Foodie True Crime

16 episodes

Curated by:
User profile picepekilis

Most of us are completely disconnected from the natural sources of our food and completely trust that what we get from the store is what it says it is. Take a dive into the world of food fraud, as well as celebrating the diligent men and women who fight for product safety and truth in advertising and labelling.


  • 1

    Fake Food

    Gastropod

    40:16 | Jun 6th, 2017

    1 recommendation

    Hamburgers that turn out to be horse, not beef. Honey sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup. Old, grey olives dipped in copper sulfate solution to make them look fresh and green. Fraudulent foods su...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    For the first entry in my new Foodie True Crime playlist, I went back and found this old episode of Gastropod. It’s an eye-opener, I’ll tell you.

  • 2

    Olive oil is not what you think it is. According to Tom Mueller, author of Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil, an olive is a stone fruit like a plum or cherry—meaning that ...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    I first learned of EVOO mislabelling on an episode of The Splendid Table but this one dives deep into the topic.

  • 3

    Poison Squad: Founding of the FDA

    A Taste of the Past

    52:06 | Jan 30th, 2020

    1 recommendation

    Technology and industry put more food on the shelves and in markets by extending the life of perishable goods with canning and processing methods. But was the food safe? By the late 19th century, the...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    Maybe I’ll start a foodie true crime playlist. We rely heavily on labeling to tell us the truth. There is a reason for that - a chemist named Dr. Wiley made it his mission to reform food safety for ...Show More

  • 4

    Consumer talk: fake honey

    Good to Know with Wendy Knowler

    30:11 | Jul 25th, 2018

    1 recommendation

    Pippa Hudson talks to Wendy Knowler | Correspondent at Consumer Talk and Dr Harris Steinman | Medical Dr With Special Interest In Consumer Issues

    epekilis recommended:

    This is one for the “if it’s too cheap to be true . . . “ file, like balsamic vinegar and EVOO. So let’s say you buy honey because you believe it is a healthier sweetener than refined sugar. But the ...Show More

  • 5

    What's the What with Fish Fraud?

    Stuff You Should Know

    40:54 | Oct 18th, 2016

    1 recommendation

    Fish fraud, misrepresenting a fish as a more expensive one, costs Americans $25 billion a year. And because less than 100 inspectors check for fraud in the US and everyone from wholesalers to sushi re...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    Part of the issue with fish is that the same fish may have very different local names in different parts of the country. But that doesn’t explain or excuse the vast scale of deliberate mislabelling t...Show More

  • 6

    David Horlock, managing director for global food and retail supply chains at BSI, and Innovation Forum’s Ian Welsh discuss how the development of rigorous standards can help businesses build resilienc...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    Addresses the growing importance of ESG (environment, social, and governance) in supply chain management, particularly for younger consumers. Modern supply chains are so complex that credible third ...Show More

  • 7

    Ketchup: A Fishy History

    Science Diction

    17:53 | Jul 28th, 2020

    1 recommendation

    At the turn of the 20th century, 12 young men sat in the basement of the Department of Agriculture, eating meals with a side of borax, salicylic acid, or formaldehyde. They were called the Poison Squa...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    One doesn’t think of ketchup as a natural product but my respect for Heinz as a human being has grown. Also, in terms of ketchup’s historical path from Asian fish sauce to sweetened tomato syrup, it ...Show More

  • 8

    This week, Gastropod tells the story of two countries and their shared obsession with a plant: Camellia sinensis, otherwise known as the tea bush. The Chinese domesticated tea over thousands of years,...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    Ok this was so good that my family started groaning, “Enough with the Facts about Tea! Just STOP already!” My daughter was just doing her final project for Grade 11 History and they were studying the...Show More

  • 9

    The creator of the Xbox assembles a rag-tag team to extract ancient yeast from Egyptian pots and bake bread with it.

    epekilis recommended:

    Terrific tale of Xbox inventor who pursues his twin hobbies in Egyptopology and bread-baking to try and bake an ancient bread. A really ancient bread. With, like, ancient Egyptian yeast. It’s so wo...Show More

  • 10

    A Scottish woman changes personal injury law forever after she finds a snail in her ginger beer.

    epekilis recommended:

    A dramatization of the foundational case that established modern product liability law. Yes it is still relevant and we did study it in great detail in first year law school. In doing so we may have ...Show More

  • 11

    When a replica of Queen Elizabeth’s royal wedding cake was destroyed by vandals, hundreds of people would come together to recreate the show stopping replica cake.

    epekilis recommended:

    An act of vandalism destroys a life-size model of Queen Elizabeth’s wedding cake in an abandoned museum. The UK Sugarcraft Guild mounts a national effort to rebuild it, which requires the highest pos...Show More

  • 12

    Made in Italy, really!

    A Taste of the Past

    39:18 | Mar 26th, 2021

    Authentic products by artisan producers are worth protecting. Beatrice Ughi, founder and president of the food importing company Gustiamo talks about the fake and adulterated products passing as "Made...Show More

  • 13

    The Fever Tree Hunt

    Stuff The British Stole

    30:23 | Jul 25th, 2023

    2 recommendations

    Most heists target gold, jewels or cash. This one targeted illegal seeds. As the British established their sprawling empire across the subcontinent and beyond, they encountered a formidable adversary ...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    Exciting & fascinating history of the tonic water in your gin & tonic. Lots of skulduggery involved. Saving to my Foodie True Crimes playlist.

  • 14

    What Happens to the Food You Try To Sneak into the Airport?

    The Atlas Obscura Podcast

    15:46 | Mar 4th, 2024

    With the help from a podcast friend (Andres O’Hara of The Sporkful), we go inside one of the busiest airports on earth. And we find out the fate of all the food that gets confiscated by customs. Spoil...Show More

  • 15

    GALS Gone Wild

    The Atlas Obscura Podcast

    15:02 | Mar 5th, 2024

    On our second day with Sporkful senior producer Andres O’Hara, we see what happens when invasive creatures that have made their way to the US refuse to leave … even when they’re slow and slimy. MORE...Show More

  • 16

    Colonel John Hoffman of the Food Protection and Defense Institute has been advising companies and government on how to harden their cyber functions. Here he deconstructs how JBS came to be hacked and ...Show More

    epekilis recommended:

    Interesting analysis of cyber security threats to the food supply chain.

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