Category Archives: podcasts

Podcast: Gastropod and Ice Cream!

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I’m featured in the latest Gastropod podcast, and it’s all about ICE CREAM!

It’s one of the most complex food products you’ll ever consume: a thermodynamic miracle that contains all three states of matter—solid, liquid, and gas—at the same time. And yet no birthday party, beach trip, or Fourth of July celebration is complete without a scoop or two.

Contrary to popular myth, ice cream was not brought to Italy from China by Marco Polo, and then introduced to France by Catherine de Medici. In fact, it is a delicious love-child, born of the union between a culinary tradition of custards and burnt creams in medieval Northern Europe, and the fruity, floral, sherbets (sharbat in Persian) that were typically served over ice as a refreshing drink in the Middle East.

This episode of Gastropod serves up a big bowl of delicious ice cream, topped with the hot fudge sauce of history and a sprinkling of science. Grab your spoons and join us as we bust ice-cream origin myths, dig into the science behind brain freeze, and track down a chunk of pricey whale poo in order to recreate the earliest ice cream recipe written in English

Listen here to learn more!

Podcast: Thanksgiving!

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Something to put on while you’re doing the cookin’.

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Sarah tells you the real history of Thanksgiving, with historic recipes and the stories behind your favorite side dishes! Soma’s gonna help you cook your turkey right! Plus: why you should serve eels this year, and what’s spatchcock?

Podcast: Cocktails! The Blue Blazer, Shaken not Stirred, and More!

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It’s our off month for our live Masters of Social Gastronomy event, so I bring you our latest podcast! It’s all about the history and science of cocktails, and listening to it will make you a better cocktailer: whether you like making ’em, or simply enjoy drinking ’em.

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Podcast: Cooking with Illicit Substances

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One more in the podcast bonanza! Whilst Masters of Social Gastronomy is on our summer break (we’ll be back next month with the history & science of soda) I give you ILLICIT SUBSTANCES.

On this week’s Masters of Social Gastronomy podcast, we’ll look at the culinary world’s experiments with illicit substances.

Let’s get high with the Victorians! From patent medicines to absinthe, Coca-Cola to laughing gas, we’ll look at all the forms of socially acceptable substance abuse during the 19th century.

Later, we’ll fast-forward to modern-day America, and explore the little known true history of the pot brownie. We’ll survey the range of altered-state culinary concoctions and see what both science and chefs have to say about creating the most effective epicurean euphoria.

Podcast: We are SWEET on You: Sugar, HFCS, & Artificial Sweetners

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Hey, hey! Another podcast from MSG! While we’re taking a break from our live shows these summer months, we wanted to give you something to tide your over. This week’s podcast is all about sugar & sweeteners! And we spend a bit of time talking about artist Kara Walker’s piece at the Domino Sugar Factory in Brooklyn. Today is the last day to see it, as well as the factory itself, which is being bulldozed to make way for condos. Get there before it’s gone!

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This time on the Masters of Social Gastronomy podcast, we’re talking about **sugar and artificial sweeteners**

If you’ve ever crossed the Williamsburg Bridge, then you’ve surely noticed the towering structures of the defunct Domino’s Sugar factory. In this month’s MSG we’ll explore Brooklyn in an era when sugar was king, as well as take a behind-the-scenes peek at its modern day inheritor Sweet n’ Low.

But is giving in to our sweet tooth digging our own graves? Let’s break down the science behind the fear of sugar, from carcinogenic artificial sweeteners to the possible perils of that ubiquitous high fructose corn syrup.

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Further Reading: Eat the City: A Tale of the Fishers, Foragers, Butchers, Farmers, Poultry Minders, Sugar Refiners, Cane Cutters, Beekeepers, Winemakers, and Brewers Who Built New York & Sweet and Low: A Family Story.