This week we look at the impact of the challenges facing families and eating under quarantine. We examine how a town survived six months under quarantine when the bubonic plague was sweeping England and also how you can stock your home with healthy foods that have long shelf life. We also compare how we survive in challenging situations today with COVID-19 with how the pioneers did, when faced with similar challenges while trekking across North America in Canada and the United States. Suggestions and guide books for the pioneers exist today and we refer to them for guidance.

The story of candy and how it evolved from hardened honey on a stick to KitKat chocolate bars with the flavour of red potato from Japan! No matter what your taste, the candy world has something that will appeal.

So in this latest episode, we return to examining the challenges of feeding an army. With the end of the Roman civilization, especially in western Europe, logistics took a real nose dive with armies resorting to looting and pillaging for the most part to feed. The French came along with a better idea and then lost some of that because of the revolution. Then the Brits, who were faced with similar challenges as the French: colonies a long way away to secure with armed forces requiring long logistical chains, the Brits came along and improved on the French improvements. And then we leave off for a bit, because, well, that was a lot of military eating. We'll come back to the modern stage in a bit or a bite.

This week Tom and Sandra examine the challenges and solutions the Mongol army met and matched during the century or so of establishing one of the world's largest empires. An army not only marches on its stomach, but moves on an army of horses. And when the soldier heads off to war, it's atop his trusty steed and a bag lunch washed down with fermented mare's milk. Um, yum...

We have all heard the saying about an army marching on its stomach. It's true. It's been the challenge of commanders across history to keep armies fed so they can fight. How did they do this? We begin examining how different armies through time have achieved this and what, exactly, was on the menu for the soldiers and their support staff as they invaded to conquer or stood to defend.

Tom and Sandra wonder where Jen is and once they determine she is still off saving the world, move on to talking about lunch. They also talk about how women have been doing a lot more than just packing lunch bags - they've been inventing them.

And of course, behind every woman creating something wonderful, there's men standing behind them, waiting to rip them off for anything valuable, take the credit and laugh all the way to the bank. 

This time, the women win.

Tom has trouble finishing but then pulls it together to thank Zack Twamley and his When Diplomacy Fails Podcast.

The paleo-diet is still quite a thing and this week, Tom and Sandra talk about the differences between the "new" paleo and the original paleo as eaten by a man now known as Oetzi or Ötzi. He was a shepherd found after being dying in the mountains between modern day Italy and Austria and Switzerland. Covered in ice for centuries, we now know what he ate a few hours before being shot in the back with an arrow in his late forties or early fifties, about 5,400 years ago. Now, thanks to Oetzi, you can now order a meal based on foods that he used to eat - or at least as close as we can get today.

The first in the series of podcasts about food. In this episode we look at some of the early menu items on humans' list of ideal edibles and not coincidentally, why grub sometimes means food, today. Mmmm. Tasty. With Tom Villemaire and Sandra Richmond.