Эпизоды
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Leyla Kazim visits York, the UK's 'chocolate city', on the centenary of Joseph Rowntree’s death, to find out how the Quaker entrepreneur pioneered both social reform and iconic chocolate brands like Smarties and Kit Kat.
Today, many independent chocolate makers still call York home, as do some of the word's biggest multinational confectionary makers. Leyla Kazim wanders through York Chocolate Festival to trace the city’s unique chocolate heritage and find out what changed when global companies got involved.
As the so-called 'Dubai chocolate' drives a frenzy of demand for filled bars and imitations, Leyla meets a Newcastle chocolate maker with a penchant for wacky flavours and who inspired the original sell-out hit.
Leyla also hears how falling global production and high prices of cocoa could be the end of chocolate as we know it.
Produced by Nina Pullman for BBC Audio in Bristol.
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Baroness Floella Benjamin once said “childhood lasts a lifetime” and our experiences of school dinners can shape how we eat for the rest of our lives. In this edition of The Food Programme Sheila Dillon investigates the importance of those early food memories with the help of Dr Heather Ellis from the School Meals Project. The Project says its aim is to produce the first ever comprehensive history of school meals across the different nations of the United Kingdom The programme makes a trip to the Food Museum in Suffolk to see a landmark exhibition around school food and Sheila pays a visit to a forward-thinking school in West London which bakes its own bread with flour made from the wheat that it grows just outside the school kitchen!
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Robin Markwell
Featuring an archive clip from BBC Breakfast in April 2025 with Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson MPAlso a brief extract from the book The Farmer's Wife: My Life In Days by Helen Rebanks
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Пропущенные эпизоды?
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With the Government pledging to overhaul the way food is sourced for public institutions like hospitals, schools, prisons, and army bases, Sheila Dillon explores how these changes could be implemented and why they are deemed essential by many.
Sheila visits St Peter’s Hospital in Chertsey, Surrey, where chef Raouf Mansour has transformed the canteen for staff and visitors. After bringing the operation in-house post-Covid, the hospital began collaborating with local suppliers to provide fresh, seasonal produce. Raouf emphasises that retraining chefs to prepare nutritious, mezze-style meals has been crucial in encouraging staff to dine at the restaurant. The hospital is also working on plans to revamp patient meals, which are all prepared off-site, by working with smaller local caterers who can better meet some of the specific needs of patients there.
Following her visit, Sheila returns to the studio to discuss whether the changes in Chertsey could signal a broader trend. She is joined by:
Kevin Morgan, Professor of Governance and Development at Cardiff University and author of "Serving the Public: The Good Food Revolution in Schools, Hospitals, and Prisons"Kath Dalmeny, Chief Executive of SustainKatie Palmer from Food Sense Wales, who is working on the Welsh Veg in Schools ProjectDerek Wright from Blackpool Catering Services, which has expanded its school meal provision over the past five years, with on-site chefs and locally sourced produce.
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Natalie Donovan
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The restaurant trade is fickle and can be a "here today, gone tomorrow" business. But a very small number of restaurants seem to have been with us for ever. Dan Saladino explores the secrets of the world's oldest restaurants.
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Sheila Dillon hears the first exclusive readings from a Tudor ‘pamphlet of cheese’ that details the cheesemaking traditions of the 16th century, and reveals how cheese was seen as a nutrient-rich health food - from digestion aid to wound cleaner. Fast-forward to today, and Sheila visits Yorkshire cheesemongers Andy and Kathy Swinscoe to help recreate one of these historic recipes by hand in their dairy, as they discuss the significance of cheese history and how milk and cheese have a ’terroir’ just like wine.
While the Tudors believed cheese was inherently good for you, modern-day science is still exploring the evidence. Now, cheese scientists are producing ground-breaking research investigating links between cheese and the health of our hearts and gut microbiome. But making cheese today is a tough job, from complying with food safety rules to the challenges of setting up and maintaining a small business. Sheila speaks to renowned cheesemaker Martin Gott to hear the strange tale of how gave up his career in the UK to set up the first ever organic creamery in Oman. Are we losing our cheesemakers just at the point when we’re rediscovering more about its potential health benefits?
Sheila’s journey to find out how our cheese heritage faltered takes her to the Middle East, Japan and finally back to Yorkshire, where a new raw milk cheesemaker sparks hope for the future.
Presented by Sheila Dillon and produced by Nina Pullman for BBC Audio in Bristol.
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Dan Saladino finds out how a family farm in west Cork became one of the world's most influential cookery schools. Featuring Darina and Rachel Allen, Rory O'Connell and JR Ryall.
Produced and presented by Dan Saladino.
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In this second episode from Copenhagen, Sheila Dillon explores why Denmark leads the way in organic food consumption.
In 2023, nearly 12% of all food bought in Denmark was organic—one of the highest levels in the world. In the UK, that figure is just 1.5%.
But how did Denmark get here? And can the organic movement keep growing as the conversation shifts toward climate concerns and plant-based eating?
Sheila meets the people shaping Denmark’s food future, from organic farmers to chefs and researchers. She also asks how does this apparent national embrace of organic food sit alongside Denmark’s industrial farming, including its vast pork industry?
Featuring conversations with:• Trine Hahnemann – Chef, writer, and campaigner• Trine Krebs – Organic farmer and Green Chef at The Food Organisation of Denmark• Prof. Ole Mouritsen – Gastrophysicist researching how to encourage more plant-based eating• Søren Buhl Steiniche – Head chef at EAT, a public kitchen serving Copenhagen’s schools• Heidi Svømmekjær – Copenhagen-based food writer and home cook
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Natalie Donovan
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Restaurant critic and lifelong Charlton Athletic fan Jimi Famurewa finds out how football clubs are upping their game when it comes to serving food for their fans. He’ll taste the world at AFC Wimbledon’s Food Village, hear how Forest Green Rovers went vegan and discover the secret liquor behind Leyton Orient’s pie and mash. Food writers Jack Peat and Daniel Gray pitch in with their thoughts on a world that has moved far beyond Bovril and burnt burgers.
Presented by Jimi FamurewaProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Robin Markwell
The Bovril Song was composed by Roger Jackson and Phil Nicholl and performed by Sing! Cambridge in 2013 Football commentary courtesy of BBC Radio London and BBC Radio Nottingham
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Five years on from the first Covid lockdown Dan Saladino asks if our food supply can withstand more shock to the system? Is there resilience to face another pandemic or even war?
Produced and presented by Dan Saladino.
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Bradford is this year’s UK City of Culture - but what does food have to do with it? Sheila Dillon visits the city to meet market traders, chefs and restaurateurs to find out how its industrial past has influenced the thriving food culture of today.
She visits Bradford’s St James wholesale market to discover how the Asian restaurant trade has been integral to the market’s survival, before eating breakfast at The Sweet Centre, which serves the same Kashmiri breakfast speciality as it did for millworkers in the 60s. Two food projects are harnessing the vibrant multicultural nature of Bradford as part of its City of Culture celebrations. The Bradford Selection, orchestrated by artists Sonia Sandhu and Harry Jelley, tells the stories of Bradford communities through a series of biscuits. Meet My Mothers is a recipe book project representing the diverse food cultures in Bradford, as participant coordinator Aamta Waheed tells Sheila at the Women Zone community centre.
Renowned Yorkshire food historian Peter Brears meets Sheila for a tea and some traditional pork ‘savoury duck’ to talk about pre-industrial food of the Bradford district. Meanwhile, on BBC One, Harry Virdee is the eponymous detective star of thriller series Virdee, written by Bradford native A.A.Dhand. Sheila speaks to the bestselling author to find out how he wrote specific south Asian food and drink traditions into the series and his own childhood food memories of growing up in the city.
How important is the city’s food history, economics and culture to its hopes for regeneration? Shanaz Gulzar, creative director of Bradford 2025, summarises the city’s belief in food as social cohesion and the confidence that the city feels after winning the title.
Presenter: Sheila Dillon Producer: Nina Pullman
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Sheila Dillon joins diners eating together in Manchester and Copenhagen, and hears why some think we should be making more time in the UK for eating communally.
During World War II, British Restaurants provided nutritious, affordable meals across the UK. Endorsed by Winston Churchill, they ensured good food was accessible to all. Now, some believe this model should return.
Professor Bryce Evans from Liverpool Hope University explains why reviving communal dining could help tackle today’s cost-of-living crisis. In Manchester, we hear from "The Manc Kitchen" - a pilot inspired by MP Ian Byrne’s "Scouse Kitchen" and his "Right to Food" campaign. Similar initiatives are emerging across the UK.
Sheila Dillon travels to Copenhagen, "the capital of communal dining," to see how the Danes have embraced eating together. She visits Absalon, a repurposed church where 200 people dine each night, and Grønne Eng (Green Meadows), a co-housing community where 190 residents cook and share meals communally four times a week. Even in workplaces, communal dining is the norm—Sheila eats with a team of architects at a long table.
Food writer Heidi Svømmekjær explains how Denmark’s long, dark winters have shaped this culture, making shared meals a way to foster warmth and connection.
With food insecurity and loneliness on the rise, Sheila asks if communal restaurants be a solution?
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Natalie Donovan
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Two of the country's largest wholesale markets are on the brink of closure. The City of London Corporation has decided to shut the historic meat market at Smithfield and the fish market at Billingsgate, bringing to an end centuries of food history. Sheila Dillon is given a tour of Smithfield market by the historian Matthew Green who describes how Smithfield features in the work of Charles Dickens and was once described as the "kitchen of the universe" by the writer Ned Ward in 1702.
The programme hears from the Smithfield traders who work through the night butchering and selling meat to restaurants and shops across London, the South East of England and beyond.
There has been considerable opposition to the closure of the markets. More than 37,000 people have signed a petition asking the City of London Corporation to keep the markets where they are including Alicia Weston who we meet at Ridley Road street market in East London. Here fishmongers are concerned about where they will source their supplies if Billingsgate closes. The City of London Corporation chairman Chris Hayward responds.
Finally, the author of Hungry City Carolyn Steel and Professor Tim Lang from City University reflect on the importance of wholesale markets in strengthening food supply chains as well as their contribution to the social and cultural fabric of a place.
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Robin Markwell
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It's a term used by the smallest farmers and the world's biggest food businesses. But what does 'regenerative agriculture' mean?
Produced and presented by Dan Saladino.
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Sheila Dillon revisits the idea of our grannies’ cooking and how it shapes us, hearing from listeners who sent in their own stories. Why does learning to cook from your granny seem to be such a powerful experience? What about those grannies who leapt at the chance technology offered to escape the endless cycle of cooking from scratch? And – for those of us who feel we’re relying too much on processed food - can we find a granny substitute to help us put down the takeaway menu and pick up a peeler?
Guests include:Dr Polly Russell - food historianAlicia Weston - founder of Bags of TasteSophie Beckett - Public Health Research Officer at Birmingham Museums TrustJonny Murphy "The Hungry Hooker"
We'd like to thank all of the listeners who wrote in to us following the broadcast of the programme "Nan the Wiser", but we'd like to say a special thanks to Matthew, Lynn, Mary, Tony, Marie, Peter, Rob and Giselle.
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Beth Sagar-Fenton. The Assistant Producer was Jo Peacey.
Archive from Birmingham's Food and Drink Oral Histories Project:Interviewee: Doris Evans, 1984. From the City Sound Archive, courtesy of Birmingham Museums TrustInterviewee: John Baker, 1984. From the City Sound Archive, courtesy of Birmingham Museums Trust
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It's 2025, and the same old questions are still being asked about food and health—how do we get people eating better, reduce obesity, improve health, and ease pressure on the NHS? Despite decades of policies and campaigns, the challenge remains. In this episode, Sheila Dillon is joined in the studio by three people whose work is dedicated to finding answers: Dr Dolly Van Tulleken, a visiting researcher at Cambridge University's MRC Epidemiology Unit, who has examined UK government obesity policy, documenting its repeated failures and interviewed several leaders about what can be learned from them; Anna Taylor, head of the Food Foundation, whose organisation has been researching the impact of poor diets, particularly on those living in poverty; and Ben Reynolds, formerly of Sustain, where he played a key role in some of the most successful food campaigns and is now working on food and farming policy across Europe as Executive Director of the Institute for European Environmental Policy.
Also featured are Henry Dimbleby, author of The National Food Strategy; Welsh food historian Carwyn Graves; and two Food Ambassadors for The Food Foundation Dominic Watters and Magda Rechnio.
Together, they discuss what’s gone wrong, what’s worked, and, as the new government announces plans for a fresh food strategy, what must be put in place to ensure it delivers real change.
Presented by Sheila DillonProduced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Natalie Donovan
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What's behind the rise and rise of low alcohol and alcohol free drinks? The sector grew by a quarter last year alone, fuelled by our changing relationship with alcohol. More than fifteen million people are thought to have considered taking part in Dry January this year and younger drinkers in particular are turning away from alcohol and embracing alcohol-free versions of beer, wine and spirits or entirely new drinks coming onto the market.
In this programme Jaega Wise considers the changes in the drinks industry. She eavesdrops on an alcohol-free workshop with the mindful drinking movement Club Soda and speaks to its founder Laura Willoughby. She hears from the alcohol-free beer brand Lucky Saint and the market research company Kam on our changing drinking patterns, including the trend for zebra-striping - alternating between alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks.
Then Jaega visits Bristol to find out how breweries are using different techniques to make alcohol-free beer that is far superior to the much-derided watery and flavourless versions of old. The Bristol Beer Factory tells her that their alcohol-free brand now makes up a fifth of sales. At Wiper & True nearby, they reckon within five years around half of all their beers will be alcohol-free.
The movement towards "low and no" drinks means there is now a World Alcohol Free Awards as their co-founder Chrissie Parkinson explains and Dash Lilley from the Three Spirit brand talks about how some drinks makers are looking to very different ingredients from the plant world to create original flavours.
Presented by Jaega WiseProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Robin Markwell
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Want to lose weight? How much can you achieve through exercise? Dan Saladino investigates with the help of Mike Keen, a chef and Arctic explorer.
Mike has had numerous adventures in Greenland, including kayaking thousands of miles, and sometimes doing nothing at all. What happened to his weight on this trips has left him puzzled.
They enlist the help three experts, Chris Van Tulleken, author of Ultra Processed People; Nigel Smith of the UK Sports Institute and Andrew Jenkinson, surgeon and author of Why We Eat too Much and How to Eat.
Produced and presented by Dan Saladino.
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Emulsifiers are among the most common food additives found in ultra-processed foods (UPFs), a much-discussed category of foods commonly defined as those made using manufactured ingredients. They are often packaged and have a long shelf life. Research examining the impact of diets high in UPFs suggests higher rates of obesity and diseases such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.
However, discussions about labeling these foods as "ultra-processed" have also sparked debates about whether their negative effects are primarily due to their high fat, sugar, and salt content, or whether they stem from the effects of processing itself, particularly the additives they contain.
In this episode, Jaega Wise explores one of the most commonly used additives in UPFs—emulsifiers. She investigates how they work, what they do, their history, associated health concerns, and their potential future developments.
Featuring: Nicola Lando and Ross Brown from the online specialty cooking supplies company Sous Chef; Tim Spector, professor of epidemiology at King’s College London and co-founder of the personalized health app Zoe; food historian Annie Gray; John Ruff, Chief Science Advisor at the Institute of Food Technologists; Professor Barry Smith at the University of London’s Centre for the Study of the Senses; Professor Anwesha Sarkar, an expert in colloids and surfaces at Leeds University’s School of Food Science and Nutrition; and Dr. Benoit Chassaing, a research director at The Institut Pasteur in Paris, who studies microbiota and the health impacts of certain emulsifiers.
Presented by Jaega WiseProduced in Bristol for BBC Audio by Natalie Donovan
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How will Artificial Intelligence (AI) transform the food industry? Experts say it's already having an effect - whether through self-service checkouts or the algorithms that determine which recipes you see online or the way supermarkets are using it to predict the next big food trend.
Jaega Wise heads to the Waitrose Headquarters in Berkshire to find out how their product development team is using AI to inform which ingredients they stock on the shelves. She also talks to the firm Tastewise which makes software that calculates food trends by analysing social media and online menus.
A restaurant in Glasgow is already using embodied AI in the form of robots which serve their customers. Jaega witnesses the robots in action and finds diners are divided over their use. She also talks to consumer affairs journalist Harry Wallop about how supermarkets use our data and the futurist Tracey Follows who gives us her take on what might happen next in the world of AI. Jaega also hears the tipped top food trends for 2025.
Presented by Jaega WiseProduced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Robin Markwell
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In the year 2000 there were barely any food banks in the UK but today there are nearly three thousand. So what's behind the sharp rise and how did it get to a point where the government says we have "a mass dependence" on food banks?
In this episode Jaega Wise tells the story of the food bank. She hears from those using the Bristol North West food bank. They talk openly about how the food bank helped turn their lives around. She also visits a "social supermarket" in south London where people on benefits are able to shop from donated stock cheaply.
Dr Andy Williams from Cardiff University discusses how the food bank model was imported from the United States where it had its roots in the Great Depression and Emma Revie of the Trussell Trust gives her view on why there has been such a surge in food bank usage.
Jaega also visits Middlesbrough where the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown is opening a "Multibank" - these are warehouses full of donated stock that includes food and other household goods. Gordon Brown talks about his ambition to open Multibanks all over the country to tackle the growing problem of food insecurity.
Presented by Jaega WiseProduced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Robin Markwell
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