst others. Can what you eat help ease these symptoms?

Officially a woman has reached menopause after 12 months without a period, however the transition itself can take years.

Many women are prescribed hormone replacement therapy to tackle some of these symptoms, but lifestyle changes can also be helpful.

In this programme we’re joined by three women who have experienced menopause and found some benefits in food. Elizabeth Ward is a registered dietitian based in the United States. She co-wrote a book called ‘The Menopause Diet Plan, A Natural Guide to Managing Hormones, Health and Happiness’. Fiona Staunton is a trained chef in Dublin, Ireland, who offers menopause cookery courses called ‘Fiona’s Food For Life’. Sue Mbaya is a Zimbabwean living in Ethiopia, she works in policy and governance, and presents the podcast ‘Pause for Menopause’.

(Picture: woman using hand held fan. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Aeroplane food doesn’t have the greatest reputation. Though it might be easy to blame an airline for serving lacklustre meals, the problem is more complex.

Ruth Alexander discovers how the physics of flying wreaks havoc on our senses, the extraordinary lengths airlines have gone to try to dress up their food offering, and what it’s like to be the one serving you at your seat.

And, she asks, will it ever be possible for all passengers to enjoy a tasty and nourishing meal in the air?

Culinary historian, Richard Foss, chef-patron of Kitchen Theory, Jozef Youssef, and flight attendant, Kaylie Kay, join her for the ride.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Child wearing headphones, eating food on board a plane. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Many chefs reach global status, with international demand for their latest book. Spare a thought for the translators, tasked with making their recipes accessible across barriers of language, culture and cuisine.

Translating a recipe isn’t as simple as getting the dictionary out, you need to understand the different terminology and ingredients used in each country, whilst staying true to the original dish.

We speak to Rosa Llopis, a Spanish translator who specialises in gastronomy and has translated a number of cookbooks. Cristina Cigognini is an Italian translator who usually specialises in literary translation of novels, but brought her skills to two cook books published by the chef Yotam Ottolenghi. Nawal Nasrallah is an Iraqi living in the US who translates medieval Arabic food texts, bringing those historic recipes to new audiences.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected].

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

As Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II marks 70 years on the throne, we find out how you get a royal warrant.

It’s an official seal of approval granted to the suppliers of goods and services to the Royal household.

In London we visit one of Britain’s oldest cheese shops, Paxton & Whitfield, established in 1797. Managing director James Rutter tells us about the royal warrants the business has held since Queen Victoria was on the throne. We also visit Windsor, home to Windsor Castle one of the Queen’s many properties and Windsor & Eton brewery, which was awarded a royal warrant in 2018. Owner Will Calvert tells us what it takes to get this royal recognition.

Royal Warrant holders can’t tell you much about what the royal household buys or likes, we try to fill in the gaps with royal and social historian Caroline Aston, features writer for Majesty Magazine.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Presented by Ruth Alexander.

Produced by Beatrice Pickup.

What do writers eat to stoke their creative fires?

George Orwell is said to have had a penchant for plum pudding, while Agatha Christie was partial to sipping cream while at the typewriter.

Food is fuel for an author but also serves as inspiration; often finding its way on to the page.

In this episode of The Food Chain, Ruth Alexander speaks to novelists Avni Doshi and Abi Dare about their relationship with food and drink and how that influences their writing.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Image of an apple and two bananas on a laptop screen. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Thinking about how food passes through your body may not be something that crosses your mind, but for people who have had stoma surgery, they’re aware of it at every meal. Tamasin Ford explores what it’s like to live with a stoma bag and how it redefines your relationship with food. We speak to three women who have had lifesaving operations to have a stoma bag fitted. The surgery tends to involve either the small or large intestine, with a stoma creating an opening on the skin of the abdomen to bypass the normal digestion process. Instead digested content is diverted to a pouch, worn on the outside of your body. We find out how they learned to eat again after having surgery, what they're doing to fight the stigma around stomas, and how they’re embracing their new lives with stoma bags. Joining us are Aisha Islam in Saudi Arabia, Alisa Kuivasto in Finland and Gill Castle in the United Kingdom. If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Woman with stoma bag. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Sarah Stolarz Presenter: Tamasin Ford

Wheat is one of the most important grains worldwide: you’ll find it in bread, biscuits, pasta, sauces, sweets and more besides. Indeed, take wheat products off supermarket shelves and they would look rather bare. But recent global events – not least the war in Ukraine - have caused crop prices to soar.

Ruth Alexander charts how a humble grass grown in the Fertile Crescent became a commodity traded worldwide, and she explores whether we have become too reliant on this “mega crop” for our food supplies – and what alternatives there might be. She talks to Cathy Zabinski, professor of plant and soil ecology at Montana State University, US; Frank Uekotter, professor of environmental humanities at the University of Birmingham, UK; and Augustine Sensie Bangura, CEO of Sierra Agri Foods, Sierra Leone.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: An ear of wheat blowing in the wind. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Hot sauce can inspire fervent passion in its devotees. It’s a global obsession that translates to billions of dollars of sales a year. But with so many on the market, how do you create a taste that becomes a global hit? In this programme, Ruth Alexander explores the origin stories of two iconic brands – Sriracha and Lao Gan Ma. How did these sauces - born in humble circumstances in Vietnam and China in the 1980s - come to sit on dining tables around the world today? We explore their extraordinary stories and ask what their popularity tell us about changing global tastes.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected] 

(Picture: Large red chilli. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Contributors

Stephanie Li, blogger and YouTuber at ‘Chinese Cooking Demystified’

Andrea Nguyen, cookbook author and publisher of Vietworldkitchen.com

The man with carefully sculpted six-pack is everywhere: in Hollywood action films, on magazine front covers, in your social media feed, on dating apps. And so are the online ads telling you how to get the look. But what does it really take to get a washboard stomach? This week, Ruth Alexander hears from three men about the reality of getting ‘ripped’ and how much of it is down to what you eat. They reveal how deeply the experience can affect your relationship with food, your loved ones and yourself

(Picture: Male torso ripped in half. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Graham Isador, writer

Florian Gaffet, massage therapist

Matthew Todd, author ‘Straight Jacket: Overcoming Society’s Legacy of Gay Shame’

Can the love of eating meat ever get in the way of a relationship?

You may have heard the phrase ‘the way to someone’s heart is through their stomach’, but what happens if the foods they eat are wildly different from yours?

Tamasin Ford explores what it’s like to date a carnivore. Not just someone who eats meat, but someone who loves meat. Someone who has been brought up to eat meat in every meal.

We speak to two couples whose diets can sometimes be the source of their most heated arguments to find out how they navigate meal times and social events. Can tolerance win out over frustration?

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: Steak on a plate. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Barbara Friend

Molly Savard

Charlie Pears-Wallace

Joe Deeney

Wine producers say a warming planet can be detected in the glass.

The owners of long-established vineyards are having to adapt their methods to preserve the taste of their wines, but experts say change is inevitable and already tangible.

Ruth Alexander finds out how climate change is challenging some of the world’s most famous wine regions, while providing opportunities for new producers emerging in the most unlikely places.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: woman holding a glass of wine. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Sally Evans, Chateau George 7, Bordeaux, France

Dr Greg Jones, wine climatologist and CEO of Abacela vineyards and winery in Oregon, United States

Bjorn Bergum, Slinde Vineyard, Sognefjord, Norway

As food prices are rising around the world, along with the cost of energy, even people living in some of the world’s wealthiest countries are struggling to manage.

In this episode, three UK citizens discuss how difficult it can be to feed a family on a low income.

Single parents Sue and Dominic tell of how they have had to skips meals themselves to ensure their children are fed, and how food insecurity has at times left them with feelings of shame.

And Kayleigh Maughan, the founder of the charity End Holiday Hunger, explains how the donations she relies on to make up the food parcels she sends to families in need are dwindling as supermarkets and households feel the pressure of the rising cost of living.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

(Picture: hand holding a shopping basket. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Sue Stalker

Dominic Watters

Kayleigh Maughan

Imagine a world where going out for dinner virtually - from the comfort of your own sofa - becomes the norm. Whether it sounds appealing or dystopian - there are restaurants, chefs and gamers already out there experimenting with food in virtual worlds.

Tamasin Ford speaks to the developer of a ‘foodverse’ that will feature everything from virtual dining and cookbook signing experiences to food-based virtual games and we hear from a large US restaurant chain on why they are playing with their customers in the metaverse. But what does a future of virtual worlds mean for the food industry? Will it be a niche pursuit or an invaluable tool? And could it threaten the existence of restaurants in the real world?

(Picture: person wearing VR headset. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Contributors:

Supreet Raju: Co-Founder of OneRare Tressie Lieberman: Vice President of Digital Marketing at Chipotle Michelle Evans: Global Lead of Retail and Digital Consumer Insights at Euromonitor International.

Chef Olia Hercules invites us into her London home to reflect on her country’s rich culinary heritage and the power of food in even the darkest of times.

She opens her well-stocked kitchen cupboards and fridge to reveal the varied flavours, colours and scents of a cuisine she says is often wrongly dismissed as being ‘beige’ or boring.

Ruth Alexander joins Olia and her Russian friend and fellow food writer, Alissa Timoshkina, to discuss the close ties between their nation’s traditional dishes, and the importance of the two women’s own personal friendship.

The conversation was recorded on Tuesday 8 March; 12 days into the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Olia Hercules and Alissa Timoshkina. Credit: BBC)

Producer:

Sarah Stolarz

Slipping drugs or extra alcohol into someone’s drink is a crime, but one that is under-reported and little understood.

It’s often thought to take place in bars and nightclubs, but as Ruth Alexander discovers from people who’ve been targeted, it can happen to anyone, at any time.

Campaigners explain why myths and misconceptions around drink spiking persist, and we ask what could be done to move the crime out of the shadows and into the open.

(Picture: hand holding glass of water. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: [email protected]

Producer: Elisabeth Mahy

Contributors:

Clara George, Miss United Kingdom, and campaigner against drink spiking

Dr Lata Gautam, associate professor in forensic science, Anglia Ruskin University, UK

Dawn Dines, CEO and founder of Stamp Out Spiking

What is a recipe? A simple question... with many answers. It could be a set of instructions on how to make a dish – but also so much more. Recipes can reveal how we lived in the past, and how we are living today. They are part of our sense of identity, belonging and loss and they are portals we can use to travel to different cultures.

This week, Ruth Alexander speaks to three recipe collectors in India, Ghana and the USA to find out why they are preserving their nation’s recipes. What can you learn by documenting these culinary guides? How do you even capture a recipe that has never been written down? And what is at stake if they are lost?

(Picture: Cookbook with utensils. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Abena Offeh-Gyimah, writer and food entrepreneur, Ghana

Megan Elias, cultural historian and director of the Gastronomy programme at University of Boston, USA

Muskaan Pal, co-founder, Indian Community Cookbook Project at Flame University in Pune, India

Social media is full of fake news about food.

Fad diets, cure-all superfoods, demonised ingredients, made-up health scares – you’re never more than a few clicks away from unreliable nutritional information.

In this episode, Ruth Alexander meets two people trying to take on those who peddle the food myths. What is it like getting into an online food fight; can an individual ever hope to change people’s minds; and why would anyone even try?

(Picture: Hand holding cream pie on man's face. Credit: Getty/BBC) Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Dr Joshua Wolrich, NHS doctor, nutritionist and author

Erin aka Food Science Babe, chemical engineer and food scientist

It’s estimated that as many as 1 in 7 adults are suffering from constipation at any one time. And yet, talking about the problem is taboo.

Ruth Alexander is joined by two experts who want us to be more open about the condition. They say our reluctance to talk about constipation is having an impact on our well-being and creating a costly burden on health services.

Find out why a balanced and varied diet will help many people avoid the problem, but not all; and why prunes – a famous remedy – can actually make it worse.

Plus, a historian traces how we came to be so reticent about our toilet habits; and how constipation may have had a decisive role at numerous turning points in history.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: Closed airplane toilet door. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Anton Emmanuel, University College Hospital London and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery

Louise Foxcroft, medical historian and author

Miguel Toribio-Mateas, School of Applied Sciences at London South Bank University.

Imagine being able to ‘taste’ every word that comes out of your mouth. Everything you or someone else says provoking something in your brain to kick your taste buds into action. It sounds incredulous, but for a tiny proportion of the world’s population, that is their reality. It’s a neurological phenomenon called synaesthesia, where two or more senses merge.

Tamasin Ford meets two sisters from Glasgow, Scotland, who have had the condition for as long as they can remember. They share what it’s like to live with this explosion of taste at every waking moment.

But how and why does it happen? We try to unpick the science behind it and take a look at what synaesthesia could tell us about how we experience taste and flavour.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Keyboard letters in a soup bowl. Credit:Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Julie McDowall and Jennifer McCready Guy Leschziner, author and Professor of neurology and sleep medicine at King's College London.

Can you imagine suddenly finding that it hurts to eat? Or that when you take a bite of your favourite meal you feel nothing?

In this episode, we’re talking about something that isn’t much talked about: what happens to your relationship with food when you’ve got cancer.

Ruth Alexander is joined by three women who want you to know about a side effect of treatment that they weren’t fully prepared for - the loss of their sense of taste.

They share how what is a relatively minor detail, given a devastating diagnosis, nevertheless had a huge effect on their everyday routine, their interactions with family and friends, their sense of self.

Hear how they learned to cope and how, out of the depths of this distressing experience, came a new appreciation of the everyday.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Grapefruit with pills coming out of it. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Producer:

Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Heather McCollum

Semira Oguntoyinbo

Angharad Underwood

How do you feed a dog? The answer may be more fraught than you had imagined.

Should you give them ‘dog food’? Is it a step too far to feed them at the table? And can man’s best friend thrive on a vegetarian diet?

we bring together three dog-loving experts from the UK, India and the USA to analyse what dog feeding reveals about our relationship with animals and even our own relationship with food.

Be prepared to hear some surprises, some empowering advice and maybe some uncomfortable home truths. And even if you don’t have a dog, you may get some ideas that you can apply to your own life.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: dogs licks lips. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Shirin Merchant, dog trainer and behaviourist in Mumbai, India

Louise Glazebrook, dog trainer and behaviourist in London, UK

Marc Bekoff, professor emeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Colorado Boulder, USA

A lack of sleep might leave us tired, but it can also have a major impact on what we eat, and our health.

Ruth Alexander explores the surprising relationship between diet and a poor night’s rest, and learns that it’s not just what we’re eating, but when: we hear about the perils of consuming calories late into the evening or, even worse, overnight.

But it’s not all bad news: there’s growing research into the idea that we might be able to improve our sleep quality by tweaking our diets.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Tania Whalen, fire brigade despatcher, Melbourne, Australia; Matthew Walker, University of California, Berkeley, USA; Maxine Bonham, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia; Marie-Pierre St-Onge, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, New York, USA.

(Picture: A young girl asleep on a plate of spaghetti. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Caffeine is a key ingredient in some of our favourite foods and drinks, but it’s also a mind-altering drug that can be very tricky to quit.

Tamasin Ford meets three people who’ve tried to cut caffeine out of their lives by eliminating some of its main sources from their diets - coffee, tea and chocolate.

We hear about some uncomfortable withdrawal symptoms, social awkwardness, and the struggle to adapt to life without a caffeine high. How long did they stay caffeine-free?

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Petteri Rantamäki, business software professional, Helsinki, Finland; Abigail James, aesthetician and author, London, UK; John Horgan, science journalist, New York, USA.

(Picture: A young woman holding a cup of coffee. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

In this final episode of 2021, we're revisiting some of the most powerful food stories from the pandemic. Following widespread restaurant closures and labour shortages across the hospitality sector, we catch up with a New York chef who is forging a new path. And what about those people who thanks to Covid-19 can’t even smell or taste their food anymore? We’ll be finding out whether this leading symptom of the virus is now better understood. Plus, how is one of the world’s newest emojis – the arepa flatbread - faring, one year on?

(Picture: Drawing of sweet being unwrapped. Credit: BBC/Getty)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Amanda Cohen, Chef and owner, Dirt Candy restaurant New York

Chrissi Kelly, founder, smell and taste loss charity AbScent

Sebastian Delmont, software developer and co-creator of the arepa emoji

World War Two rationing imposed severe restrictions on food, so why would anyone voluntarily go back to it?

Ruth Alexander meets three women who chose to adopt the diet endured in 1940s and 1950s Britain, one of them for an entire year.

We hear how such scarcity inspired creativity, a reverence for the ingenuity of wartime cooks, and an enduring change of perspective on the responsibility of the 21st century food consumer.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Karen Burns-Booth, food writer - www.lavenderandlovage.com/category/recipes/general-recipes/wartime-recipes Claud Fullwood, author of The Rations Challenge: Forty Days of Feasting in a Wartime Kitchen Carolyn Ekins, blogger - https://the1940sexperiment.com

(Picture: Basket of food rations on display at the Imperial War Museum, London, in 2011. Credit: Paul Kerley/BBC)

What dish says Christmas to you - roast turkey, goat? Carp perhaps? What about fried chicken?

In Japan nothing says ‘festive family food’ more than a bucket of KFC fried chicken. And if you’re Jewish and from the US, a Christmas meal will almost certainly mean a trip to Chinatown.

Ruth Alexander unearths the origin stories of these two unlikely, but incredibly popular, - alternative Christmas food traditions, and finds out how food can help give you a sense of belonging, even if celebrating Christmas isn’t for you.

(Picture: Bucket of fried chicken and bowl of Chinese food. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Nina Li Coomes, writer based in Chicago, USA

Rabbi Joshua Plaut, author ‘A Kosher Christmas: ‘Tis the Season to be Kosher’.

Producers: Sarah Stolarz and Simon Tulett

Catering on film and TV sets is notorious for being one of the toughest jobs in the hospitality industry.

Imagine feeding hundreds of people in a different location every day, running your kitchen in some of the world’s most remote places, and accommodating the varied diets of the planet’s biggest stars.

Tamasin Ford speaks to three caterers to find out what it takes to succeed in Hollywood, Bollywood, and the world of reality TV, and finds out how vital food can be to the success of a shoot.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Sid Ghai, director of Ghai Caterers Ltd, London; Antonia Crowley, executive chef and event stylist at Flying Trestles, Auckland; Wayne Brown, co-founder of Red Radish, London.

(Picture: A stack of pizza boxes next to a film director's chair. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Rationing looms large in the memories of a generation who lived through World War Two. Basic groceries were limited and getting enough food on the table became a daily challenge that went on long after the last bombs fell. Ruth Alexander brings together a German and an English woman, who grew up on opposite sides of the world’s deadliest ever conflict, to share their recollections of wartime eating. What was it like struggling to find food, how did they adapt, and how has it changed their approach to food forever?

(Picture: Ingeborg Schreib-Wywiorski and Beryl Kingston, Credit: BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Contributors: Ingeborg Schreib-Wywiorski and Beryl Kingston.

Presenter: Ruth Alexander

Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Gabriella D’Cruz, from Goa, wants to improve diets, transform livelihoods, and protect the planet using an often-overlooked marine vegetable - seaweed.

Ruth Alexander speaks to the 29-year-old about her big plans for the underwater crop, and her hope that it could bring lasting economic and environmental change to India’s coastal communities.

Gabriella’s passion and her project’s potential saw her chosen by a panel of international judges as the winner of The Food Chain Global Youth Champion Award 2021.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Gabriella D'Cruz, founder of The Good Ocean; Ismahane Elouafi, chief scientist at the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations.

(Picture: Gabriella D'Cruz in the sea holding a basket of seaweed. Credit: Gabriella D'Cruz/BBC)

How is a new cuisine created? Ruth Alexander explores two unique cuisines in South Africa and the USA: ‘Cape-Malay’- a 300-year old tradition born out of colonialism and slavery that unites Indonesian and Dutch tastes; and ‘Viet-Cajun’ - a more recent phenomenon that has seen the Vietnamese diaspora experimenting with Cajun flavours in Texas. We explore how history’s darkest episodes can lead to some of the most captivating flavour combinations and ask why some people will cringe at the term ‘fusion food’.

(Picture: Pot lid being opened. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Cass Abrahams: Chef and Author, Cape Town, South Africa Mai Pham: Food writer, Houston, USA

Throughout the coronavirus pandemic some people discovered a solace and comfort in cooking, but for many others the opposite was true - the joy they had once felt in the kitchen evaporated.

Tamasin Ford speaks to three formerly passionate cooks to find out what it’s like to lose the love of the thing you enjoy doing the most.

What’s really behind their ‘cooking burnout’, how have they tried to reignite that spark, and has this experience changed their relationship with food for good?

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors: Helen Rosner, food correspondent for The New Yorker, New York, USA; Yamini Pustake Bhalerao, author and ideas editor at shethepeople.tv, Pune, India; Wayne Barnard, chef and ambassador for The Burnt Chef Project, Cardiff, Wales.

(Picture: A woman making cookies. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

The pressure to tackle climate change by altering what we eat is huge, and it can be a daunting prospect. But you don’t have to go vegan, shop 100 per cent local, or start your own allotment to make a difference.

This week, as world leaders gather for a key climate conference in Glasgow, we’re asking you what small changes you’ve made to your everyday food habits to make them a little bit greener. Plus, Tamasin Ford hears from a chef in Nigeria about the special role he thinks the professionals have to play, and we ask for one life-changing piece of advice from an expert and writer on food waste.

(Picture: Hand reaches for apple, Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Michael Elégbèdé: chef, ÌTÀN Restaurant and Test Kitchen in Ikoyi, Nigeria Tamar Adler: author ‘An Everlasting Meal’, New York, USA

And Food Chain listeners:

Annabell Randles: London, UK Mike Hoey: Berkely, California Simone Osman: Maputo, Mozambique Yael Straver Laris: Geneva, Switzerland Kate Minogue: Lewes, UK Karine Young: Cape Town, South Africa Jeremy Okware, Uganda Rebecca Neo: Singapore

The UK food industry relies on foreign workers, but what happens when they stop coming? A combination of COVID-19 and Brexit has led to fewer workers available to pick, process and transport food. For some farmers it has led to heartbreaking dilemmas. Tamasin Ford speaks to two pig farmers who face having to kill thousands of healthy pigs, and a salad farmer who has seen millions of lettuce heads rot in his fields.

(Picture: farmer in field, Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Contributors: Vicky Morgan, pig farmer, Pockthorpe Hall Farm, East Yorkshire, UK Kate Morgan, pig farmer, Pockthorpe Hall Farm, East Yorkshire, UK Nick Ottewell, Farming and Commercial Director at LJ Betts Ltd, Kent, England

The hospitality industry is facing a staffing crisis, but why have thousands of chefs and waiters quit, and why now?

Tamasin Ford speaks to three former restaurant and bar workers to find out why the coronavirus pandemic prompted them to leave, and what they're doing instead.

We find out what, if anything, might tempt them back - higher pay, more sociable hours, or better work culture, maybe kinder customers? And we ask whether Covid-19 might really be the moment for industry reform.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors: Adam Reiner, New York; Melissa Sosa, Miami; Renée Harper, Phoenix.

(Picture: Upset waitress leaning on a bar. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Alcohol is part of the fabric of life in many cultures. It’s associated with socialising, dating, networking, even commiserating . But what happens if you take it away? Tamasin Ford brings together three people who decided to give up alcohol in a drinking culture. We ask them why and how they did it. What effect did it have on their lives professionally, socially, physically and emotionally? And would they ever want to drink again?

If you Would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected].

If you have found any of the issues raised in this programme upsetting and are looking for further information or support - please visit BBC Action Line by clicking on the link below.

Contributors: Annie Grace - Author and founder This Naked Mind Colorado, USA Andy Ramage - Performance coach, Essex, UK Kate Gunn - Author 'The Accidental Soberista' Whitlow, Ireland

(Picture: Hand on empty bottle. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Insects are cheap, packed full of nutrients, and farming them for food could help save the planet. Convincing more people to eat them, though, remains a big challenge.

Tamasin Ford speaks to three insect entrepreneurs trying to persuade the squeamish, especially in Europe and North America, to overcome their fears of crickets, worms, and spiders, and instead see them as a tasty, sustainable, alternative source of protein.

We also hear that it’s not just the ‘yuck factor’ holding this fledgling industry back - should governments, chefs, and climate campaigners be doing more to support it?

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Joseph Yoon, chef and executive director of Brooklyn Bugs; Marjolaine Blouzard, former co-owner of Bugs Cafe; Andy Holcroft, founding director of Grub Kitchen and Bug Farm Foods.

(Picture: A dish of peas, carrots and worms prepared by chef David Faure. Credit: Didier Baverel/Getty Images/BBC)

From bread making to Thai cuisine, cookery classes have become a popular way for people to learn new culinary skills and meet people. But coronavirus lockdowns suddenly brought these businesses to a standstill. Rory Cellan-Jones hears from three cooks, who quickly pivoted to virtual cooking classes to survive. Could they get over the technical challenges, and can you really teach someone to cook through a computer?

(Picture: mother and child on a virtual cooking course. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Contributors:

Fayruza Abrahams, Taste Malay Rawan Al Waada, Rebels in the Kitchen Sue Hudson, Bread Workshops

Hot stoves, perishable food, and potentially dirty surfaces can make the kitchen a difficult place for someone with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

People with OCD will frequently experience unwanted thoughts, images or urges - which may include worries about contamination or harming themselves and others. They will often use repetitive behaviours to relieve their anxiety - including washing and cleaning, or repeatedly checking their actions. All this means that both cooking and eating food prepared by others can become very distressing.

In this episode, Emily Thomas meets three people who have suffered from the disorder. They explain how debilitating the condition can be by describing just one aspect of daily life - the way they eat.

Contributors: Chrissie Fadipe, Shai Friedland, Patricia Grisafi

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this programme, please see the related links section at the bottom of this page.

Food photography is about much more than beautifully presented dishes in cookbooks - it’s also being used to change the way we think about what we eat.

Emily Thomas meets three photographers to discuss some of their most powerful images - from a bloody scene in a Thai slaughterhouse to a display of human resilience in a refugee camp.

They explore why still images of food and food production can be a compelling way to communicate about politics, society, and economics. We also hear about the impact such hard-hitting photography can have on the people behind the lens.

To see the images described on the show, plus a few more, visit our homepage www.bbc.com/foodchain

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Producer: Simon Tulett.

Contributors:

Jo-Anne McArthur; Dorte Verner; Li Huaifeng.

(Picture: A Moken spear fisherman diving for his catch. Credit: Dorte Verner)

Starches are among the most important and versatile additives in processed food, but most of us know little about them and there are some we should be wary of.

Emily Thomas hears why starch is a food manufacturer’s best friend - making pies crispier, cakes airier, and yoghurts creamier. It’s even used to mimic and replace ingredients some of us want to limit, like sugar and fat.

But although starch is a vital source of energy for all of us, some highly processed starches have been linked with negative health outcomes, and it can be hard for the consumer to find out which type they’re eating.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Producers: Simon Tulett and Siobhan O'Connell.

Contributors:

Peter Hendrikx, Ingredion; Marty Jopkin, author of 'The Science of Food'; Fred Warren, The Quadram Institute

(Picture: Bread 'flying' in mid-air. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Is there someone in your life who needs to have total control in the kitchen? Someone who breathes down your neck, micromanages your every move and can’t resist explaining exactly how to chop a carrot? If so, you may be in the company of what we’re calling ‘a Chefsplainer’. Or perhaps all this rings a bell because you are a chefsplainer? Whoever you are - this episode of The Food Chain is for you.

Emily Thomas meets a married couple, a mother and son, and two friends to unpack their power dynamics in the kitchen. They explore why some people feel the need to take control over the cooking, how this reflects our emotional attachment to food, and whether what happens in the kitchen reflects or changes relationships outside it. Plus - why do some of us think that it’s ok to behave in certain ways in the kitchen - that we wouldn’t dream of elsewhere?

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

(Picture: couple argue in a kitchen. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Abby Saverino Russell Newlove Harriet Gore Joel Gore Louis Coiffait Ali Potter

Calories are ubiquitous across most of the world and have been used to help people manage their weight for more than a century. But have we been counting them wrong all along? In this episode, Emily Thomas finds out how the calorie is a lot more complex than many of us realise.

Historian Louise Foxcroft describes how this measure of energy became the darling of scientists and public health experts across the globe, and the unwitting bedfellow of the diet industry. Geneticist Giles Yeo argues that calorie counting can actually be harmful, encouraging us to make unhealthy choices, and Bridget Benelam from the British Nutrition Foundation explains why she thinks that despite all its flaws, the calorie will be with us for a good while yet.

Sugary drink and fast food sponsors have become almost inseparable from sporting superstars and major events like the Olympics. But why are these epitomes of health and exercise aligning themselves with products linked to obesity, heart disease and diabetes?

Simon Tulett explores the reasons for this relationship's long history and hears about the damage it could be doing to young, impressionable fans.

If this sponsorship is a problem, whose job is it to end it, and can it be done without leaving event organisers, athletes and grassroots sport facing a financial black hole?

Producer: Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Michael Payne, former IOC marketing executive; Dr Sandro Demaio, VicHealth; Tuhin Mishra, Baseline Ventures; Tammy Aitken

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: Composite of an American football player catching a burger. Credit: Lew Robertson, Rubberball/Mike Kemp, Getty Images/BBC)

When it comes to food, we have a lot more than honey to thank bees for - more than three quarters of the world’s food crops depend, at least in part, on pollinators. But bee populations, we often hear, are under threat, and that’s largely due to human behaviour.

Emily Thomas speaks to three beekeepers about the challenges of making money from honey and the complicated relationship between the human and the honey bee.

If we look carefully into the hive, she discovers, bees can teach us much about the environment, society and ourselves.

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Joan Kinyanjui, Yatta Beekeepers, Nairobi; Dale Gibson, Bermondsey Street Bees, London; Ian Steppler, Steppler Farms, Manitoba.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: A honey bee on the end of a human finger. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

When you’re competing in a round-the-world race and you have to take all your food with you, what do you bring and how do you cook it?

If you’re scrambling up and down mountains for days on end, or swimming across an entire ocean, how do you find the time to eat, and what can you stomach? Tamasin Ford speaks to three extreme endurance athletes about the planning, practicalities and monotony of these gruelling events. Is food simply fuel, or can it power competitors in other ways?

Producer: Simon Tulett

Contributors:

Dee Caffari; Billy White; Benoit Lecomte

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: A runner in the 2019 Marathon des Sables race. Credit: Erik Sampers/Gamma-Rapho/Getty/ BBC)

Do you need a lemon right now but don’t want to leave the house? Just download an app and you’ll have it in 13 minutes. That’s the kind of service you can expect from a swathe of new ‘rapid delivery’ grocery apps. Dozens have appeared around the world since the start of the pandemic, and investors have been flocking to invest, pumping billions into the sector. So are these apps the obvious next step in our on-demand lifestyles, or should they be a cause for concern? When it comes to food, can things become just a bit too convenient?

Tamasin Ford hears from one company boss with big ambitions and a former competition lawyer who’s worried these apps could spell the end for smaller food stores. Plus, we travel to Istanbul in Turkey where people have already been using them for years.

(Picture: Man sat on sofa groceries being handed to him. Credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Alec Dent: Co-Founder, Weezy Kaya Genç: Novelist Michelle Meagher: Founder, Balanced Economy Project

When chef Jamie Oliver launched a campaign to improve British school meals, it inspired one headteacher to take things much further.

Charlton Manor Primary School, in south London, now grows its own produce, keeps bees and chickens, and has a restaurant aiming for a Michelin star. Head Tim Baker has also overhauled the teaching curriculum to put food centre stage - from learning about fair trade banana growers in geography lessons to slicing pizzas to help with fractions.

Tamasin Ford speaks to teachers and students to find out how they did it, and asks whether this could act as a model for how to teach our children about food's impact on our health and the planet.

Producer: Simon Tulett

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: Students Sarah and Vaidas in the garden at Charlton Manor Primary School)

Contributors:

Students at Charlton Manor Primary School; Joe Grollman, teaching chef; Nick Shelley, gardener; Flavio Hernandez, head chef; Tim Baker, headteacher; Kim Smith, TastEd and City, University of London; Dennis Hollywood, teacher

The celebrated French chef Raymond Blanc tells Emily Thomas about his life through five dishes.

From a childhood roaming magical forests in Eastern France, to the rather less enticing restaurant scene of 1970s England, Raymond describes how with little grasp of the language and no formal training, he quickly became one of the UK’s best known chefs. His restaurant, Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, has been thriving for almost 40 years and during that time he has added a string of cookbooks, TV shows and brasseries to his name. Raymond explains how he balances being a gastronome and perfectionist with running a large business.

But we also hear another side to the exuberant chef. The past year has been perhaps one the most difficult of Raymond’s life - closing his restaurants, the isolation of lockdown, the death of his mother and being hospitalised with coronavirus for a month. He tells us why he thinks it will make him a better man.

Meet the unsung heroes of your kitchen drawers.

When you hold a vegetable peeler or potato masher, do you ever think about the person behind it?

We celebrate chefs and cookbook writers - but what about the people who make the tools that make it all easier?

Emily Thomas meets three product designers who explain the thinking behind the everyday objects we keep in our kitchens. We’ll hear about accessibility and segregation - but also art and beauty. Welcome to the philosophy of kitchen gadgets.

Contributors: Dan Formosa, Scott Jarvie, and Gavin Reay.

The Food Chain delves into the world of ‘Ultra-Processed Food’ - a term coined in Brazil that has been provoking debate around the world.

Ultra Processed Food is a term that encompasses a broad range of common products from industrialised bread to breakfast cereals to chocolate bars. A growing body of evidence points to an association between their consumption and negative health outcomes including obesity, over-eating, depression, heart disease, and type-2 diabetes. Countries like Brazil are so concerned they are recommending people avoid UPFs all together. But in some of the world's most developed economies these foods make up, up to 80% of our diets, whilst the public understands very little about them.

Emily Thomas speaks to representatives from the food industry and people at the forefront of the science into UPFs to try to find out whether this is just another dietary buzzword that muddies the waters when it comes to improving the nation’s diets - OR whether it’s something we should ALL be talking about.

(Picture; Cookie talking in chocolate chips, Credit: BBC/Getty)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Gyorgy Scrinis: Associate professor of Food Politics and Policy, University of Melbourne Maria Laura Louzada: Assistant professor, Department of Nutrition at the University of Sao Paulo Kevin Hall: Senior investigator, National Institutes of Health, Maryland Kate Halliwell: Chief Scientific Officer, Food and Drink Federation, UK

Gene editing could revolutionise agriculture, with some scientists promising healthier and more productive crops and animals, but will consumers want to eat them?

With the first gene edited crops recently approved for sale, Emily Thomas hears why this technology might be quicker, cheaper and more accurate than the older genetic engineering techniques that produced GMOs, and asks whether these differences could make it more acceptable to a deeply sceptical, even fearful public.

Some are not convinced by the claims, and there are concerns that current regulations won't protect consumers or the environment from any potential risks. By putting their faith in technology, have scientists and companies overlooked other simpler solutions to our food security problems?

Producer: Simon Tulett

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: A DNA model on a plate. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Contributors:

Jennifer Kuzma, North Carolina State University; Hiroshi Ezura, University of Tsukuba and Sanatech Seed; Neth Daño, ETC Group; Philippe Dumont, Calyxt

In an illustrious career spanning three decades, there’s little that booking-writing, seed-breading, ‘philosopher chef’ Dan Barber has not put his hands to. Celebrated as the poster child of the ‘farm to fork’ movement, he tells Graihagh Jackson how a visit to a wheat farm called into question everything he thought he knew about agriculture and changed his cooking and ethos forever.

Surprisingly though, Dan started life wanting to be a writer not a chef. Through five dishes, we hear how a failed stint as a baker, a baptism of fire in french kitchens and running a company from a mice-infested kitchen eventually won him over to the cause. We learn that an obsession with simplicity and flavour has taken him on a farming odyssey around the world, what coronavirus can teach us about the future of food, and how it all started with a humble dish of scrambled eggs.

If you would like to get in touch please email [email protected]

(Picture: Chef Dan Barber. Credit: Richard Bolls/BBC)

Three people who lost their vision as adults tell Emily Thomas how they learnt to cook again, becoming so accomplished in the kitchen that they became restaurateurs, cookbook writers, food podcast makers and Masterchef winners. They explain how their relationships with food have changed, and why cooking with just four senses can make you a better chef.

(Picture: Payal Kapoor, Simon Mahoney, Christine Hà. Credit: BBC/Julie Soefer Photography)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Christine Hà, chef, writer and owner of ‘The Blind Goat’ restaurant Payal Kapoor, host of ‘Rasoi ke Rahasya’ YouTube channel Simon Mahoney, author ‘First Catch Your Rabbit!: Or Cooking Without Fear’

Millions of Americans live in so-called ‘food deserts’ - areas where it’s hard to access fresh affordable food. For people who aren’t able to travel to other neighbourhoods to do their food shopping, this might mean microwave meals bought from the local gas station are the only way to feed themselves. Emily Thomas meets two people who live in areas where fresh food is hard to come by in Albany, NY State and St Louis, Missouri. They explain why they reject the term food desert in favour of ‘food apartheid’ - which they say addresses the food system in its entirety, including race.

(Picture: two shopping trollies with food, credit: Getty/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors: Tyrean Lewis, Founder and CEO of Heru Urban Farming Roni Minter

Carlo Petrini is leading a food revolution - one that fights to protect local, traditional ingredients and farming methods in the face of a standardised, industrialised food system.

From a protest against a McDonald's in the heart of Rome, to a network of more than 100,000 members in 160 countries, his Slow Food movement strives for a world where producers are fairly treated and the planet is better protected.

Carlo tells Emily Thomas the story of his life and activism and why he believes that a post-pandemic world offers a profound opportunity for economic, environmental and social change - should we choose to take it.

Producer: Simon Tulett

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: Carlo Petrini. Credit: James Leynse/Corbis via Getty Images/BBC)

Chillies can be hard to love at first, but they are integral to the cuisines of many countries. So what do you do if hot peppers are at the heart of your food culture, but your child can’t stand the heat?

Emily Thomas is joined by three cooks and parents. Each of them grew up in a food culture where chillies are important, but are now bringing up their own children in a country where hot peppers have less significance. We hear why you might want a child to develop a taste for chilli, how young they should be introduced to it, and whether you should ever resort to bribery.

Guests: MiMi Aye, Sunrita Dutta, Mei Li.

Serving sizes have increased dramatically in recent decades. It’s happened so subtly that many of us simply don't realise, but it’s having a serious impact on our health and our planet. So, how can we reverse it?

Emily Thomas learns how food manufacturers and clever marketers have nudged us into buying ever larger portions, leveraging ultra cheap ingredients and our own psychology. We hear that the phenomenon is so pervasive it’s also crept into the home, where many of us have lost any concept of what an appropriate portion is.

Given the increasing awareness of the poor health and environmental outcomes linked to overconsumption, we find out what regulators and companies are doing to shrink portions back to a more sustainable size, and ask whether the real answer might lie in a fundamental shift in the way we all value food.

Producer: Simon Tulett

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: A woman drinking from a giant coffee cup. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Pierre Chandon, professor of marketing and director of the INSEAD Sorbonne University Behavioural Lab, Paris; Theresa Marteau, director of the behaviour and health research unit at Cambridge University; Denise Chen, chief sustainability officer at Melco Resorts & Entertainment, Hong Kong.

Anti-Asian hate has surged since the coronavirus outbreak, and some of the most common targets have been Chinese food businesses.

Tamasin Ford speaks to three people who’ve witnessed the rise of Sinophobia first hand and seen it damage not only their livelihoods, but also their families.

They explain why they’re not prepared to stay silent, as was often the case for previous generations, and how they plan to use food in the fight against racism and ignorance.

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: A person holds a sign during a rally against anti-Asian hate in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Credit: Kerem Yucel/AFP/Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Patrick Mock, manager of 46 Mott bakery in New York; John Li, owner of Dumpling Shack, London; Ying Hou, owner of ShanDong MaMa, Melbourne

President Biden has pledged to scrap the 'tipped wage' in the US - a salary system where diners effectively subsidise waiters' wages.

It's a move that's divided restaurant staff across the country. Tamasin Ford hears from those who want a higher minimum wage and an end to a system they argue makes servers vulnerable to discrimination and harassment. On the other hand, some staff are outraged because, they say, the changes could wipe out their chance to make double or even triple their hourly wage in tips.

With the coronavirus pandemic wreaking havoc on the hospitality industry, restaurant owners too are wondering whether now is the time for a shake-up, and also how customers might react.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: A waitress writes notes on a pad. Credit: Getty Images/BBC) Contributors:

Saru Jayaraman, president of One Fair Wage USA; Dr Michael Lynn, professor of services marketing at Cornell University, New York; Xian Zhang, co-owner of Cafe China and Birds of a Feather, New York; Joshua Chaisson, president of the Restaurant Workers of America and a waiter in Portland, Maine

On the streets of Bucharest a woman unwraps a package of Chinese pepper ... and falls in love. In Portland Oregon, a family finds a new home - in a farmers market. A food writer opens her front door in London and finds a Chinese banquet waiting for her. On a cold winter’s morning, in a city 10,000 kilometres away from her family, a woman stands and waits for a taste of home.

As part of the BBC World Service festival exploring how the Coronavirus pandemic is reshaping our social lives, Emily Thomas hears four stories of how food can bring us closer together when we’ve never been more distant from one another.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Two women sit on a bench talking, Credit: Getty/BBC)

Contributors:

Albertina Coacci Tse Yin Lee Fuchsia Dunlop Schlifka Collier

Vitamin D keeps our bones and muscles strong, and now there's some evidence it could help protect us from Covid-19. With many of us deficient in the 'sunshine vitamin' could food fortification be the best way to ensure we're getting enough?

Emily Thomas hears how enriched milk and margarines have helped to almost completely eliminate vitamin D deficiencies in Finland, and how plans to fortify flour could prevent devastating bone diseases like rickets in Mongolia.

As more countries are urged to act, we ask whose responsibility fortification should be - governments' or the food industry's? Plus, why is it so hard to get enough vitamin D from sunlight or our regular diets, and is it possible to get too much?

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

Kevin Cashman, professor of food and health at University College Cork, Republic of Ireland; Amaraa Bor, operations manager at the Christina Noble Children’s Foundation, Mongolia; Christel Lamberg-Allardt, professor of food and nutrition at the University of Helsinki, Finland

(Picture: An optical illusion of a boy 'eating' the sun. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

When a footballer is around, does food simply become fuel? Emily Thomas is joined by the wives of two former professional footballers and the ex-captain of the New Zealand National team. They reveal how the game affects meals for the players and the people around them. We hear about the highs and lows of fuelling a professional athlete - from managing diet through injury and retirement, to turning a blind eye to 2am curries, to keeping all the chocolate hidden away.

(Picture: Footballer shoots at goal. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Bex Smith Prudencia Buxton Shauna Muamba

Alice Waters is one of America’s most influential chefs and food writers. In the 1970s she led a food revolution that sparked a movement towards local, sustainable, organic food. Alice tells Emily Thomas about her life, from a suburban childhood in New Jersey to the radical politics of the University of California, Berkeley. She explains how she was inspired to set up a small French restaurant called Chez Panisse, after a trip to France as a student, and how it became a mecca for writers, chefs, musicians and artists.

After almost half a century of food activism, Alice tells us that she still has plenty of work to do. She talks about her mission to educate children through her Edible School Yard project, how lockdown has focused her mind on climate change, and what it has felt like to see her beloved restaurant forced to close its doors over the past year.

(Photo: Alice Waters. Credit: Amanda Marsalis/ BBC).

A spongy collection of flour, water, wild yeasts and bacteria may seem an unlikely object of affection, but some sourdough starters are truly cherished, and can even become part of the family.

Emily Thomas hears how one starter has been used to bake bread in the same family since the Canadian gold rush more than 120 years ago, and speaks to a man trying to preserve sourdough diversity and heritage by running the world's only library dedicated to starter cultures.

And a German baker, whose starter has survived Nazism and communism, reveals the commercial demands of maintaining it and why old ‘mothers’ (as sourdough starters are known) hold a powerful lesson for us all in nurturing living things.

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

(Picture: A woman holding bread. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Contributors:

Ione Christensen; Karl de Smedt, Puratos; Christoph Hatscher, Bäckerei & Konditorei Hatscher

In March 2020, as countries struggled to contain the coronavirus pandemic, 90% of the world’s school children were sent home. With all eyes - and headlines - on the spread of Covid-19, it took a while for many to see that another crisis had been unleashed - hundreds of millions of children around the world were now going hungry because they relied on free school meals as their main source of nutrition. Not every parent had the money to buy more food - and few governments had adequate plans in place to help them.

Emily Thomas hears extraordinary stories from Kenya and the US of how schools and charities fought to reach children throughout school closures. Could the coronavirus have changed school meals for good - and if so, why did it take a pandemic for the world to wake up to their importance?

(Picture: boy with school lunch. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected].

Contributors:

Wawira Njiru: Founder and Executive Director, Food for Education

Carmen Burbano: Director of the World Food Programme’s School Feeding Division

Dr. Gabriella McLoughlin: Research Associate, Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri

The internationally-acclaimed food writer and TV cook Nigella Lawson, tells her life story through five memorable dishes. Often filmed devouring food with a showy relish, she tells Emily Thomas how her mother’s bulimia sparked a life-long determination to enjoy eating.

Nigella explains how a series of bereavements has led her to memorialise her loved ones through recipes, and why she’s become more protective of her privacy in recent years.

Nigella’s books and TV shows often give the impression of a gregarious host, cooking for a multitude of family and friends, but her latest book ‘Cook, Eat, Repeat’ and its accompanying TV series, partly written and produced during lockdown, show her on her own. We find out how she’s coped.

(Picture: Nigella Lawson. Credit: Matt Holyoak/ BBC).

Trump vs Biden isn’t the only issue that's been dividing communities in the USA in recent months - some have also been arguing over alcohol. Alongside November’s presidential vote, several counties and cities voted on whether to give up their ‘dry’ status and allow alcohol sales, many for the first time in 100 years. This week we hear from Bath County, Kentucky, which narrowly voted to go ‘wet’. Emily Thomas hears the story of this small rural community told by the people on opposite sides of the sometimes bitter argument - a pastor whose daughter was killed by a drunk driver, and a young metal worker convinced alcohol sales will bring prosperity.

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

Contributors:

The Reverend Lowell Rice, pastor at Owingsville First Church of God, Kentucky Dallas Whisman, Bath County Alcohol Beverage Control administrator, Kentucky

(Picture: A broken beer bottle on a US flag. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Do you give food emojis much thought? If not, perhaps you should. Emily Thomas hears how these tiny digital images can have a big social and economic impact. We reveal who decides which emojis are accepted and how you can propose your very own. Two Venezuelans living in the US explain why their brand new ‘flatbread emoji’ could be one the most significant achievements of their lives, and the emoji artist responsible for everything from the ‘dumpling’ to ‘bubble tea’ tells us why she sees her work as a calling, and how it has made her an unexpected cultural ambassador.

(Picture: selection of food emojis. Credit: Lumen Bigott/Yiying Lu/BBC)

Contributors:

Sebastian Delmont, software developer Lumen Bigott, graphic designer Yiying Lu, artist and entrepreneur

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

When the only road into her town was blocked by a landslide, documentary filmmaker Suzanne Crocker was shocked by how quickly supermarket shelves went bare. It set her mind racing; would her remote Canadian town - just 300km from the Arctic circle - be capable of sustaining itself? She decided to undertake a radical experiment: an entire year of eating 100% local. Emily Thomas hears how she grew, hunted, foraged and negotiated her way through the seasons with a cupboard bare of salt, sugar and caffeine. How did she persuade three hungry teenagers to come on board, and what did a year of eating local do to family dynamics?

Suzanne’s film about the experience is available on FirstWeEat.ca until 1 February 2021.

If you would like to get in touch with The Food Chain please email [email protected]

(Picture: The Crocker family: Credit: Suzanne Crocker/BBC)

The influential Israeli-born, UK-based chef tells his life story through some of his most memorable dishes.

Often credited with bringing Middle Eastern food into the mainstream in the UK, he now has a string of restaurants and delicatessens behind him, along with several best-selling cookbooks, but he was a late starter in the kitchen - almost pursuing a career in philosophy instead.

He tells Emily Thomas about his youth in the vibrant and diverse Jerusalem of the 1970s, coming out as gay in Tel Aviv, and the huge impact of his younger brother’s death.

Usually reluctant to delve into politics, Yotam also explains why he’s decided to speak out in support of his industry during the coronavirus pandemic.

Producers: Simon Tulett, Siobhan O'Connell and Sarah Stolarz

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: Yotam Ottolenghi. Credit: David Loftus/BBC)

Many of us love cookbooks. For some, they are a useful tool, and for others a source of inspiration. But then there are those for whom they are a whole lot more.

Emily Thomas meets two people who are obsessed with cookbooks, collecting thousands of copies, and building emotional connections with each of them.

Irish food writer Diana Henry explains how books can become soulmates, and Californian chef Cindy Pawlcyn describes how it feels to have a collection built over decades, destroyed overnight.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Pile of books. Credit: Getty/BBC)

What is it about garlic that wards off the evil eye? Why is rice sometimes thrown over the happy couple at a wedding?

The way we grow, eat and use certain foods is said to bring us luck - good or bad - but why do we imbue them with these mystical powers, and why do these beliefs persist?

Tamasin Ford explores some of the most common and also unusual food superstitions practiced around the world.

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

(Picture: Two hands pulling a wishbone. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Contributors:

Jayanti 'Jonty' Rajagopalan, owner of Detours India, Hyderabad; Mae Azango, journalist with FrontPage Africa, Liberia; Tasha Marks, food historian, London.

Coronavirus shutdowns have seen many more people step into the kitchen to cook for themselves this year. Whilst some have boasted about the joy, comfort and delectable dishes they’ve discovered, it was the food failures that really went viral.

Three amateur cooks tell Tamasin Ford about their epic kitchen catastrophes and the valuable lessons failure taught them about food, and themselves. Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

(Picture: A woman looking at burnt cakes in the oven. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Contributors:

Ngo Thi Viet Anh; Heidi Allen; Dan Nash

Almost ten years ago, chef Joshna Maharaj walked into a hospital kitchen and was horrified by what she saw. Since then she’s been leading a movement to change what patients eat.

But it’s not easy to make large cash-strapped public institutions up their food game, nor to win over cooks whose culinary skills have been reduced to opening packets.

Joshna tells Emily Thomas the story behind her new book Take Back the Tray - Revolutionising Food in Hospitals, Schools and Other Institutions.

(Picture: Joshna Maharaj. Credit: Joshna Maharaj/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Only three countries still hunt whales commercially. They do it despite little demand for whale meat and sometimes fierce international condemnation. So why do they continue?

Emily Thomas finds out why Norway, Japan and Iceland still kill whales for their meat and discovers that tradition, culture and a strong sense of national identity can outweigh all of these factors.

She hears why aggressive international pressure, particularly from environmental or animal welfare NGOs, can backfire, and speaks to the man behind a campaign that may have helped end commercial whaling in one of these countries for good.

Producers: Simon Tulett and Sarah Stolarz

(Picture: A captured minke whale is lifted by a crane at a port in Kushiro, Japan, in July 2019. Credit: Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/BBC)

Contributors:

JohnJo Devlin, BBC reporter; Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen, Norway’s Minister of Fisheries and Seafood; Michal Kolmaš, assistant professor of Asian studies and international relations at the Metropolitan University in Prague; Sigursteinn Másson, journalist and anti-whaling campaigner

Selassie Atadika spent a decade working for the UN in some of the world’s most volatile regions, and it led to a realisation - that food has an essential role to play in rebuilding economies and bringing communities together.

The Ghanaian chef is now on a mission to revive many of Africa’s lost or forgotten foods, and make the rest of the world sit up and take notice.

She tells Emily Thomas how, aged five, she was forced to flee her home in Ghana following a military coup, and why she caused a ‘scandal’ in her family by dropping her plans to be a doctor for a career in humanitarian work.

Selassie is now gaining international acclaim for Midunu, a nomadic restaurant she set up in her family’s former home in Accra, which embodies what she calls ‘new African cuisine’. She explains how she wants to use it to make the continent healthier, wealthier, and greener.

(Picture: Selassie Atadika. Credit: Selassie Atadika/BBC)

Is there ever a good time to open a restaurant? Surely, during a global pandemic isn’t one of them? As coronavirus rips through communities around the globe, lockdowns are forcing tens of thousands of restaurants to close their doors. Tamasin Ford meets the entrepreneurs who are doing the opposite. We hear how a West African restaurant in London and a Chinese restaurant in LA are managing their openings. Plus, how putting food on the menu, became a matter of survival for one of London's top dance clubs.

(Picture: Adejoké, Henry and Stuart. Credit: BBC/Adejoké Bakare/Henry Molina/Stuart Glen)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Adejoké Bakare: Chishuru restaurant, London Henry Molina: Good and Nice restaurant, LA Stuart Glen: co-founder The Cause, London

Mealtimes with small children, whether they are your own or someone else's, can be a far from relaxing experience. Dinner with a toddler can be a wild affair, leaving the adults around the table exhausted. Is this a key part of a child’s learning, or should we get in quick and teach table manners in the high chair? How can a parent banish mealtime battles and turn a child into a dream dinner companion? And what can we tell about our attitudes to food and parenting philosophies when we look at how we teach our children to eat?

Emily Thomas meets three parents from around the globe, who’ve mastered the art of a chilled family mealtime.

Contributors: Pamela Druckerman, author of French Children Don’t Throw Food, Sherlyn Kim, CEO of Molly Manners Korea and Vaishali Sudan Sharma of The Champa Tree parenting blog.

Four years ago some of the biggest electoral shifts in the US were seen in the north-central state of Wisconsin. It was one of the swing states that decided that election. And it could be again. This week Emily Thomas hears the stories of two farmers who live and work in this key battleground region. How much have Donald Trump's trade wars with China, Canada and Mexico challenged a traditionally Republican community? And has Joe Biden offered enough incentives for farmers to vote Democrat?

(Picture: Carrie Mess and Will Hsu. Credit: Will Hsu/Carrie Mess/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Carrie Mess, dairy farmer Will Hsu, farmer and President - Hsu’s Ginseng Enterprises

Presidential campaigns are all about connecting with voters, and Donald Trump and Joe Biden have both been using food to do it.

Emily Thomas hears how they’ve targeted food brands, food media and even food influencers to help bolster their image, promote their policies, and reach new audiences.

But the deep cultural connections that come with food can make it a risky policy - eating the wrong thing or in the wrong way on the campaign trail can have a devastating impact.

And, entertaining though all of this might be, does it detract from the serious food issues that affect the lives of every American, and the fact that actual food policies are rarely discussed?

Contributors:

Emily Contois, assistant professor of media studies at the University of Tulsa Jeremy Jacobowitz, @brunchboys Jayson Lusk, distinguished professor and head of the agricultural economics department at Purdue University

(Picture: Fries being dropped into a ballot box. Credit: Getty Images/Katie Horwich/BBC)

Does it feel uncomfortable calling someone fat because we think there is something bad about fatness? And if so - does that come from a concern about health, or is it something more insidious? Emily Thomas examines how society sees fatness - exploring the idea that we live in an inherently fat-phobic world. We hear from those who say viewing fatness as a health problem alone, obscures some uncomfortable truths about poverty, racism, misogyny and ourselves. What would a less fat-phobic world look like? (Picture: woman sitting on sofa. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

If you would like to get in touch with the team, please email [email protected]

Contributors:

Esther D. Rothblum, professor of women's studies, San Diego State University Sonya Renee Taylor, founder, The Body is Not An Apology Sabrina Strings, associate professor of sociology at the University of California, Irvine Sigrún Daníelsdóttir, project manager for mental health promotion, Iceland Directorate of Health

Some thought Covid-19 would give our planet a breather while many of our movements and industries were restricted, but there are worrying signs that in some parts of the world exactly the opposite is happening.

Emily Thomas finds out how the pandemic has left many people hungry, desperate, and turning to rainforests and wild animals to feed themselves, whilst for others there's growing evidence the virus could be providing cover to make profit at the planet’s expense.

We hear allegations of illegal slashing and burning of an Indonesian rainforest to make way for a palm oil plantation and ask Nestle, the world’s biggest food company, what it’s doing to make sure its products are deforestation free. The head of the UN’s Environment Programme explains why it’s more vital than ever for countries to put environmental protection at the heart of their economic recovery plans, and a conservation worker in Kenya shares fears that decades of animal and environmental preservation work is in danger of being undone.

Contributors: Michael O'Brien-Onyeka, senior vice president for the Africa field division at Conservation International; Farwiza Farhan, founder of HAkA; Benjamin Ware, head of responsible sourcing, Nestlé; Inger Andersen, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme

(Picture: Giraffe at Serengeti National Park, Tanzania. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Emily Thomas asks whether the coronavirus pandemic will turn out to be the defining moment in the fight against obesity. Will we see governments take radical action, now that the pandemic has turned the spotlight on this growing global problem? And why hasn’t the pandemic made most of us eat more healthily?

Even experts have been surprised by just how strong an impact obesity has been found to have on the risks of coronavirus. We hear from Professor Barry Popkin, of the University of North Carolina, who led a major study into the relationship between the two. He tells us he’s worried that food companies are using the pandemic to push ultra processed food on low-income populations.

Professor Corinna Hawkes, of City, University of London, explains how obesity policy became personal in the UK after Boris Johnson caught the virus.

And Jacqueline Bowman-Busato, Policy Lead for the European Association for the Study of Obesity, tells us how her own experience of living with obesity has led her to lobby for changes in how obesity is viewed and treated. She says the pandemic has provided a much needed wake up call on a neglected and misunderstood public health issue.

If you would like to get in touch with the show please email [email protected]

(Picture: Fat cells, Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Preppers have been preparing for a global emergency like coronavirus for years, stocking up supplies just in case society was ever brought to a standstill. So when our food systems began to buckle under the pressure of the pandemic, were they sitting pretty, and has this much ridiculed community now been vindicated?

Emily Thomas revisits some preppers she first met three years ago to see how they’ve been coping since the crisis hit. Pete Stanford tells her he didn’t need to join the supermarket scramble for food in the first weeks of lockdown, but the crisis has made him rethink the way he preps and how much he’s willing to share. Lincoln Miles tells us he’s had a flood of new customers to his prepping shop, but that even he wasn’t prepared for the spike in demand.

And we speak to a prepping newcomer, New York Times reporter Nellie Bowles, who’s gone from ridiculing this community to believing that being prepared is the socially responsible thing to do.

(Picture: A man with a backpack and axe in the forest. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Following the Beirut explosion, we’re exploring the chemical that caused the blast - ammonium nitrate. It’s something many of us will have come across before, it’s in some of our antibiotics and used to feed yeast but it’s most commonly sold as a fertiliser. Graihagh Jackson examines how this substance has changed the world - feeding millions on the one hand, and fuelling warfare, pollution and biodiversity loss on the other.

If you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Ammonium nitrate on petri dish. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

She was born into one of the most prominent and wealthy families in the Philippines, but life has not been easy for Margarita Forés.

She was forced to flee her country during President Ferdinand Marcos’ military dictatorship, she battled bulimia as a young woman and has overcome cancer twice. She tells Graihagh Jackson how cooking has helped her cope with some of her toughest challenges, offered a way to win her family’s approval, and helped her prove to herself that she could make it on her own.

Now an award-winning chef and owner of Cibo, a successful chain of restaurants in her home country, she made her mark by blending Filipino ingredients with Italian cooking techniques, after falling in love with the country whilst at a cookery school there.

And she has set her sights on pushing for Filipino food to be internationally recognised, whilst championing local farmers and their ingredients.

(Photo: Margarita Forés. Credit: Margarita Forés/BBC)

After decades of racism, persecution and forced assimilation, Native Americans had lost many of their traditional foods and recipes. Award-winning chef Sean Sherman has made it his life’s mission to bring them back from the brink of extinction.

He tells Graihagh Jackson about a “feral” childhood spent on a vast reservation in South Dakota, USA, and how his impoverished community was forced to rely on highly processed, government-supplied commodity foods, which he says have had serious and long-term health implications for his people.

A successful but highly stressful career running restaurant kitchens pushed him to the point of burnout – he explains how a recuperation mission to Mexico led to an epiphany about his own food heritage and a meticulous effort to revive it and rid it of colonial influences.

He’s since written an award-winning cookbook, set up a non-profit to educate others about North America’s native cuisines, plans to open a restaurant next year, and tells us he wants to make his indigenous food movement a global one.

(Picture: Sean Sherman. Credit: Heidi Ehalt/BBC)

When a misguided halloween costume resurfaced on social media in June - no one could have predicted the events that ensued. It ignited a twitter storm about racism in food writing and led ultimately to the resignation of two food editors at major US publications. Graihagh Jackson hears from the whistleblower at the centre of the controversy and from critics of mainstream food media, who say myopic, white-washed and problematic representations of food are all-too-common. We hear from people trying to change the status quo and ask if this is the moment of reckoning the industry needs.

If you would like to get in touch please email [email protected]

(Picture: Letters on a chopping board. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Meatpacking plants around the world are quickly becoming hotspots for Coronavirus outbreaks. In many rural parts of the United States, meat processing factories have now become the main source of Covid-19 infections. But why are other food factories not experiencing the same problem? And why is the US so adversely affected?

Tamasin Ford takes a look at the unique conditions at meat processing factories that enable the virus to thrive and how the outbreaks have revealed some of the gruelling working conditions facing many workers around the world.

In Denmark, Europe’s largest pig processor, we explore whether artificial intelligence and the use of robots could help prevent future outbreaks, or whether it’s simply about providing better working conditions for people working in the factories.

If you'd like to get in touch with the team, please email [email protected].

(Picture: A man cuts meat for sausage. Credit: Lev Fedoseyev/TASS via Getty Images/BBC)

Money, time, and healthy choices can make mealtimes a challenge for many parents, but how do things change when sole responsibility falls on one adult's shoulders? In some parts of the world single parent families are now more common than ever before, but how does being a single parent influence your relationship with food, and also your child's?

Tamasin Ford speaks to three lone-parents about their experiences: Salma Abdo, from Madrid, explains why mealtimes with her young son were the loneliest part of her day; Billy McGranaghan, founder of London charity Dads House, says he regularly had to skip meals so his child could eat; and Neferteri Plessy, who runs Single Mums Planet, in Santa Monica, California, talks about how food decisions can be tricky to negotiate with your ex.

But all three describe how, despite the challenges, food can help create unique bonds in a single parent home through cooking and eating together.

Producer: Simon Tulett Studio Manager: Hal Haines

(Picture: Neferteri Plessy, Salma Abdo, and Billy McGranaghan. Credit: BBC)

Abandoned by her biological mother at six months old, a victim of sexual harassment and discrimination in the kitchen, and a recent breast cancer survivor – Dominique Crenn has faced her fair share of battles.

The award-winning chef, author and campaigner – not to mention the first woman in the US to win three Michelin stars – tells Graihagh Jackson how sheer determination and a desire to make a difference have taken her to the top.

She discusses the five key dishes that have shaped her life, from enjoying fresh oysters in a fish market with her father at 4am, to tomatoes – the ingredient that showed her the power of food and the importance of where it comes from.

Dominique tells of her struggles in a male-dominated restaurant world, the heartache of her father’s death, and how she’s facing up to her latest challenge – Covid-19. Plus, she explains her recent decision to scrap land-based meat from all of her restaurants, and why cancer has prompted her to seek out her birth mother.

Producer: Simon Tulett Studio manager: Annie Gardiner

(Picture: Dominique Crenn. Credit: Jordan Wise/BBC)

It’s something many of us intuitively believe - certain foods have the power to make us feel better. But what’s the science behind this, why do we crave certain dishes, and do they provide solace for everyone?

Graihagh Jackson explores what’s really happening when we turn to food for a pick-me-up: psychologist Shira Gabriel explains these foods’ links to memory and social connection; and psychiatrist Lukas Van Oudenhove reveals why so many comfort foods are high in fat or carbohydrates, and how this could be problematic in the long run.

But comfort foods aren’t always comforting - we find out why an unhappy childhood can mean they provide little or no solace. And the concept is far from universal - food writer Jenny Linford says in some food cultures the idea is irrelevant.

Plus, of all the millions of dishes out there, why do some rise to comfort food status? Food writer Kay Plunkett-Hogge explains why rice is the ultimate comfort food for many Thais.

Producer: Simon Tulett Studio Manager: Hal Haines

Let us know what you think about the show - email [email protected]

(Picture: A man hugging a giant ice cream. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

When Asma Khan was born it was said her mother cried, but not tears of joy. As a second daughter born in 1960s India, Asma felt she was a disappointment, even a burden, because she could not inherit and would cost her family a fortune in dowries. But she went on to defy those low expectations and open one of London’s most sought-after restaurants.

Asma tells us how she could barely boil an egg when she first got married and moved to England, about the intense loneliness she felt so far from home, and how the smell of paratha convinced her that the only way to recover was to learn how to cook.

The Darjeeling Express founder describes the restaurant’s humble beginnings as a supper club in her London flat, why it has always had an all-female kitchen, and her plans to use food to empower female refugees and prostitutes.

This programme was first broadcast in January 2020.

Let us know what you think about the show - email [email protected]

(Picture: Asma Khan with a pakora and chutney. Credit: BBC)

Jacques Pépin is a household name across much of the US. He shot to fame starring alongside Julia Child on TV cookery shows in the 1990s, has written more than 30 books, and picked up multiple awards.

He tells Graihagh Jackson about his precarious childhood dodging bombs in wartime France and the near-fatal car crash that ended his restaurant career, but set him on a path towards celebrity.

Plus, the 84-year-old explains why he’s still sharing his cooking and recipes with the world through the coronavirus lockdown.

Producer: Simon Tulett Studio Manager: Hal Haines

Let us know what you think about the show - email [email protected]

(Picture: Jacques Pépin. Credit: Tom Hopkins/BBC)

Taste and smell loss are thought to be two of the most common symptoms of coronavirus, but some of the least understood, persisting long after the virus has gone.

Scientists all over the world are racing to find out why Covid-19 is attacking these senses, and what this might teach us about the virus and how to track it – we hear about the latest theories from Turkey-based research scientist Maria Veldhuizen from The Global Consortium for Chemosensory Research. Meanwhile, thousands of coronavirus survivors are struggling to adapt to a life without taste and smell, including a young doctor who tested positive for the virus more than three months ago. She tells Graihagh Jackson how she’s been desperately trying to recover her sense of smell ever since, and how it has destroyed one of her great passions – food.

We hear how smell is vital to the way we perceive flavour, but that it’s also important in other ways. Dr Rachel Herz, a neuroscientist and researcher on the psychology of smell at Brown University and Boston College in the US, explains that long-term smell loss is linked to depression because of the way the sense is plugged into the part of our brain that processes emotions and memories.

But there is some hope - we speak to Chrissi Kelly, from the charity Abscent, who tells us how it’s possible to train your nose to smell again.

Producer: Simon Tulett Studio Manager: Hal Haines

Let us know what you think about the show - email [email protected]

(Picture: A woman staring at an apple on a plate. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

The fishing industry has been brought to its knees in some countries, with Covid-19 forcing fishing to stop. Graihagh Jackson asks if the global slowdown could present an opportunity for beleaguered fish stocks to flourish once more and what would it mean for the fishing industry.

If you would like to get in touch please email [email protected].

(Picture: Fisherman holds fish on trawler. Credit: Chris Furlong/Getty Images/BBC)

Antonio Carluccio describes his most memorable dishes in his last ever interview. The cook, restaurateur and writer, known as the 'Godfather of Italian cooking', died five days after this recording was made, aged 80.

He tells Emily Thomas about his passion for simple, authentic Italian cuisine, and why he only began to pursue it professionally relatively late in life. He describes his horror at Britain's version of Italian food in the 1970s, his obsession with mushrooms, and reveals how much the late opera singer Luciano Pavarotti could devour in one sitting.

Plus, hear about his struggles with fame and heartache, the tensions that came with expanding his eponymous chain of restaurants and delis, and the dish he would choose as his last.

This interview was first broadcast on 16 November 2017.

(Picture: Antonio Carluccio. Credit: Fred Duval/FilmMagic via Getty Images/BBC)

Food businesses have been some of the hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic. Worldwide lockdowns have forced thousands of restaurants, bars and cafes to close, but many entrepreneurs have managed to keep their businesses afloat, forced to innovate to survive.

We revisit some past Food Chain guests to find out how they’ve been coping and ask what they’ve learned about their business, their customers, and themselves. Tamasin Ford speaks to a chocolate maker in Ghana who hasn’t sold a single bar since the country locked down in March, and a fried chicken entrepreneur in South Africa who’s turned to feeding frontline workers to keep his kitchens and staff going.

But business hasn’t been all bad - we hear from a baker in Montreal, Canada, who says he’s never sold more bread and has started selling bags of flour to meet a growing demand from home bakers. Plus, a restaurant critic from Melbourne, Australia, tells us what it was like going out for a meal for the first time in more than three months.

Let us know what you think about the show by emailing [email protected] or using #BBCFoodChain on social media.

Presenter: Tamasin Ford Producers: Simon Tulett and Siobhan O’Connell Studio manager: Hal Haines

(Picture: A woman picks up food and a drink from a restaurant during lockdown. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Have you noticed how there have been so many acts of kindness during the pandemic, especially when it comes to food? Graihagh Jackson hears how millions were raised in a matter of days to feed healthcare workers and how people have rallied to support food banks in the past few months. But what is behind this outpouring of generosity? And crucially, can it last? This week we delve into the psychology of why so many have felt compelled to help and ask whether COVID-19 could make us more generous.

If you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected]

(Picture: woman carries box of food from food bank, Credit: REUTERS/ Lucy Nicholson/BBC)

Scientists are still trying to uncover exactly how COVID-19 emerged, although some evidence suggests the disease may have originated in bats and infected us via another animal host. Recently, we’ve seen the emergence of many such viruses - so-called zoonotic diseases - that jump from animals to humans; including Ebola, SARS and MERS. Some scientists believe they’re becoming increasingly common and that the primary driver is likely food and farming. So how have zoonotic diseases been dealt with in the past and can we learn any valuable lessons about our food chain there?

Graihagh Jackson travels to Malaysia to uncover the story of Nipah virus that first emerged in 1999, killing up to 75% of those it infected. We hear how the virus emerged, how it changed the community there forever and how it was eventually curbed. Could the story of Nipah virus hold the key to how we protect ourselves from future pandemics like COVID-19?

If you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected]

(Picture: Forest burning in the Amazon. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

China’s so-called ‘wet’ markets have been under intense scrutiny ever since the first coronavirus cases were linked to one in Wuhan six months ago. Now a growing number of influential figures, including leading White House adviser Dr Anthony Fauci, are calling for them to be banned.

But the suggestion has been met with dismay and even anger in China - an expert on the markets tells Graihagh Jackson they are the main source of fresh food in Chinese cities and a healthier and more affordable option than many supermarkets. A market trader in Beijing tells us they play a vital cultural and community role too.

But if these markets were shut down, would it prevent future outbreaks? We speak to a virus-hunter and expert in the region, who explains that it's global agriculture’s growing encroachment into wild spaces that's making us most vulnerable to emerging infectious diseases.

If you would like to contact us about this or any other episode please email [email protected].

(Picture: A vendor sells meat at Xihua Farmer's Market in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, China. Credit: Alex Plavevski/EPA/BBC)

Lockdowns around the world have seen many restaurants close overnight, but how many will be able to re-open once restrictions are lifted? And if so, what will they look like? Graihagh Jackson hears from a top New York chef and a London food writer how an existing culture of high rents, razor-thin margins and low-paid workers has plagued the industry leaving many vulnerable to permanent closure. Could this forced break be a chance to ‘reset’ for the better? A strategist explains how restaurants need to completely re-orientate their business models to weather the storm and keep their suppliers in business in the process. Plus, a veteran franchise investor explains why - contrary to many others - he is excited about the opportunity this time of huge change could bring.

If you would like to get in touch please email [email protected].

(Picture: Man arranges single table outside his restaurant in Rome. Credit:EPA/FABIO FRUSTACI/BBC)

Coronavirus has crippled the restaurant industry, leaving thousands of chefs fighting to save their businesses, but some have been using the crisis, and their own influence, to help and inspire others.

Massimo Bottura, one of the world’s most celebrated chefs, hasn’t been able to serve guests in his three-Michelin-star restaurant, Osteria Francescana, since early March. He tells Graihagh Jackson why, instead, he has been inviting the world into his home kitchen via Instagram every night during Italy’s long lockdown.

Deepanker Khosla, one of Thailand’s top young chefs, refused to close his kitchen when Bangkok’s eateries were forced to shut. He’s now using it to cook thousands of meals for the migrant workers who’ve been left jobless and hungry by the pandemic.

And Ana Roš, chef at one of the world’s top 50 restaurants - Hiša Franko - has been creating new products to support her local farmers and suppliers, and is trying to use the crisis to reform Slovenia’s entire food industry.

If you'd like to get in touch with us please email [email protected]

(Picture: Massimo Bottura, Ana Roš, and Deepanker Khosla handing out food to a woman in Bangkok. Credit: Sylvain Gaboury/Patrick McMullan, Pablo Cuadra, Getty Images, Deepanker Khosla, BBC)

As coronavirus continues to spread and lockdowns leave swathes of people unemployed, a new problem is emerging: hunger. It is being witnessed in communities around the world, especially where people are living hand to mouth. We travel to India and Kenya to see how the unfolding hunger crisis is being addressed. Graihagh Jackson hears from one of Nairobi's poorest neighbourhoods - Mathare - that many are not able to buy enough food and are surviving on one, innutritious meal per day. The local community has rallied to provide fresh water, food donations and cash transfers - but it is not nearly enough to address the scale of the problem. Many say they would rather go out to find work and risk getting coronavirus, than stay home and face starvation. Then to Delhi, where a last-minute lockdown in the country has left thousands of migrant workers stranded and without the means to feed themselves. We speak to a food charity on the unprecedented need for food, how you manage preparing and distributing 22,000 meals per day and what this could all mean for the future of how hunger is perceived and addressed.

To get in touch with the show, please email [email protected].

(Picture: Man receives food donation. Credit: Getty Images/Hindustan Times/BBC)

As the spread of Covid-19 confines millions of us to our homes, we go behind closed doors to hear how people all over the world are using food and cooking to help them through the crisis.

Graihagh Jackson speaks to an artist from Iran who has found inspiration in stories of shared recipes, a sense of healing in her own cooking, and hope for a more peaceful future. A young lawyer from Italy tells us that lockdown meals have helped her reconnect with her family, but that her mother’s exuberance in the kitchen has posed a problem for her waistline. And an Azerbaijani living alone in Barcelona explains why she set up virtual tapas parties to replace the physical ones she’d enjoyed with other expats before the pandemic.

We also hear listeners’ quarantine cooking stories: a Sri Lankan who now lives in Australia tells us how the crisis has reminded him of growing up amid civil war and driven him to reconnect with the food and culture of his birthplace; and a newlywed from Vatican City tells us how discovering a passion for cooking has helped him express his love for his new wife, and that the kitchen has made him a better person.

Let us know what you think about the show, or share your own quarantine cooking stories by emailing [email protected]

(Picture: A man in quarantine taking delivery of groceries. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

This week, we pay homage to the workers making sure we stay fed in times of lockdown. As farmers around the world struggle to find enough people to plant and harvest their crops, we travel to Bavaria in Germany to hear from a school teacher-turned hop farmer about what it’s like to swap his classroom for a field. He tells Graihagh Jackson how the backbreaking work has changed his perceptions about food and farming. A Welsh Michelin-starred chef talks about his decision to move his family into his restaurant and start making thousands of free meals for hospital workers, after coronavirus forced him to shut his business. A supermarket cashier reveals the toll her job is taking and her hopes the pandemic may change perceptions about the importance of frontline food work. Plus, a trucker in the US says his work transporting goods for Walmart has never been more appreciated by the general public, as empty supermarket shelves highlight how vital his job is in keeping food flowing.

If you would like to get in touch please email [email protected].

(Picture: Man brings meal to hospital workers. Credit: Natalia Fedosenko/Getty Images/BBC)

As coronavirus tightens its grip on the world, many of us are facing life in lockdown and are worried about food. Graihagh Jackson takes a journey along the global food supply chain - via her grandparents - to see how it is holding up so far through the crisis.

We hear how supermarkets are responding to the strain of widespread stockpiling and panic buying and what implications this could have on the future of food shopping. Food giant Unilever reveals how they are weathering transport bottlenecks and are adapting production to cater to the 'post-virus' food penchants of different nations. As global lockdowns affect the flow of local and migrant labour forces we speak to one of Europe’s largest fresh food producers about how they will manage this season’s fruit and vegetable harvests; and the United Nations warns that cooperation by consumers and between countries is key, if we are to avert a global food crisis.

If you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected].

(Picture: Woman stares at nearly empty supermarket shelves. Credit: Michel Porro/Getty Images/BBC)

If you are a beer lover, the idea of running your own brewery might sound like the stuff of dreams. And it might seem like the perfect time to do it - an explosion of interest has seen craft breweries pop up in huge numbers in many parts of the world.

But the industry is notoriously hard to crack. Expensive equipment, the space required for brewing, a need for big marketing budgets and fierce competition from other brands are all factors. Then there’s the hugely important, but rather subjective question of whether your beer actually tastes any good. Tamasin Ford speaks to three craft beer aficionados in the UK, USA and Brazil who all tried - and failed - to turn their hobby into a viable business. They talk about their hopes, hurdles and mistakes and whether the journey has affected their love for the amber nectar.

If you'd like to get in touch with us about the show please email [email protected].

(Picture: Jon Cockley, Sergio Fraga and Carol Waggener. Credit: Handsome Frank, Sergio Fraga, Bold Missy Brewery, BBC)

What's the fascination with watching total strangers eat plate after plate of junk food? Is it a grotesque and irresponsible spectacle, or could it be a way to tackle loneliness, and even help some deal with their own food issues? Graihagh Jackson finds out what's fuelling the internet craze 'mukbang' and asks what it says about our attitudes to food and each other.

An avid mukbang watcher explains how it gives her emotional and social connections she's lacking in her offline life, and also helps her resist the urge to eat foods she shouldn't. Performer Moxie Beast describes how she amplifies the sounds of her crunching and chewing to soothe her viewers, and how she tries to stay healthy while doing it.

In South Korea, where mukbang started, we hear how mukbang is helping to forge digital communities at a time when many, especially the young, are living alone. Plus, a clinical psychiatrist talks us through his latest research into the links between mukbang and eating disorders.

Street food is one of the many charms of South East Asia, but there are signs this much-loved way of life and much-needed source of food is on the decline. We visit three of the region’s best-known street food areas – Bangkok, Singapore and Penang – to find out why.

A food hawker in Bangkok tells us his family’s stall, like thousands of others, was forced off the streets as part of a government move to clean up the city. Plus, Graihagh Jackson hears how these changes could have serious consequences for the city’s residents, many of whom have no kitchens at home and rely on cheap street food for their daily meals.

A family of street food vendors in Singapore, where the trade has been moved into enclosed food courts, tells us it’s long, hard and poorly-paid work, and that young people often have no interest in carrying on the tradition.

And in Penang, Malaysia, a government move to preserve local dishes by banning foreign workers may have backfired by removing a source of cheap labour vital to keeping many vendors afloat.

(Picture: A street food vendor in Bangkok, Thailand. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Fried chicken is loved the world over - it’s the most popular dish in global fast food, according to industry analysts, eclipsing even the burger. From Senegal to Singapore many countries have their own native twist on it, whether it’s covered in sesame seeds, battered in tempura or finished with a dunk in aioli. But what is it that makes fried chicken so appealing to so many different cultures?

Graihagh Jackson speaks to three fried chicken shop owners from South Korea, the UK and South Africa to find out how battered poultry has come to achieve such global dominance. They explain how different cultures like their birds fried, how competitive the industry can be, and go deep into the science behind the perfect bite.

We also learn how hard it can be to convince customers that fried chicken should be viewed as a gourmet meal, and priced accordingly, rather than a cheap, unhealthy snack. And how important is it to source the best possible meat, without going bust?

Plus, is the smell of a deep fat fryer any good for your love life?

(Picture: A hand holding a piece of fried chicken. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Why are companies blasting bottles of alcohol and crops into space? Are they just publicity stunts, or are there some serious scientific discoveries to be made?

We explore the potential of space when it comes to producing food and drink - not for astronauts or the first settlers on Mars, but by developing crops that could be more productive and more resistant to climate change here on Earth.

A NASA scientist tells Graihagh Jackson how microgravity on the International Space Station could be the key to unlocking the potential of many Earth crops, and a serial entrepreneur explains why he’s investing hundreds of millions of dollars in the idea in a bid to save Bordeaux wine.

Plus, we find out how space science has already helped us grow indoor crops and develop more efficient and environmentally friendly fertilisers.

(Picture: Planet Earth, composed by NASA images. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Have you ever looked at the ingredients on your microwave meal and wondered what dextrose and sodium nitrite are doing in your dinner?

These are some of the many chemicals used in processed foods - some are found in nature, but others can also be made in a laboratory. They’re used by food manufacturers for many reasons, from making sure rice doesn’t go mouldy, to ensuring yoghurt is low fat. But has the industry gone too far, adding too many synthetics to our food?

Graihagh Jackson meets three food scientists to find out what they're adding to our food, and why. Does it matter whether we use 'natural' or synthetic substances, why are some added ingredients not listed on the label, and how do these scientists ensure they are safe?

Plus, how do you bake cookies at 30,000 feet, and what does space smell like?

(Picture: A scientist picking up a plant leaf. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Nobuyuki Matsuhisa has more than 40 restaurants spread across six continents, many of them frequented by some of the world’s top celebrities. His business partner and friend is Hollywood star Robert De Niro, and he’s even been in a handful of movies himself.

Nobu, as he's known, is one of the most famous chefs in the world, but his early life and career were marked by tragedy and disaster – his father died in a motorcycle accident when he was eight, and one of his first restaurants burnt to the ground just weeks after opening, leaving him broke and contemplating suicide.

But the sushi master eventually plucked up the courage to give the restaurant business one last shot, and his eponymous restaurant in Beverley Hills, California, was a huge success. He tells Graihagh Jackson the story of his life through five of his most memorable dishes, from the miso soup whose aroma would wake him most mornings as a child, to the dish that caught the attention of Robert De Niro and eventually catapulted him to global fame.

(Picture: Nobu Matsuhisa. Credit: BBC)

Gluten-free is booming – it’s become a multi-billion dollar industry, supermarket aisles are crammed with products, with a number of high-profile celebrities endorsing their health impacts.

But this is much more than a fad diet - doctors are seeing a growing number of patients who have serious problems with this protein, most commonly found in wheat products like bread and pasta. And, an increasing number of these patients do not have coeliac disease - for a long time the adverse reaction most commonly associated with wheat.

So what’s going on? Graihagh Jackson hears about an emerging condition called non-coeliac gluten sensitivity, which could be affecting hundreds of millions of people worldwide, and meets the doctors fighting over how best to treat it. She asks why this condition is spreading so fast – could it be something to do with our modern lives and diets? And are wheat and gluten entirely to blame, or could there be dangers lurking in a whole range of other foods?

(Picture: A woman's hand touching wheat in a field. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

In some corners of the world tipping a waiter or waitress would be considered an insult. In other countries, the exact opposite is true. So why did these dramatically different cultures of gratuity evolve, and how difficult is it to change them?

We speak to two restaurant owners on opposite sides of the world struggling to reverse tipping norms – one restaurateur in New York explains why he eventually had to abandon a ban on gratuity, and another in Shanghai describes how difficult it is to convince Chinese customers that they should pay extra.

But is there any relationship between tips and service quality anyway? One academic who’s spent his life studying the custom has found it to be almost non-existent. So why do customers continue to tip? Apparently, it’s all down to guilt.

(Picture: A waitress refusing a tip. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

What do Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone and Lady and the Tramp have in common? Both use food in subtle ways to immerse us in their stories and help us make sense of fictitious worlds - from jumping chocolate frogs to kissing over spaghetti.

The same is true for many novels, where food can be an integral part of building characters, plots, even entire worlds. Graihagh Jackson speaks to three world-acclaimed writers – two authors and one Nollywood script writer and film director - to find out how and why they employ food in their work.

How do you create make-believe foods for a science fiction world, yet still imbue them with meanings that real world listeners will understand? When you’re trying to appeal to multiple audiences and cultures, how do you stop your food references getting lost in translation? And can food be used to highlight or send subtle messages about subjects that are traditionally seen as taboo?

(Picture: Artistic depiction of a woman lying on top of an orange. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Australia's bushfires are thought to have killed more than one billion animals, and although many of the country's wild species have been worst affected thousands of livestock have also died, some of them buried in mass graves.

The severe droughts that partly fuelled the flames have been affecting cattle in Australia for several years, destroying many of their grazing lands - a vital source of nutrition. There are also signs that the extreme heat in some parts of the country could even be making these animals infertile. Graihagh Jackson speaks to Gundula Rhoades, a livestock vet from New South Wales, to find out more.

We also hear about the impact of climate change from two other farm vets. Edwin Chelule, from Nairobi, Kenya, says droughts there have been making dairy cows less productive, destroying families' livelihoods. And Emily Gascoigne, a sheep expert from the south west of England, tells us some disease patterns have been changing.

All three work in an industry that's a big part of the climate change problem – livestock are responsible for almost 15 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions - so can they use their medical expertise and close relationship with farmers to bring change?

(Picture: A farmer standing near the bones of a dead cow in a drought-affected paddock in New South Wales, Australia. Credit: Getty/BBC)

New Year's resolutions about food often involve cutting down on something, or giving something up, but how about committing to trying something new for the next 12 months? How much harder is it, and what do we learn about ourselves along the way?

Graihagh Jackson meets three women who went to extraordinary lengths in search of change: a working mum who cooked a different meal every day of the year to escape a cooking rut; a writer who made her own salt from seawater and learned how to butcher a sheep as part of a pledge to only eat non-processed foods; and a blogger who logged and photographed everything she ate for 365 days.

We hear how difficult, expensive and exhausting the challenges were, but also how they brought each of these women closer to their families and friends, as well as their food.

(Picture: A tree through four seasons. Credit: Getty/BBC)

The award-winning star of Netflix series 'Salt, Fat, Acid Heat' and author of the best-selling cookbook of the same name tells us about her life through five of her most memorable dishes.

The Iranian-American writer and cook has enjoyed a meteoric rise to fame in the last few years, but has struggled to come to terms with that success and says she still feels like an impostor and outsider. She very nearly took a completely different career path - she tells Emily Thomas that her dream was always to be a poet until a magical experience at a fine-dining restaurant changed everything.

Even now, though, she doesn't aspire to run a restaurant or establish a culinary empire - she doesn't like the person she becomes when put in charge of a team of chefs.

This episode was recorded at The Cookery School at Little Portland Street and was first broadcast on 30 May 2019.

(Picture: Samin Nosrat. Credit: BBC)

Does your stomach turn at the thought of a Christmas pudding? How about pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving? Foods like these, commonly served at annual celebrations, are deeply ingrained in our cultures, but why, and how hard is it to reject them?

We meet three people who dislike dishes that traditionally appear during festive or other holidays, and ask why they continue to serve them anyway: Ed Levine, a food writer and broadcaster from the US, explains his antipathy towards pumpkin pie; chef and restaurateur Emily Roux, daughter of Michelin-starred chef Michel Roux Jr., tells us how she dodges Christmas pudding and turkey; and Al Pitcher, a comedian from Sweden, recalls his traumatic experience tasting one of the country's most famous national dishes - sour herring.

Why can it be so hard to admit our dislike of these foods, and what’s the best way to banish them from our tables without upsetting family, friends or even entire nations?

Thanks to Canal Digital Sweden for the extract from Al Pitcher's surströmming video.

(Picture: An unhappy young boy looking at a Christmas pudding. Credit: Getty/BBC)

The bittersweet world of chocolate is complex - cocoa beans are produced by some of the poorest people on the planet and turned into chocolate for some of the richest, and the sweet stuff is haunted by child labour, slavery, trafficking and deforestation. But could the rise of artisan chocolatiers change this?

We speak to three people who are putting traceability and sustainability at the heart of their chocolate businesses, and find out just how difficult that can be - still today, there is no guarantee your chocolate bar is free from the industry's ills.

One of our entrepreneurs, in Ghana, tells us about her determination to put one of the world’s biggest cocoa producers on the chocolate map, and a chocolatier in Singapore explains why she gave up a career in banking to make chocolate bonbons. Plus, we ask whether consumers are willing to pay a relatively high price for bar that's been more ethically sourced.

We also get up close with a cocoa pod, find out what 'bean to bar' really means, and discover the science behind how chocolate is actually made.

(Picture: A chocolatier making a chocolate truffle. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Sommeliers are to a restaurant’s wine what a head chef is to its food. These waiters taste and study thousands of bottles, and the best can even tell you exactly where a wine was grown and when its grapes were harvested, just with a sniff and a slurp.

But to some they can seem part of a stuffy, exclusive and mysterious club. We meet three sommeliers from the USA, Sweden and London who are all trying to change that image and guide even the most clueless of customers through their wine lists.

We hear how much wine they actually drink, how they deal with know-it-all customers and a master sommelier tells us how he passed one of the most difficult exams in the world. Plus, we put all of them to the ultimate blind taste test.

(Picture: Cameron Dewar, Fernando Beteta and Emma Ziemann. Credit: Cameron Dewar, Fernando Beteta, Emma Ziemann, BBC)

Award-winning chef, restaurateur and writer Marcus Samuelsson describes his extraordinary culinary and personal journey from one of the world's poorest countries to Sweden and then to Harlem, New York.

His life in five dishes takes us from his birthplace in Ethiopia, where his mother died when he was just a few years old, to his adoption by a couple in Sweden. He tells Emily Thomas how his adopted grandmother taught him about homemade locally-sourced food and installed a work ethic in the kitchen that he’s never lost.

His sense of culinary adventure then took him through some of the top restaurants in Europe and on to the US, where he’s now opened a string of restaurants of his own, cooked President Obama’s first White House state dinner, published many books and become a regular feature on TV cooking programmes. He's also rediscovered the foods of his birthplace and tells us about the emotional moment he met the father he'd long assumed was dead.

Marcus reveals how racism was a career obstacle, but that it also contributed to his success, and explains why his focus has changed from cooking for the one per cent, as he puts it, to a more democratic dining scene.

(Picture: Marcus Samuelsson at Red Rooster Shoreditch. Credit: BBC)

It’s the world’s most consumed vegetable oil, used for everything from frying food to making it last longer – but can palm oil be produced in a way that doesn't wreak enormous environmental and human damage?

In conjunction with another BBC World Service programme, Crowd Science, we visit the Sabah region of Malaysian Borneo, where different groups are working together to change the way palm oil is produced.

Presenter Graihagh Jackson hears about a certification system aimed at raising standards on smallholders, reducing the industry’s impact on biodiversity, and boosting incomes. And she speaks to an organisation fighting for the rights of indigenous communities against land-hungry palm oil companies.

Plus, what can consumers do to affect change in the industry? We hear how it's sometimes difficult to know whether products contain sustainable palm oil or not.

For more on the steps being taken to lessen palm oil's environmental impact listen to Crowd Science: Should I stop eating palm oil?

(Picture: A man harvesting palm oil. Credit Getty/BBC)

Running a bakery is hard work - you’re up all night mixing, kneading, proving and baking, and then when the sun rises you need to actually sell your bread and run the business.

It’s physically demanding too - repetitive strain injuries to hands are not uncommon.

So who’d be willing to put themselves through it? Emily Thomas meets three artisan bakers from different continents to find out what drives them, and why they think most of us have been eating bread all wrong: Islam Sabry, who runs Cairo's Baker, in Egypt; Lee Utsumi, of Lee's Bread, just outside Tokyo, Japan; and Seth Gabrielse, co-owner of Automne Boulangerie in Montreal, Canada.

Plus, what happens to your waistline when you're surrounded by freshly baked bread and pastries all day?

(Picture: Islam Sabry, Seth Gabrielse and Lee Utsumi. Credit: Cairo's Baker, Automne Boulangerie, Lee's Bread, and BBC).

The food industry has a big problem with packaging, but what if you could simply eat your wrapper or coffee cup instead of throwing it away?

Could packaging made from food ingredients prevent our oceans and landfill sites from being clogged with waste, much of it plastic? Could it still preserve and protect our food from damage or spoiling? And does it taste any good?

Emily Thomas speaks to two companies developing edible products - one producing plates, cups and bowls, the other making a protective coating for fruit -to find out whether edible packaging is really a clever solution to some serious environmental problems, or just a marketing gimmick.

And a food futurologist explains why we're all likely to see more food-based packaging on our supermarket shelves, and how that could change the way we eat and shop.

(Picture: A woman pretending to eat a plate. Credit: Getty/BBC)

How dangerous is your takeaway?

If you ever order food through an online delivery service like UberEats, DoorDash, or Deliveroo, you probably think only about the meal that will soon will arrive at your door - will it arrive quickly, and piping hot? You possibly don’t think much about the person delivering it, let alone whether they have put themselves at risk in getting it to you.

These companies allow customers to order food from a range of restaurants, and then provide a delivery service - by assigning jobs to drivers who are usually self-employed.

Across the world, their popularity is soaring. But one hidden aspect of their growth is the dangers faced by their growing legions of delivery drivers, from road accidents, to intimidation, to violence.

The Food Chain has seen dozens of reports from all over the world, and spoken to numerous people who work with these companies, all suggesting that the safety of takeaway delivery drivers, needs closer scrutiny.

Emily Thomas investigates what it is about food delivery in particular that can be so dangerous - and whether enough is being done to keep these drivers safe.

Please note: This programme contains content that some may find disturbing.

(Photo: Food delivery driver. Credit: Getty Images/ BBC)

Across the world, as fruits ripen, teams of pickers set out across the fields. Without them, produce would be left to rot and farms profits would plummet.

But in many countries, population shifts and changes to immigration laws have left farmers struggling to find enough people to do the work. The effect has been particularly pronounced in the US where President Trump has cracked down on immigration, and the UK with its plans to leave the EU.

Enter the robots. Over the past few years, interest and investment in machines that can pick fruit and vegetables that are usually harvested by humans, have been ramping up.

Emily Thomas asks whether we should welcome these new developments. Picking fruit is low paid, low-skilled and physically demanding work, and exploitation in the industry is well-documented. But it’s also a source of income that many depend on, and the main source of employment in some parts of the world.

Plus, if we do let machines do the job, what are the implications for the environment, and how our food looks and tastes?

(Picture: Man reaches forward to pick an apple from a tree. Credit: BBC/ Getty Images)

How can you have a successful relationship with someone whose eating habits you find repulsive, infuriating, even morally abhorrent? What do you do when your wife and mother are locked in a fierce battle over what you eat, when your long term partner insists on eating sandwiches in bed, or when you’re in love with a vegan but like nothing better than a chicken teriyaki?

As part of Crossing Divides, a BBC season bringing people together in a fragmented world, Emily Thomas meets three couples who are strongly divided when it comes to their food preferences, and asks them to divulge how they handle it.

As economies develop and our eating habits become ever more individualised and with ever more choice, is food becoming the ultimate passion killer? And are arguments about food ever really just about food, or do they signify a deeper incompatibility?

Plus, do couples that eat together stay together? And does it matter whether they are sharing the same dish?

(Image: A woman and a man disagree about meat Image credit: Getty Images)

What do the most famous names in film, sport and politics eat for dinner, and what does it say about who they really are? Three private chefs give us the ultimate insight into the lives of the rich and famous - after all, what's more exposing than what and how we choose to eat? Emily Thomas hears about the Premiership footballer who wanted to helicopter a chef to his home to make him and his girlfriend oven chips, the politician who had a romantic meal with not one, but three beautiful young women, and the Hollywood star who would only eat what she could squeeze into half of a small plastic cup.

How do you even become a private chef, and how much money can you make? And what happens when the person you are cooking for is not someone you want to pander to - a politician whose policies you can’t abide, or a celebrity whose private behaviour makes you uncomfortable?

Emily speaks to Charlotte Leventis, the London-based founder and executive chef of Extravaganza Food; Kwame Amfor, founder of Biishville, a Ghanaian catering company; and Kathleen Schaffer, the founder and creative director of Schaffer LA. Between them they’ve cooked for A-listers including Angelina Jolie, George Clooney, Idris Elba, Eddie Murphy, David Beckham and Kate Beckinsale.

(Picture: Kate Beckinsale, David Beckham and Idris Elba. Credit: Getty/BBC)

Farming has some of the highest suicide rates of any profession in many parts of the world. Emily Thomas explores why depression and stress amongst farmers is a global problem that is thought to be on the rise.

It can be an incredibly tough business and many farmers struggle to make ends meet. But aside from financial pressures, are there other aspects of agricultural work and life that could contribute to mental illness?

Farmers in Australia explain why social and physical isolation, along with a culture of stoicism and strength, could be contributing to the problem, especially amongst men. And a specialist in farm succession in the US state of Oregon explains why family pressures and the tricky business of inheritance can cause enormous stress, and even lead people to take their own lives. Plus, we hear how social media and criticism of farmers over climate change and animal welfare might be adding to the problem.

But there are solutions - we hear how mindfulness, governments, and even farm animals themselves can be the key to escaping depression.

For advice and support on the issues raised in this programme, and details of help available where you live, visit www.befrienders.org

(Picture: A farmer looking out over his fields. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Ken Hom is a Chinese-American cook who became famous for introducing Chinese cooking to the British public through a BBC TV series in the early 1980s. Since then he has written almost 40 books, sold around eight million woks, and become regarded as an authority on Chinese cuisine.

Emily Thomas visits the 70-year-old in his Paris flat to hear about his life told through five memorable dishes. He describes his impoverished childhood in Chicago’s Chinatown, from using his mother’s packed lunches to barter for better treatment at school, to working in a kitchen as an 11-year-old – a job that would put him off the restaurant business for life. Ken describes the dishes only served to Americans in a 1960s Chinese restaurant, and re-enacts the nerve wracking screen test at the BBC 40 years ago, that was to change his life. Ken also explains what he thinks matters most in the food world today, why he has always kept his personal life, private, and how his early childhood experiences fed an entrepreneurial streak that would last his entire life.

(Picture: Ken Hom. Credit: Getty Images/ BBC)