140: Recovering from Restrictive Online Diet Myths with Dr. Sarah Ballantyne

This week, Julia Skinner is back to talk about what shapes food security can take, beyond the academic metrics we're used to. Julia is a former librarian and Library Science PhD turned food historian and fermentation expert. She is the author of the award-winning book Our Fermented Lives: A History of How Fermented Foods Have Shapes Cultures & Communities. She also runs workshops, events, and a newsletter through Root, which was born from a deep love for community and a belief in the power of food to tell stories, connect us to place, and build a bridge to the past. She's on the show today to talk about some of the themes in her new cookbook, Essential Food Preserving: The Comprehensive Guide to Canning, Freezing, Drying, and Fermenting Vegetables, Fruits, Grains, Nuts, Beans, Meat, Dairy, and Eggs. In today's conversation, we explore the differences between fermentation and preserving, the ways that people with limited kitchen space or budget can integrate food preservation into their routines, why practices such as canning fell out of favour after WWII, and why we need to stop thinking about food preservation as a doomsday bunker strategy, but rather a practice of community. Resources: Website: https://root-kitchens.com/

When looking at a cookbook, how often do you stop to consider its structure, language, and cultural influences when thinking about how the narrative of recipes is presented? It's easy to overlook how powerful the overarching Western perspectives are in shaping cookbook storytelling, thinking though sections focused on breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, and then dessert. But for many cultures, that's not as relevant or applicable to their culinary heritages. My guest this week, Afia Amoako, unpacks some of these overlooked considerations in conversation today. Afia runs Eat with Afia (@eatwithafia), a social media platform where she highlights Ghanaian food through culture, history, and tradition. With her platform, Afia tries to underscore the diversity of culinary traditions as a product of centuries of meticulous food science, agriculture, and understanding of the land. Outside of her blog, Afia Amoako earned her doctorate in Epidemiology and is passionate about the social context of health. She recently released her first cookbook, Eat with Afia: A Celebration of Plant-Based Ghanaian Cooking, which is as gorgeous as it is comprehensive and rigorous. In today's conversation, Afia explores how she maintained her cultural roots with Ghanaian cuisines during her transition to plant-based eating, the importance of highlighting diverse and indigenous Ghanaian plant-based foods, the role of fermentation in Ghanaian cooking extending beyond a preservation method, and how she navigated the Western notions of categorization in cookbook development that do not fit the diverse Ghanaian modes of eating. Resources: Instagram: @eatwithafia Cookbook: Eat with Afia Newsletter: https://eatwithafia.substack.com/ Website: https://eatwithafia.com/ Mauril links to the app & website : Download on iOS | Download on Android | mauril.ca This collaboration is part of an advertising campaign managed by the agency Podpass for Mauril, developed by CBC/Radio-Canada.

Wellness as both a culture and industry tend to visually skew more feminine—or at least the critiques and cultural assessments of it do. In some ways, this also leads to a superficial exploration of why people feel compelled to choose wellness alternatives, be it supplements or injections or beauty products. But there's more nuance needed, especially given how wellness influencers and media advocating for masculinity through magical, mystical, foreign products. What exactly goes into these cure-alls, and what consequences does it have globally? My guest today, Adam Popescu, explores these themes through his reporting and writing. Adam is a journalist and author who writes about power and our changing world, often exploring the impacts of business on biodiversity, and commerce on culture and climate. He's here today to unpack some of the fascinating work he did for Bloomberg Business on shilajit, a supplement that has recently been favourited by the likes of MAHA proponents and Joe Rogan, but its sourcing has become contentious for many reasons. In today's conversation, Adam talks about the traditional uses of shilajit, and how its been commodified to fit the wellness industry, explores the dynamic between power and masculinity and how it plays out in wellness superfoods, the issues surrounding sourcing shilajit from the Himalayas and what the end products in the West get cut with, and the complexities of whether or not shilajit can be sustainably sourced. Resources: Adam's article in Bloomberg Business on shilajit Adam's website: https://www.adampopescu.com/ Adam is leading a wildlife writing retreat next May in the Indian Himalayas with the writers Deepa Anappara, Jonathan Miles, and Kullu Suryawanshi. Basic setup is half the day we look for wildlife and the other half is writing focused with lessons covering fiction, non-fiction and memoir and nature writing. Email him for more here: [email protected]

Scroll through social media these days, and you can easily get hit with a wave of overwhelming expectations around what you should be eating, how much you should be eating, how meals should be plated and styled perfectly for internet audiences, all while trying to make a living and stay afloat. But what happens if we pause from these narratives, and reframe our cooking experiences? Today's guest, Sonali Menezes, explores just that with me today. Sonali is an artist, zinester, and writer. She lives in Hamilton, Ontario with her husband, cat, and houseplants. She loves food, and eats it every day in celebration. Her first book, Depression Cooking: Feeding Yourself When It All Feels Too Hard, is out officially as of today through ECW Press. In today's conversation, Sonali explores what it means to depression cook and how she structures her recipes to maintain accessibility for those navigating mental health, disabilities, and challenging phases of life, how messages around appetite and hunger in her younger years living in Scarborough and North York informed her anti-diet and approachable writing and recipe-crafting, how the art world she came up in understands eating (or not eating) and its relationship to her illustrations, and establishing gentler relationships with eating and cooking. Resources: Instagram: @sonaleeeeeee Depression Cooking book

Industrialization has undoubtedly and profoundly shifted our relationship with food globally, and it can be hard to remember the work being done outside of commercialized growing to remain connected to the land through vegetables. What stories are held in the diversity of vegetable species across the globe? Today's guest, Ali Francis, is here to explore their fascinating and curious lives! Ali is an Australian-born journalist and former Bon Appétit reporter living in Salt Lake City, Utah. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic, The Cut, BBC, The Guardian, TASTE, and other publications. She's the co-founder of Best Food Blog, a journalist-owned publication about eating. Ali also writes Anyway!, a newsletter about building meaningful lives in these bizarre modern times. Her first book, The Curious Lives of Vegetables: An Artful Exploration of the Wonderful World of Edible Plants, Their History, and Their Crucial Role in Our Future is out now, and is a wild quest to uncover the stories we don't usually hear about plants. In today's conversation, Ali touches on how her and the book's artist Adriana Picker tackled such an immense and robust task of sharing plant narratives through writing and gorgeous illustrations, what factors have contributed to the declining biodiversity of vegetables in the world, how colonial naming conventions shaped our relationship to vegetable varieties, and the important role that seed savers play in building more vibrant, flavourful futures. Resources: Ali's Website