A Taste of the Past

Look in your kitchen cabinet, there’s no doubt a Pyrex dish in there somewhere, whether it be a glass pie plate or the ubiquitous glass measuring cup with the red incremental markings.  This year marks the 100th anniversary of Pyrex, and Linda Pelaccio is celebrating on today’s episode of _ A Taste of the Past _ with guest Regan Brumagen of the Rakow Research Library at the Corning Museum of Glass...

Take a trip to the Far East long ago as host Linda Pelaccio welcomes Kian Lam Kho to the studio for a brand new episode of A Taste of the Past.  Kian shares descriptive details on what banquets were like in China more than three-thousand years ago and how traditional Chinese cuisine was shaped by the worldly trading routes.  Through much culinary detective work, Kian goes on to share tantalizing f...

Women of African descent have contributed to America’s food culture for centuries, but their rich and varied involvement is still overshadowed by the demeaning stereotype of an illiterate “Aunt Jemima” who cooked mostly by natural instinct. Toni Tipton-Martin describes her years of research amassing one of the world’s largest private collections of cookbooks published by African American authors,...

With the harvest season in bloom, A Taste of the Past host Linda Pelaccio welcomes food historian, author, and epicure William Woys Weaver for a thorough discussion on the significance of vegetables in the colonial and revolutionary period of early America from the gardens to the table.  William shares the plethora of vegetables grown during these eras and describes the process of maintaining the...

A Taste of the Past is back for a new radio season with host Linda Pelaccio welcoming guest Stephen Schmidt to the studio for a thorough talk on manuscript cookbooks. Stephen is the Principal Researcher and Writer for The Manuscript Cookbooks Survey , which catalogs pre-1865 English-language manuscript cookbooks. An ongoing project, Stephen shares that the site aims to give culinary historians, fo...

What is Scottish cuisine? Well, it’s certainly more than haggis. Travel to the UK’s northern-most country on a brand new episode of A Taste of the Past . Host Linda Pelaccio is joined by Rachel McCormack, an expert on the subject of Scottish cuisine. She is a regular panelist on BBC Radio 4s The Kitchen Cabinet since the first pilot programme. She has also broadcast on the station’s From Our Own C...

A sweet tooth is a powerful thing! This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is exploring the vast array of sweets across the globe with Darra Goldstein, the Editor in Chief of “The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets.” As Linda and Darra point out, the “science of sweet” is only the beginning of a fascinating story, because it is not basic human need or simple biological impulse tha...

The food of the Cuban table has largely been reproduced in other countries primarily by those who left their home in an attempt to recreate the tastes and smells of their past. Now that relations are opening up again, author Ana Sofia Pelaez together with photographer Ellen Silverman traveled to Cuba to rediscover those flavors and history of the cuisine, documented in their book, The Cuban Table....

Elizabeth Minchilli has been eating her way through Rome since she was 12 years old. “Eating Rome,” is her homage to the city that feeds her, literally and figuratively. This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is getting Elizabeth’s personal story which is a quirky and deliciously entertaining look at some of the city’s monuments to food culture. Strolling through her favorite open...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio welcomes Eric Kayser, artisan baker, founder of Maison Kayser, and author of the book “The Larousse Book of Bread” to the show. Born into a family of French bakers, dating back four generations and recognized as one of the most talented artisan bakers of his generation, Eric Kayser has built his reputation on his passion for bread. The quality...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is taking listeners on a journey to Iceland! Welcoming guest Jody Eddy, author of the new cookbook “North: The New Nordic Cuisine of Iceland,” to chat about one of the most beautiful and untouched places on Earth and its utterly unique and captivating food scene. Characterized by its distinctive indigenous ingredients, traditional farmers and...

On this week’s episode of A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio takes listeners on a vivid and far-ranging journey across time and space on the ancient spice trades with Dr. Gary Nabhan. Talking about his new book, “Cumin, Camels, and Caravans, A Spice Odyssey,” Gary draws on his own family’s history as spice traders, as well as travel narratives, historical accounts, and his expertise as an e...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is talkin’ sugar and its checkered, dark past with guest Andrew F. Smith, author of “Sugar: A Global History.” It’s no surprise that sugar has been on our minds for several millenia. First cultivated in New Guinea around 8,000 B.C.E., this addictive sweetener has since come to dominate our appetites-whether in candy, desserts, soft drinks, or...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio takes listeners along to the recent International Association of Culinary Professionals Conference held in Washington, DC, and chats with the distinguished Anne Willan. Anne Willan has had an extraordinary career in the culinary arts and is recognized as one of the world’s preeminent authorities on French cooking and even founded École de Cui...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio welcomes Judy Witts Francini to talk all about the food of Italian feasts! Despite not being Italian herself, Judy has an impressive Italian culinary resume including Divina Cucina cooking classes and tours as well as a cookbook and smartphone app. Telling Linda how she initially fell in love with Italy and Italian cooking, her journey to culi...

The vernal equinox is upon us and with it brings the start of spring! It is also the beginning of the ancient Persian New Year celebration of Nowruz, and on this week’s A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is talking to the “guru of Persian cuisine,” cookbook author, and culinary educator Najmieh Batmanglij all about the history and food traditions of the holiday. Having just baked a batch of...

Americans once sipped coffee and ate pie around communal tables, sharing their struggles and dreams with strangers at Horn & Hardart’s iconic Automat. This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is talking the history of the automat with Marianne Hardart, the great-granddaughter of Automat co-founder Frank Hardart; her father, Augustin, was the last of three generations of Hardarts...

From dal to samosas, paneer to vindaloo, dosa to naan, today’s A Taste of the Past is delving into the history of the food in India. Host Linda Pelaccio welcomes guest Colleen Taylor Sen, a culinary historian and writer who has specialized in the cuisine of the Indian subcontinent, to the show to dissect this country’s rich culinary traditions. The cuisine differs from north to south, yet what is...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is taking a trip on the Trans-Siberian Railway with author Sharon Hudgins . Sharon has traveled along this particular railway numerous times and worked for University of Maryland University College for 20 years, primarily as a professor in the university’s programs in Germany, Spain, Greece, Japan, Korea, and Russia. She also served as UMUC’s...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is delving into the pages of culinary history, wondering how the working-class ate at the turn of the century. Dr. Katherine Leonard Turner joins Linda via phone, adding to the discussion interesting facts and thoughts brought up in her book “How the Other Half Ate: A History of the Working-Class Meals at the Turn oft he Century.” She explains...

Ciao! This week on a brand new episode of A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is chatting with one of America’s foremost authorities on Italian food, Julia della Croce . She is the author of over 13 cooking and travel books, notably “Italian Home Cooking: 125 Recipes to Comfort Your Soul” and “The Classic Italian Cookbook.” In the past decades, traditional Italian home cooking has seemingly...

This week on a brand new episode of A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio kicks off 2015 talking to Dr. Kimberly Wilmot Voss, author of “The Food Section: Newspaper Women and the Culinary Community.” Linda and Kim discuss how food blogs are everywhere today but that for generations, information and opinions about food were found in the food sections of newspapers in communities large and small...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio welcomes Anna Boiardi of the infamous Chef Boyardee empire. Anna is the granddaughter of Mario Boiardi, a man who along with his two brothers (including the chef himself, Hector Boiardi) launched a canned pasta empire that now pumps out 2.5 million cans of pasta a day. Anna gives Linda the story behind how the family business came to be, inclu...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is delving into some delicious food memories, using theJewish cuisine on Delancey Street in New York City, as a guide. Welcoming Aaron Rezny, Jordan Schaps, Arthur Schwartz and Cara De Silva to the show, they are the authors and contributors to the book “Eating Delancey: A Celebration of Jewish Food.” Delancey Street conjures up an entire worl...

This week on A Taste of the Past , host Linda Pelaccio is headed to the Grecian Island of Ikaria where inhabitants seemingly forget to die! Chef, author, and Greek food expert Diane Kochilas joins Linda to talk about this amazing place via her new book, “Ikaria: Lessons on Food, Life, and Longevity from the Greek Island Where People Forget to Die.” Diane explains that Ikaria is mythical, beautiful...