It's More Than Food
Summer Readings
This week on It's More Than Food, we meet with four amazing authors, each who are all here to talk about their latest summer readings, focusing on the importance of personally reconnecting with food and how we can each go about doing so. Together with host Michel Nischan, and Head of Readers' Advisory at Darien Library Stephanie Anderson, today's guests look through the lens of 5 subjects: heritage/ancestry, cooking, familial relationships, growing food, and health. The three books discussed include, Jane Ziegelman's "97 Orchard: An Edible History of Five Immigrant Families in One New York Tenement", Beth Nguyen's "Stealing Buddha's Dinner: A Memoir", and Michael Moss' "Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us." First, Michael updates us on the story of the processed food industry, and explains its link to the emerging obesity epidemic. Next, Beth Nguyen talks about her book, a vivid, funny, and viscerally powerful memoir about childhood, assimilation, food, and growing up in the 1980s. Lastly, Jane Ziegelman pulls us into the story about five families of various ethnicities living at the turn of the twentieth century in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and an investigation of their lives and culinary habits - shopping, cooking, and eating. Looking for a new and inspiring book to pickup? Tune-in to learn more from the authors today!
"What we're trying to do is gain control over processed foods, rather than them taking control over us." [20:05]
-- Michael Moss on It's More Than Food
"There's a power to cooking food, and there's a power to feeding people." [43:10]
-- Jane Ziegelman on It's More Than Food
"Reading a physical book can be very powerful, especially for a parent and his or her children." [46:05]
-- Stephanie Anderson on It's More Than Food
"Everything is always about the desire to get the food just right." [49:03]
-- Beth Nguyen on It's More Than Food