The Splendid Table

This week it's a cooking lesson with a virtuoso. Violinist Joshua Bell has received every accolade imaginable in his career, including a Grammy for his stunning performance in the soundtrack of the Academy Award-winning film The Red Violin. Now he's creating his first home and he wants to learn to cook. He and Lynne met up at the stove in his New York City kitchen where Tagliatelle with Caramelized Oranges   Almonds was the lesson of the day.
The Sterns are in Cleveland where they're eating Wiener Schnitzel and Dobos Torte at Balaton. Sally Schneider, author of The Improvisational Cook, returns with a cold weather cooking technique you will love.
Food scientist Harold McGee, author of the seminal On Food and Cooking, explains those ever more confounding scientific contortions coming out of restaurant kitchens these days. And We'll hear from the United States Oyster Shucking Champion.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• November 10, 2007 (originally aired)
• November 29, 2008 (rebroadcast)

This week it's Jeff Henderson, "Chef Jeff" of the Chef Jeff project on The Food Network, Jane and Michael Stern are at Enstrom's Toffee in Grand Junction, CO. And we visit with Dorie Greenspan author of Baking, From My Home to Yours, and Gourmet magazine's John Willoughby.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• November 22, 2008

This week we have a homage to all things porcine, and the story of family life in a rural French village from French chef Stéphane Reynaud, author of Pork & Sons, Jane and Michael Stern have found the "krunkest" fish in Nashville at Eastside Fish, and Kim Marcus of The Wine Spectator brings us up to date on the wines of Portugal.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• November 3, 2007 (originally aired)
• October 25, 2008 (rebroadcast)

This weeks it's the intersection of food and international relations with Chris Fair, author of Cuisines of the Axis of Evil and Other Irritating States: A Dinner Party Approach to International Relations. Jane and Michael Stern are eating cream puffs at Butler's Donuts in Somerset, MA and Gourmet Magazine's John Willoughby brings us their picks of America's legendary restaurants.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• October 18, 2008

This week we peek at the fantasy life of a house in Tuscany with Michael Tucker, author of Living in a Foreign Language, A Memoir of Food, Wine and Love. Sally Schneider author of A New Way to Cook gives us a fresh take on pears, and Seattle chef Tom Douglas explains the trials and tribulations of becoming a "gentleman" farmer.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• October 3, 2007 (originally aired)
• October 11, 2008 (rebroadcast)

This week we talk to journalist Julia Flynn Siler author of The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty. Jane and Michael Stern are at Kumback Lunch in Perry, OK. David Rosengarten looks at the origins of ramen noodles. And for an interpretation of an epicurean's take on happiness we turn to philosopher and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht, author of The Happiness Myth: Why What We Think is Right is Wrong.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• September 8, 2007 (originally aired)
• September 27, 2008 (rebroadcast)

We're looking at global seed banks with journalist John Seabrook, author of The New Yorker article, Sowing For the Apocalypse. Jane and Michael Stern are at Short Sugar's BBQ in Reidsville, NC, wine wit Joshua Wesson takes us to Italy's premier wine event, Vin Italy, and Jill Carle, co-author of College Cooking: Feed Yourself and Your Friends, has ideas for breaking out of the popcorn and noodle cup rut.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• September 15, 2007 (originally aired)
• September 6, 2008 (rebroadcast)

This week we're talking to distinguished nutritionist and food activist Marion Nestle about who should really be responsible for our food supply. She is the author of What To Eat. The Stern's are at Standard Baking on the Portland, ME waterfront and Sally Schneider author of the award-winning The Improvisational Cook gives us a new view of the kitchen staple, the egg.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• June 9, 2007 (originally aired)
• August 9, 2008 (rebroadcast)

We're taking a look at sushi-what we never knew about it, that the way we eat it is probably all wrong, and that its birthplace in not Japan. Our guest is journalist Trevor Corson, author of The Zen of Fish: The Story of Sushi, from Samurai to Supermarket. The Sterns are in Colorado where they're tucking into cinnamon rolls the size of dinner plates at Johnson's Corner in Loveland.
Middle Eastern food authority and historian, Claudia Roden, brings us something new to grill: kafta, the ground meat kebabs that every country in the region makes its own. She leaves us her recipe for Moroccan Kebabs from her beautiful new book Arabesque: A Taste of Morocco, Turkey, & Lebanon. Whisky maker John Glaser of Compass Box Whisky Company has been dubbed a maverick by the trade for his new-style blends of Scotch. He stops by with samples for Lynne.
French chef and national treasure Jacques Pépin talks the small simple things he's created over a lifetime of cooking that make sensational eating. He leaves us his recipe for Fromage Fort from his latest, and perhaps most personal, book, Chez Jacques: Traditions and Rituals of a Cook. Carolin Young, author of Apples of Gold in Settings of Silver: Stories of Dinner as a Work of Art, fills us in on her Paris walking and dining tours; and, as always, the phone lines will be open for your calls.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• June 30, 2007 (originally aired)
• August 2, 2008 (rebroadcast)

This week we meet the charming Spanish wunder chef Jose Andres, host of PBS's Jose's Made in Spain. The Sterns are in Sacramento, CA eating Squeeze Burgers at The Squeeze Inn, and Lynne puts veggie burgers to a taste test in her kitchen.
Broadcast dates for this episode:

• July 19, 2008