Bite

By all accounts, 2016 was a bleak year—except when it came to cookbooks. This year bore such a bumper crop of cookbooks that Bite host Tom Philpott had trouble choosing his favorites. After careful consideration, he’s come up with five that make perfect gifts for the home chefs in your life—including one that features a cuisine that you’re unlikely to find even in restaurants. Then, keeping on the book theme, Tom talks about the best books about food politics with author and food activist Anna Lappé.

A question that some people might be asking right now: How can you think about food at a time like this? But actually, food has everything to do with the election of Donald Trump: On this episode, Tom Philpott talks to Tom Colicchio of TV’s Top Chef, about how the mighty food industry is poised to stage a major resistance against some of Trump’s policies. One giant group of people who are wondering what’s in store for them over these next few years is restaurant workers, many of whom are undocumented. We hear from one of them, a waiter in New York City with a complicated immigration status. Also: Jenny talks to the formerly homeless manager of a kitchen at a single room occupancy building about why he voted for Trump.

In this episode, we talk to Sam Kass, who served as the Obamas’ personal chef until early 2015. In addition to whipping up sweet potato fries and other family favorites, Kass directed the First Lady children's health effort Let’s Move!, and served as the senior White House adviser on nutrition policy. Kass tells us about how the Obama administration changed the way Americans eat, as well as his current project: making your fridge smarter. Also: A local bartender whipped up election-night cocktails especially for Bite: the Bad Hombre and the Nasty Woman. Cheers to that.

Nearly every topic you can think of, and many you hoped wouldn’t, have surfaced during the 2016 presidential election. But there’s been almost zero talk by either candidate of the thing that fuels the country: our food system. On today’s episode, Mark Bittman dishes on how the next president might tackle food and agriculture. Bittman is most famous for the Minimalist recipe column he wrote for the New York Times and award-winning cookbooks like How to Cook Everything. He was also the only national newspaper columnist tapped with covering food politics and policy. Also: Tom gives you the low-down on how agribusinesses are spending their campaign money, and Maddie has the scoop on some cooking tips from WikiLeaks.

Manhattan's Chinatown recently made headlines for being the target of an offensive segment on Bill O’Reilly’s Fox News show. Fox missed the real story: the truly special place it occupies in the US food scene. Navigate the narrow, bustling sidewalks Mott Street between Canal and Hester and you'll see food everywhere, from live frogs to whole dragon fruit. What makes culinary Chinatown tick? For answers, we turn on this week's Bite podcast to Valerie Imbruce, author of the new book From Farm to Canal Street. Imbruce argues that Manahttan's Chinatown is a remnant of pre-supermarket New York—and also a viable model for a more tantalizing food future. We also went to San Francisco’s Chinatown to track down the surprising origins of fortune cookies. (Hint: They’re not from China!) And: If you want to spice up a conference panel, invite some angry, chanting vegans. Just ask Tom.

Dine out in any major American city, and you'll notice plenty of restaurants paying tribute to immigrant cuisine: taco stands, Ethiopian joints, Jewish delis, Vietnamese cafés. But there’s one striking omission to this melting pot. "There should be restaurants all over the country showcasing Native American foods,” says our guest Sean Sherman, who goes by the name “the Sioux Chef.” A few years ago, Sherman set out to recreate his ancestors' cuisine, the way it was before Indians were forced onto reservations and frybread became their defining dish. Sherman concocts meals like corn and sumac-seared Walleye and duck and wild rice pemmican, and makes use of foraged plants and native fruits and vegetables. We talked to him about what it was like growing up on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, the history of frybread, and his connection to the Dakota Access Pipeline protest. Also: Kiera and Maddie recap some very weird food news stories, involving drones, gummy candies, and Donald Trump.

Are babies better off on baby food or whole foods? Should they eat all organic? Does a mother’s diet during pregnancy affect her kid’s tastebuds? What’s the deal with alcohol? To try and answer questions like these, parents often have to weigh outdated, loosely researched, or guilt-inducing opinions. Well, today we bring you answers from the authors of The Informed Parent: A Science-Based Resource for Your Child’s First Four Years. Scientists Tara Haelle and Emily Willingham have scoured thousands of studies to come up with up-to-date answers for your trickiest parenting food dilemmas. But even if you don’t plan to have kids, chances are, you like baked goods, right? Don’t miss this episode, because Maddie has a special delivery from the heart of the West.

Tom and Kiera talk to Chef Daniel Patterson about his journey from high-end restaurants to the world of fast food. Jenny checks out an app that connects Silicon Valley's homesick foreign tech workers with food from their homelands, and Kiera wonders: Is it fair to call a soda tax a grocery tax?

Many of the most delectable ingredients, from parmesan cheese to extra-virgin olive oil to tuna sashimi, are deceiving you. Food fraud affects up to 10 percent of the global food supply, and it poses a risk to your health, your taste buds, and your wallet. We chat with Larry Olmsted, author of the book Real Food, Fake Food, about how much of what you eat is a lie, and what you can do about it. Maddie catches up with novelist Margaret Atwood about futuristic pigs, and Tom tells you about the Olympics’ coffee woes.

Luz Calvo and Catriona Rueda Esquibel are co-authors of Decolonize Your Diet. The cookbook draws on ingredients and recipes from ancient Mexico. “We quickly found that foods from the pre-Hispanic era were among the healthiest foods on the planet,” writes Calvo. We talk to the couple about those pre-Hispanic foods and get a mouthwatering summer recipe involving squash blossoms. Plus: Tom gives us the scoop on where Hillary and Donald stand on food and agriculture issues, and Kiera dives into a moral debate involving Malcolm Gladwell and college dining.