The Food Programme

As Ramadan 2019 draws to a close, many British Muslim reach the culmination of a month of fasting during daylight hours. But that doesn't mean that food is forgotten. On the contrary... In this programme, food writer Yasmin Khan celebrates the social, cultural and culinary rituals of Ramadan, the most holy month in the Islamic calendar. She speaks to comedian Tez Ilyas about celebrations with family and friends and a very memorable 'Happy Eid cake'. And in Bristol, Yasmin joins thousands of people coming together for a 'Grand Iftar', a vast street party of Muslims and non-Muslims, who have come together to share a meal with their neighbours once the sun goes down.Presented by Yasmin Khan Produced by Clare Salisbury

Genevieve Taylor sets out to meet a few of this year's BBC Food and Farming Awards finalists, and hear how learning about food has changed their lives for the better.The first stop is Liberty Kitchen - a finalist in the Best Street Food or Takeaway category. This social enterprise operates at Pentonville Prison, where inmates produce a diverse range of 'street balls', including classic Italian meatballs, macaroni cheese balls and veggies balls; these are then sold at London street food markets. Genevieve visits the bustling prison kitchen with founder Janet Boston, before checking out the Liberty Kitchen stall at Leather Lane market in Clerkenwell - and hears overwhelming praise from current and ex-inmates involved in the scheme, who say it's giving them hope of employment post-prison.Next up, Genevieve checks in with Food and Farming Awards judges for the Cook of the Year category: Jeanette Orrey, co-founder of the educational initiative Food For Life, and Paula McIntyre, a cook, food writer and lecturer. They've been to the Moray region of Scotland, to visit finalist Logie Primary: a rural school with just 28 pupils. Although it's small, this primary school’s making a mark with a food-focused social enterprise that’s teaching pupils food and kitchen skills, and at the same time bringing together the local community. The school's older pupils launched the Cup of Joy Community Cafe two years ago, using vegetables grown in their school allotment and eggs from the school chickens; today, it's not only teaching them valuable nutrition and life skills but providing a hub for this rural community.Our final stop is London, where the judges for this years’ Pat Llewellyn New Talent Award - Ben Adler, whose late wife Pat inspired the award; and Barney Desmazery, food editor at large for BBC Good Food magazine - have been to Ealing to join the team behind Fat Macy’s supper club: a dining experience with a difference… The kitchen and front-of-house team are all homeless people currently living in hostels. The founder Meg Doherty launched the project three years ago, as a way to give people in temporary accommodation an opportunity to learn new skills, while earning enough money to get them back into the housing system. Presented by Genevieve Taylor; produced by Lucy Taylor.

Dan Saladino arrives on a beach for a Robinson Crusoe experience. Will he be able to survive on wild food? Chef Gill Meller and foragers John Wright and Monica Wilde lend their expertise.This castaway coastal feast is something of a tribute to the 300th anniversary of the publication of Daniel Defoe's novel, a story itself inspired by the experience of a Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk who in 1705 survived for four years on a remote and uninhabited island in the Pacific.Selkirk survived on wild cabbages, shellfish and goat meat, Dan and his forager friends try and recreate something of the sailor's desert island menu. But during their expedition an unexpected guest arrives on the beach, a real life, modern day Robinson Crusoe. Produced and presented by Dan Saladino.

What does it take to produce delicious food of the highest quality in the UK in 2019? This year, it was the turn of chef, food writer, BBC TV presenter, and this year's head judge in the BBC Food and Farming Awards Angela Hartnett to find out. In this programme, Angela and Sheila Dillon spend a day with each of the finalists in the Best Food Producer category. Together, they visit three farms, in Cornwall, Herefordshire and Cumbria. Among the dedicated people they meet are Tanya the 'Duck Dabbler', a woman whose expertise in duck rearing are sought far and wide, Ed the 'first-time' farmer, working slowly and sustainably in the Black Mountains, and Martin whose dedication to making cheese extends even to the starter cultures themselves. Presented by Sheila Dillon Produced by Clare Salisbury

At a time when shops are closing across the country, we visit three food retail businesses that are bucking the trend. Levenshulme Market in Greater Manchester, A Small Good Thing in Bolton and Squash in Liverpool are all making a positive impact in their communities Sheila Dillon meets entrepreneur John Timpson to find out what this could tell us about the future of our high streets.Presenter: Sheila Dillon Producer: Siobhan Maguire

Food assurance labels come in all sorts of forms, appearing on all sorts of ingredients available from shops across the UK. Their logos promise certified standards in a range of production attributes - from environmental impact to animal welfare to safety to chemical usage. But how well are these schemes understood? What does the general public really want to be assured about? How much impact can assurance labels have, in a world where we're eating more and more processed food? And what could such schemes contribute to a post-Brexit UK food system?Sheila Dillon is joined by an expert panel to discuss some of the questions around food assurance labels: Dr Siobhan Mullan, a Senior Research Fellow in Farm Animal Science at the University of Bristol Veterinary School, who's currently helping to develop a new food standard, the Global Federation of Higher Animal Welfare Assurance; Erik Millstone, a Professor of Science Policy at the University of Sussex, whose work focuses on how we structure our food system; and Phil Brooke the Research and Education Manager at the animal welfare lobbying organisation Compassion in World Farming - which has an ongoing 'Honest Labelling' campaign.Presenter: Sheila Dillon Producer: Lucy Taylor

Dan Saladino meets the scientists working on the future of a truly global food, the banana.

Can you reinvent a food culture? Dan Saladino meets a man who did, Denmark's Claus Meyer, the co-founder of Noma, one of the world's most influential restaurants. From there he went to Bolivia and set up a restaurant to rescue lost foods of the Andes and Amazon, and onto New York where he founded a cooking school in a neighbourhood with some of the worst levels of food related illness in America. So what is he now doing in Newport, South Wales. Produced and presented by Dan Saladino. (Photo: Stephan Gamillscheg)

Should you leave a cash tip or is card just as good, do you prefer a service charge or would you get rid of tipping altogether? Sheila Dillon finds out when she meets the co-founder of Hawksmoor Restaurants William Beckett to talk about our attitude to tipping in the UK and how it varies from city to city. Peter Davies of WMT Accountants describes how high-profile scandals have dented our trust in tipping and Alex Wrethman of the Charlotte Group of restaurants explains how that could be hurting businesses now. Sheila then draws on examples from the US where Saru Jayaraman is President of the Restaurant Opportunities Centre. Jayaraman explains how the system in many states has forced workers to rely on tips to earn the minimum wage and been a cause of poverty and sexual harassment. We hear from the poet Jan Beatty about waiting tables in the US for 15 years and then look at one of the most forward-thinking tipping models in the world, dreamed up by restaurateur Danny Meyer who founded New York’s Union Square Cafe and Gramercy, and ask whether it could be rolled out in the UK. Presenter: Sheila Dillon Producer: Tom Bonnett

One September Ella Risbridger tried to kill herself. She survived and left the hospital thinking about making a pie. When she got home, her partner persuaded her to make the pie, and it set Ella on a course to teach herself to cook. And in teaching herself to cook, she has taught herself to live. This is a programme about pies. The pork pie of Pete Brown and his ‘soon-to-be-wife’ Liz’s first date in Barnsley market. The pies that Julie Jones made with her mother which helped to keep her calm after a dementia diagnosis. Pies crafted by chef Calum Franklin, inspired by the surroundings of his London childhood, and pies creating a new future for young Preston businessman Robert D'Orville. Sheila Dillon travels to hear these stories, and uncovers a pie story of her own.Presented by Sheila Dillon. Produced in Bristol by Clare Salisbury