The Food Programme

Sheila Dillon talks to the publisher, writer and restaurateur Tom Jaine about his life. From his early days at 'The Hole in the Wall' in Bath to custody of his beloved 'Prospect Books' ("every book a brick in the wall of knowledge") and beyond. With contributions from Rick Stein, Joyce Molyneux and Tim Hayward.Producer: Sarah Langan Photograph by Toby Coulson.

Sheila Dillon looks at the state of play for female chefs in the professional kitchen. She talks to Alice Waters, Sally Clarke, Margot Henderson and Mary-Ellen McTague. We also hear from Joyce Molyneux, who was one of the female exceptions in the professional kitchen in post war Britain . In light of comments from some well known male chefs, most recently Tom Kerridge, Sheila asks if the kitchen as a working environment has really changed that much over the last few decades and whether prejudice and a macho culture deters up and coming talent.Producer: Sarah Langan.

Harold McGee, the man who helped explain the science of the kitchen, tells his food story. His book, published in 1984, On Food and Cooking, has influenced home cooks as well as a new generation of experimental chefs.It's seen as an important book because it made the science of food accessible and understandable to domestic cooks and chefs. It explains what happens to the protein molecules in eggs when they're whisked and what unfolds in the fibres of meat when heated.However, in the programme Harold McGee argues that his book revived kitchen science rather than introduced it. He cites figures including the 18th century Lord Rumford (an early experimenter in slow cooking) and Nicholas Kurti (a Hungarian born Oxford physicist) as the true pioneers of a more scientific approach to cooking.Presenter: Sheila Dillon. Producer: Dan Saladino.

Sheila Dillon discovers the delights of eating rabbit meat, but also why some people think it is unjustifiable.Dil Peeling from Compassion in World Farming gives details on their latest report into conditions on rabbit farms on the continent. We hear from the Knowle West Media Centre about the culture of catching wild rabbits. And Sheila hears from Peter Rigby, a young farmer near Chippenham who is going to start a free range rabbit farm.Dan Saladino also spends a morning cooking with chefs Barny Haughton and Oliver Pratt to find out how to cook it, and just how delicious the meat can be.Presented by Sheila Dillon and produced in Bristol by Emma Weatherill.

Mutton tastier than lamb - why we should all demand to eat older meat. Dan Saladino uncovers the mystery of why we no longer eat mutton, despite it being a favoured meat of the Victorians. He hears about the efforts of Bob Kennard, author of a new book, Much Ado About Mutton, who's campaigning for good quality mutton to return to our menus.Chefs Fergus Henderson and Cyrus Todiwala are both lyrical on the virtues of mutton and give tips on the best way to cook it. And Dan visits the Thomas family sheep farm deep in the Welsh hills to understand why our lack of interest in mutton has changed their way of life.The programme also hears of a mutton story from America, the Moonlite BBQ in Kentucky, a destination restaurant that draws people from all over the US in search of their slow cooked mutton. It was also a destination for artisan mutton producer Tony Davies who travelled to the restaurant to see if you could provide an answer to mutton's woes in the UK. As he explains in the programme, he arrived at a dramatic conclusion.Presented by Dan Saladino and produced in Bristol by Emma Weatherill.Photo image copyright - Bob Kennard. The audio of the Moonlite BBQ restaurant kindly provided by Mark Dolan of www.bbqpilgrim.com and the American Southern Foodways Alliance www.southernfoodways.org.

As bee populations fall, Sheila Dillon asks if some salvation may be found in the mean streets of our cities. With a report from New York where bee keeping was actually illegal for a long time but where the honey festival now thrives. In London a young brewer tells us how she combined her love of brewing and beekeeping to produce an award winning honey ale. In Copenhagen we hear from a project with hives across the city - each producing its own distinctive taste and flavour, determined by the source of the nectar. Even the offices are alive with the hum of bees as Dan Saladino hears how the venture enlists the help of homeless people and asylum seekers, giving them confidence and and training in all aspects of beekeeping, honey production and sales. Meanwhile in Bristol are trying to find out if urban habitats really can provide a stable environment for our bees to flourish - can our overlooked scruffy verges and car parks contribute to the solution to one of our biggest ecological threats?Produced by Sarah Langan.

From a lesson in "guerrilla gardening" by LA's Ron Finley to Mastering the Art of Soviet cooking with food writer Anya Von Bremzen, Dan Saladino reports from an annual food symposium held in Copenhagen, called MAD (the word for food in Danish).Now in its fourth year, the event was founded by the celebrated chef of the restaurant Noma, Rene Redzepi. In his own words, it's curated by a group of "chefs, waiters, a former banker and an anthropologist".To some it's a festival of ideas, to others it's like listening to a "food mix tape", over two days an audience of 600 chefs, writers and food obsessives hear a series of presentations about cooking, restaurants, food history and activism.Dan Saladino takes the Food Programme inside the circus tent where the symposium is hear a selection of the diverse stories being told. There's Ron Finley, a gardener from Los Angeles who was prosecuted for growing food in a patch of land in front of his him. He took on the authorities and changed the law. His story has inspired people all over the world.It's also an important arena for the world's great chefs to tell stories of kitchens and cooking and to pass on their wisdom. Food writer Joe Warwick profiles three chefs who too part in MAD 4, Pierre Koffman, Olivier Roellinger and the enigmatic Fulvio Pierangeli.It's an often eccentric mix of stories, and so as well as guerrilla gardening there's a guide to making tapioca in the Amazonian rainforest through to a first hand account of cooking in the USSR. Some stories will surprise, others will inform, but they all inspire.Music in this is edition is provided by Efterklang and Tatu Ronkko. They're not only one of the most respected bands in Denmark, they've also composed music for a restaurant in collaboration with chefs.

Teff has been grown in Ethiopia for Millennia. Traditionally, it's ground, milled, mixed with water and fermented for days to make the sour staple flatbread injera.Cultivation of this mysterious and tiny grain has been concentrated in Ethiopia for thousands of years. But now that's changing as the health-conscious Western world realise the nutritional secrets this crop might bestow.In this edition of the Food Programme, Sheila Dillon meets UK entrepreneurs bringing foods, normally seen as Ethiopian to new diners, and speaks to experts to hear how the rise in popularity of teff is affecting the farmers back home.

Dan Saladino revisits Yorkshire food traditions which were captured on film in 1974 by Derek Cooper, previous presenter of The Food Programme. From Yorkshire puddings to tripe, Dan discovers how the food from this region was formed by the Industrial Revolution, hard labour and fuel.Dan re-watches the original 1970s A Taste of Britain tv programme with historian Peter Brears, writer Christopher Hirst, and those who remember the people and places in the original film.Presented by Dan Saladino and produced in Bristol by Emma Weatherill.

In 1974, Derek Cooper set off on a hunt - for BBC Television - around Britain to discover what was left of its regional foods and traditional ingredients. Forty years on, Dan Saladino revisits Wales, and that series, called "A Taste of Britain" - to meet some of those involved, their descendants, and to find out what happened after these foods and skills, some of which at the time were on the wane when they were recorded for the cameras.Dan goes to Wales to find out how the tradition of fishing for sewin in tiny boats called coracles is faring. When Derek visited the Gower Peninsula, cockles were in short supply and had to be sourced from outside of Wales. Dan visits Swansea market to ask how the cockle trade is doing now and to see if the famous Welsh laverbread is as popular today as it was when the original series was filmed in the mid 70's. At that time, Derek Cooper feared that some of the traditional Welsh foods and skills were about to be lost forever. Dan finds out whether those fears became the reality, as he asks how Welsh identity is expressed through its food.Producer: Sarah Langan.