Exploring the Tragedy of Flavor Extinction

Vox's Benji Jones talks with food journalist and author Dan Saladino, whose new book Eating to Extinction documents rare foods and food cultures from around the world, showing how they are being affected by climate change, globalization, and industrial agricultural practices. Dan shares many incredible stories from his travels and reporting, including the last known garden growing a unique soybean, a 16-foot high corn that produces its own fertilizer, and a complex symbiosis between man, bird, and bee in remote Tanzania.

Host: Benji Jones (@BenjiSJones), Environmental reporter, Vox

Guest: Dan Saladino (@DanSaladinoUK), food journalist & author

References: 

• Eating to Extinction: The World's Rarest Foods and Why We Need to Save Them by Dan Saladino (FSG; 2022)
• The Food Programme (BBC Radio 4; also on Apple Podcasts)
• The Ark of Taste (Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity)
• "The Corn of the Future Is Hundreds of Years Old and Makes Its Own Mucus" by Jason Daley (Smithsonian; Aug. 10, 2018)

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This episode was made by: 

• Producer: Erikk Geannikis
• Editor: Amy Drozdowska
• Engineer: Paul Robert Mounsey
• Deputy Editorial Director, Vox Talk: Amber Hall

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