My Dear Kitchen In Helsinki

My guest on the podcast today is William LaFleur, an anthropologist and researcher, currently working on his doctoral studies at the University of Helsinki. He is also an enthusiastic food geek. Will is using sensory ethnography as a new method for learning sustainability and understanding local foodways. He and I invite you to a sensory discussion which involves a baguette and a börek, and we urge you to do a sensory experiment the next time you’re eating something. I advise you to listen to the podcast using headphones for the best effect! 

My guest on the podcast this week is researcher and my dear friend Francesca Allievi. Francesca defended her doctoral dissertation about meat consumption as a wicked problem a few years ago and since then she has been working on increasing awareness of food sustainability, particularly among young people. She and I talked about the complexity of food sustainability and the educational tool she developed with her colleagues to teach this complexity. For this educational tool they developed, the three researchers also received pedagogy award by the Association for the Study of Food and Society.

My second guest this week is Estonian researcher Kadri Aavik, who has been working on veganism and gender in Estonia and in Finland and is a part of Climate Sustainability in the Kitchen: Everyday Food Cultures in Transition project in University of Helsinki. She is also a food blogger and has the oldest vegan blog in Estonia. Kadri and I talked about topics ranging from veganism and gender to veganism as a political practice, intersectionality of feminism and veganism, veganism and race and more. She also has recommendations and tips for those who are thinking about becoming a vegan. 

To know more about Kadri Aavik’s work:
University of Helsinki: https://researchportal.helsinki.fi/en/persons/kadri-aavik
Climate Sustainability in the Kitchen Project: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/projects/climate-sustainability-in-the-kitchen
Her food blog: https://veganmaailm.com/

My first guest researcher Seona Candy who has been doing her post-doc research in University of Helsinki, at the Institute of Urban and Regional Studies. We talked about current problems of global food system, how to make the food system sustainable, the effects of covid-19 on food system and her own food story after coming to Helsinki from Melbourne.

To know more about Seona Candy, please check her page at the institute: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/helsinki-institute-of-urban-and-regional-studies/seona-candy