The Food Programme

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Can Food Save the High Street? Jul 09, 2012

Show notes

Sheila Dillon asks if food is the key to reviving the Britain' declining high streets. Food expert, Henrietta Green visits Croydon town centre which has just been awarded a grant by retail guru,Mary Portas to see if a radical food future is possible and asks what are the barriers to bringing quality food back to our high streets.

Producer: Maggie Ayre.

The Future of the Cookbook Jul 02, 2012

Show notes

With digital publishing evolving at a blistering pace, Sheila Dillon investigates the future of the printed cookery book.

Andrew Webb is a food journalist whose work spans the online and printed worlds. He is the author of 'Food Britannia', which just scooped the Guild of Food Writers award for Food Book of the Year, and also edits a food website. To find out where things are moving in the world of the food book, The Food Programme sent him to meet five key players in the world of food, books and publishing.

Antony Topping is a literary agent, whose clients include Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Thomasina Miers. Mary-Clare Jerram is a Publishing Director at Dorling Kindersley, looking after both digital and print editions. Ian Malone runs a company specialising in food apps for phones and tablets.

Andrew also meets Dr Peter Ross, Principal Librarian at the Guildhall Library, home to the largest collection of food books in any UK public library - and lastly, Hardeep Singh Kohli is a broadcaster, author and is passionate about food.

Sheila is joined in the studio by Neill Denny, Editor-in-Chief of the book industry magazine 'The Bookseller', Kerstin Rodgers - aka MsMarmitelover - food blogger and pop-up restaurant pioneer, and Ben Ebbrell, who cooks and presents on the Sorted food site.

Producer: Rich Ward.

The Olympic Menu Jun 25, 2012

Show notes

Sheila Dillon meets Jan Matthews head of the UK's biggest catering job, organising food for the Olympics, London 2012 to ask how successful she's been with the "Olympic Food Vision" that promised to showcase the best of British food.

She also meets the Chair of London Food, Rosie Boycott to hear the latest on the city's growing initiative that aims to be part of the Olympic food legacy.

Producer: Maggie Ayre.

The Best in Food and Farming Jun 18, 2012

Show notes

In this special programme Sheila Dillon launches the search for this year's winners of the BBC Food & Farming Awards.

Sheila is joined by Michelin-starred chef Angela Hartnett to catch up with some of the recent winners and nominees. With insights from last year's winners of the Best Food Producer award - Loch Arthur Creamery - to the Best Market - Bolton - we hear why the awards make a real difference.

Valentine Warner and Pete Brown, both new to the judging team this year, give their take on the Drinks Producer and Market categories, and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, also a winner in 2011, explains why these awards really do matter.

Producer: Rich Ward.

Tasting tomatoes Jun 11, 2012

Show notes

Sheila Dillon explores the world of the modern British tomato. Great improvements have been made in variety, flavour and quality over the last decade thanks to some technological breakthroughs including computer controlled glasshouses and use of micro-environments, green energy and smart water use.

Now many more varieties can be trialled, grown and marketed in the UK. But with the emphasis on quality and flavour rather than quantity, can they ever compete with Spanish imports?

Producer: Maggie Ayre.

Wine Trends Jun 04, 2012

Show notes

Simon Parkes reports from the London International Wine fair to discover the latest trends in the wine industry.

Simon meets wine producers from emerging wine producing countries such as India and Brazil to taste the wines that could soon be hitting the supermarket shelves in the UK. He also samples wines with a lower alcohol strength to discover if it is possible to produce wines that taste good without the high levels of alcohol.

The Food Programme also reports on two smaller festivals focussing on 'natural wine': wines made with a minimum of chemical input to find out whether natural wines are now becoming more established in the UK wine market.

Presenter: Simon Parkes Producer: Martin Poyntz-Roberts

Breakfast May 27, 2012

Show notes

Tim Hayward offers his reflections on the past, present and future of the British breakfast. Has the first meal of the day become a problem to solve rather than a pleasure?

Joined by food writer and breakfast historian Seb Emina, Tim finds out how the great British breakfast became the envy of the world. With its origins dating back to aristocratic Edwardian country houses, the cooked breakfast spread through the chop houses of working class London and beyond.

But with the huge amount of breakfast choices now available and our increasingly busy lives, eating breakfast has become an increasingly diverse and fragmented food experience.

For some breakfast is an exercise in "grab-and-go" and indulging in more of a "desk-fast" than a meal, but there are some other interesting trends underway; sales of the big name cereal brands have been falling, porridge sales have been making something of a comeback. For an insight into this trend, Tim meets Nick Barnard of Rude Health, one of the more recent players on the breakfast scene competing for our morning appetite.

With the help of food writer Anna Berrill, Tim finds out how, for some, the traditional breakfast is becoming more of a whole social occasion. Writer and comedian Chris Neill explains his own personal problem with breakfast and we learn how the so called "third wave" coffee scene is a growing influence on our mornings.

Producer: George Casey.

The Life of Pie May 21, 2012

Show notes

For many years the symbol of stodgy service station fare, the humble pie is enjoying a renaissance as chefs and public alike discover the joys of a lovingly made pastry containing top quality ingredients.

The Food Programme meets piemakers and connoisseurs at the annual British Pie Awards and hears why top chefs and food writers are extolling the virtues of the pie

Producer: Maggie Ayre.

A Soya Bean Future? May 14, 2012

Show notes

What's the future for one of the world's most successful and controversial crops, soya? It has become one of the main ingredients in feed for livestock, so crucial in meat production, and it's a major source of edible oil used in food processing and cooking, but have we become too dependent on the soya bean?

This year supplies of soya have tightened and the world price is approaching a record high. Because it's so widely used it has become a powerful trigger for food price inflation. For this reason, the food industry is now looking for alternative sources of protein.

The rise of the soya bean in the west has been a relatively recent development. Its history as a food crop in south east Asia goes back 5000 years as an ingredient for traditional foods like tofu, soya sauce, Tempe and soya milk. Then, in the 1930's, technology was developed in the United States that allowed the protein and oil in the soya bean to be extracted on a large scale.

From that point on it has become one of the most important and widely used ingredients in our food supply. In the last fifteen years alone, the global soya crop has doubled, most of which can be found in north America, Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay.

If world demand increases where will these new supplies of the soya bean come from? Dan Saladino reports on the latest trends.

Seaweed, a Forgotten Food? May 08, 2012

Show notes

Despite a long history of use in coastal areas of the British Isles, and with a well-established role in folklore and traditional medicine - seaweed is not an ingredient currently found in many British kitchen cupboards.

The raw ingredient is something of an acquired taste, and knowledge of different seaweeds and their uses is not widespread. However, as Sheila Dillon discovers in this edition of The Food Programme, things are starting to change.

In food cultures such Japan's, seaweeds have long been an important and treasured food. Through the work of people such as Prannie Rhatigan, author of Irish Seaweed Kitchen, people are starting to rediscover how to cook and utilise seaweeds and are looking again out to sea.

With a rise in scientific interest into the unique compounds within seaweeds, appreciation of its unique flavour properties, and trials of its uses as a food fortificant, Sheila asks if seaweed is a food of the future?

Producer: Rich Ward.

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