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BBC World Service


The Food Chain examines the business, science and cultural significance of food, and what it takes to put food on your plate.


The Food Chain

What should runners should eat to train for, and complete, a marathon? 
 
With major races like the London and Boston marathons approaching, more people than ever are taking on the 26.2-mile challenge. But what should you actually eat to fuel that distance? 
 
Ruth Alexander is joined by one of the most successful marathon runners in history, Paula Radcliffe, who held the women’s world record for 16 years. She shares what it takes to fuel months of marathon training, and what it feels like when things go wrong during a race. 
 
Also on the programme is former world champion runner Steve Cram, now a coach and commentator, who explains the common nutrition mistakes he sees among recreational runners. 
 
And Performance Director of the dsm-firmenich Running Team, Valentijn Trouw tells us what it’s like to oversee the performance programmes of elite athletes including marathon legend Eliud Kipchoge. 
 
Ruth asks them what runners should fuel their training, what to eat in the crucial days before a race, and how to avoid “hitting the wall” on marathon day. 
 
If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk 
 
Produced by Izzy Greenfield. 
Sound Engineer: Annie Gardiner
Picture: Credit - Getty. Paula Radcliffe competes in a marathon

What to eat to run a marathon

Ruth Alexander meets three people who gave up well-paid, high-flying careers to start all over again in the world of food. 

Nisha Katona left a career as a child protection barrister behind to start Mowgli, a chain of Indian restaurants in the UK, physically building her first restaurants herself. 

Judy Joo worked in finance on Wall Street but decided to give it up to go to culinary school. After starting at the bottom in various restaurant kitchens she founded the Korean restaurant chain Seoul Bird, which has outlets in the UK and the US. 

Duc Ngo was an engineer who felt he lacked purpose and joy. So he left his job to start a sandwich shop in Helsinki. But it wasn’t easy. He took to Tiktok to document its rise, fall and rebirth as a bistro, The Alley. 

So did they all make the right decision and would they change anything? Ruth finds out... 

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk 

Produced by Lexy O'Connor. 

Sound Engineer: Annie Gardiner 

Image: A smiling woman is behind a cafe door. She is turning the “closed” sign to “open”. Credit MoMo Productions/Getty images.

Giving it all up for food

Shattering the myth of its aristocratic origins and exploring some of the boldest creations; Ruth Alexander finds out about the history, culture and family ties wrapped up in the sandwich. 

Josh Veasey, co-owner of Rack in North West England talks about his menu’s hits and misses and what it’s like to make a living out of making sandwiches. 

The fourth Earl of Sandwich John Montagu is popularly credited with coming up with the idea of putting a tasty filling between two slices of bread; food historian Dr Annie Gray reveals the facts of the matter. 

Masterchef Australia finalist and food writer Samira el Khafir talks about some of her favourite Middle Eastern wraps, enduring staples in the region and far beyond. 

Ruth discusses the changing fashions for fillings with Barry Enderwick, the California-based creator of the social media channel, Sandwiches of History. 

And Ozoz Sokoh, author of Chop Chop: Cooking the Food of Nigeria, reflects on how the sandwiches of her childhood were shaped by a long history of enslavement and British colonial rule. 

Producers: Julia Paul & Lexy O’Connor 
Sound engineer: Hal Haines
Editor: Sara Wadeson 

(Phoro: A smiling dark haired woman holds up a sandwich with a bite taken out of it. Credit: Farkot Architect/Getty Images)

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk

The story of the sandwich

From Michelin starred kitchens to Hong Kong’s high rise tower blocks, via informal settlements in the Kenyan capital Nairobi. Ruth Alexander hears from people making the best out of the cramped and tiny spaces they’re cooking in. 

Gina Lai shows her around the kitchen in her cramped Hong Kong high rise flat and Ruth visits chef Ryan Blackburn who has retained a Michelin star whilst cooking out of the tinest of professional kitchens in Northern England. 

Plus Leah and her daughter Janice explain how they cook family meals in an informal settlement in the Kenyan capital Nairobi and AJ Forget describes what it's like to give up a big kitchen for a new life on the road, living and cooking in a converted bus. 

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk

Produced by Izzy Greenfield, Rumella Dasgupta and Lexy O'Connor

Image Description: Gina Lai is cooking in her tiny Hong Kong flat. (Credit Gina Lai/BBC)

Small kitchens

Every food company starts with a gamble - and not all of them pay off. In this episode Ruth Alexander speaks to business owners about the risks they’ve taken to get where they are today, from financial leaps to personal sacrifices, and the painful decisions that have shaped their journeys. 

Ruth hears from Kim Kiarie, chef-owner of Five Senses Nairobi in Kenya, about building a high-end restaurant in a challenging market. Adonis Norouznia, who runs Nomas Gastrobar in Macclesfield in North-West England, on the risks of deciding to serve meat at his vegan restaurant, and Keith Bearden, CEO and co-owner of Alta Eco Foods in Houston, Texas, about scaling a food business in a competitive industry. 

They describe the compromises that cost them dearly, the moments they wondered whether it was all worth it, and what kept them going. 
 
Produced by Izzy Greenfield

Image description: A foot comes down amidst a cartoon landscape of bright yellow banana skins. Credit Getty.

The risk takers

We all have recipes we turn to again and again, perhaps from the stained pages of our favourite cookbooks, or handed down through families. But have you ever wondered about the work that’s gone into writing that set of instructions? In this edition of The Food Chain, Ruth Alexander looks at the art and science of recipe writing. 

How does a cook turn what is often an instinctive and creative process into a list of instructions anyone can follow? How much detail is too much, and what are the essential elements no recipe is complete without? Ruth talks to a well-known cook who describes her love-hate relationship with recipe writing and a cookbook editor reveals how she’s built recipes from chefs’ doodles or even notes scrawled on a napkin. Find out what it’s like to work in the world of recipe testing and how the art of writing recipes has changed over hundreds of years. 

Producer: Lexy O’Connor 

Sound engineer: Hal Haines 

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk

How to write a recipe

Most of us have foods we refuse to eat - think coriander, or maybe olives. But where do those strong dislikes come from, and is it possible to change them?

In this episode of The Food Chain, Ruth Alexander sets out to find out whether you really can learn to love the foods you hate. From first encounters that go wrong to memories that linger, she explores why food preferences can feel so fixed, and whether anything might help shift them.

Ruth speaks to neuroscientist Dr Dana Small, professor and Canada Excellence Research Chair at McGill University, about what’s happening in the brain and body when we eat, and how unconscious reward signals shape what we come to like or avoid.

She also hears from psychologist Dr Rachel Herz, an expert on the science of smell and author of Why We Eat What We Eat, about the powerful role odour, memory and emotion play in food dislike, often before we’re even aware of it.

And registered dietitian Clare Thornton-Wood shares practical, low-pressure techniques used with both children and adults to build tolerance - and sometimes even enjoyment - for foods they can’t stand.

Producer: Izzy Greenfield
Sound engineer: Annie Gardiner
Picture: A woman holding a fork with a piece of broccoli in front of her, looking unsure (credit: Getty)

Can you learn to love the foods you hate?

Fermented foods are fashionable – kimchi, kefir, kombucha – they're all having a moment, many thousands of years on from where they were first produced. But how much do you know about how they're made? Do you know your SCOBY from your kefir grain? 

In this episode, fermenting novice Ruth Alexander goes on a quest to find out more about this ancient way of preserving food; how to do it yourself, why you might want to, and what it's doing for our guts.

Follow along as she experiments with making her own kefir, and talks to fermentation guru Sandor Katz about how to get started and whether there's anything that can't be fermented. 

Scientist Professor Gabriel Vinderola explains what's known about the microbes behind it all and how they affect our health while Kheedim Oh and his mum Myung Oh talk about how they've brought the family recipe for kimchi to a US audience via their business, Mama O's Kimchi. (Kimchi on pizza anyone?) 

And with the help of Adam Goldwater from UK based Loving Foods Fermented, Ruth discovers how kombucha is made, and the alien like SCOBY powering the process. 

Produced by Lexy O'Connor. The sound engineer was Andrew Mills.

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk. 

Image: A woman in an apron is holding a jar of brightly coloured fermenting vegetables, with orange carrots and purple cabbage tightly packed in. Credit Getty/Migrogen

Fermented foods: A beginner's guide

Meal kits have become a familiar part of food shopping in many countries, offering pre-portioned ingredients and recipes delivered to the door. But how widespread are they, and what do they reveal about how people are eating today?

Ruth Alexander hears from Philip Doran, CEO of HelloFresh UK and Ireland, and Sarah Hewitt, CEO of South African meal kit company UCOOK, about how these services operate in very different markets.

She also speaks to Dr Rebecca Bennett, a food systems researcher, about what meal kits say about changing cooking habits and online food platforms, and to market analyst Nandini Roy on how big the global meal kit industry is and where future growth may come from.

Producer: Izzy Greenfield
Sound engineer: Hal Haines

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk

Image: A woman unpacks a box full of food (credit: Getty Images)

Dinner unboxed

The Mediterranean diet is rich in vegetables, pulses and olive oil and traditionally includes small amounts of fish and very little red meat. Thousands of studies back its health benefits. In fact, it's considered to be one of the most widely researched diets in the world. But why has this way of eating come to prominence over others? 

Marta Guasch-Ferre from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark explains what the Mediterranean diet is and how her Spanish roots have informed her work. 

Professor Sarah Tracy from the University of Oklahoma tells the story of the diet's roots, popularised by American scientist Ancel Keys in the 1950's. 

And Ruth asks, if this way of eating isn't familiar in your culture, can you still make use of the Mediterranean diet's principles to improve your health? Singapore based cardiologist Professor Huang Zijuan has been looking at the science behind Asian inspired food swaps that could offer the same health benefits. 

Plus public health expert Professor Pekka Puska explains how he used the work of Ancel Keys in the 1970's to help transform the life expectancy of Finnish men. He co-led the now world famous North Karelia project, after Keys' research revealed how the region in eastern Finland had the highest rates of blood cholesterol in the world. 

Produced by Lexy O’Connor 

The sound engineer was Andrew Mills. 

If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk 

Image: A family is eating together. The wooden table is covered in brightly coloured plates of salads, pastas and olives. Hands reach over to take some of the food. (Credit: Getty/Compassionate Eye Foundation/Natasha Alipour Faridani)

Should we all eat the Mediterranean way?

Ahead of the French national elections, we’re looking at the food and politics of a country that for many is the epicentre of gastronomic excellence, with a tradition stretching back hundreds of years. Some see this crucial ingredient of the country's national identity being nibbled away by global competition.

We talk to French chefs, producers and historians about what the state of French food tells us about the state of French politics. To understand a changing France, do you need to understand the changing French meal?

We’ll be exploring the earliest origins of French cuisine, the foundations of the word ‘gastronomy’ and the advent of 'gastronationalism'.

(Photo: Man holding bowl of croissants. Credit: Getty Images)

Liberte, Egalite, Gastronomie?

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