Copper & Heat Radio

It is no secret that 2024 and 2025 have been tough years for food journalism in the United States, with a number layoffs happening across the industry. It’s against this national backdrop that at the end of March we hosted a panel discussion on the Podcast stage at Boise’s Treefort Music Fest. Our live podcast - also a part of Treefort’s Foodfort programming - brought together voices and perspecti...

Exciting announcement: today Copper & Heat Radio is joining Heritage Radio Network, an independent, nonprofit podcast network with a mission to build a more sustainable world by shifting the way we think about food. To mark the occasion, we’re bringing our first episode ever back to the top of the feed.  It’s called “Brigade”, and it’s the first episode in our James Beard Award-winning first seaso...

Join this second panel recorded live at the Roux event in Portland, Oregon in collaboration with Xcelerate. This episode delves into the journeys of four women entrepreneurs in the food industry as they navigate cultural influences, product development, and business growth. Moderated by Viridiana Ponce, the panel features discussions on the importance of community support, unconventional strategie...

Join this panel (recorded live at Roux in Portland, Oregon) of industry-leading women entrepreneurs as they share candid and invaluable insights into navigating business growth through diverse investment strategies, including bootstrapping, venture capital, and angel investing.  This deep-dive discussion covers essential aspects of targeting the right investors, maintaining profitability, and adap...

In this live podcast recorded at the Cookbook Fest in Napa, California, Copper & Heat Radio host Katy chats with Bricia Lopez and Brandon Skier.  The two authors share their backgrounds, discuss their newly published cookbooks, and reflect on their personal journeys in the food industry. They delve into the nuances of restaurant versus home cooking, the significance of the chef title, and the chal...

In the last year, Boise was featured in two vastly different pieces of food news. First Chef Kris Komori of KIN brought home the first Boise James Beard Award. This same year, In N Out opened its first of four locations in the Boise area.  In this episode, Katy discusses the rapidly changing restaurant industry in Boise, Idaho, recorded live at the Treefort Music Fest in March 2024. Katy and a pan...

In this guest episode from Loading Dock Talks with Chef Preeti Mistry, Preeti talks with Chefs Norma Listman and Saqib Keval, the duo behind Masala y Maíz and Marigold in Mexico City. The chefs share their unique culinary backgrounds and the melding of their heritages — Mexican, South Asian, and East African — into their cuisine. They discuss the process behind their lamb barbacoa recipe, a meldin...

Geraldine has started not one, but two international controversies with her blog "The Everywhereist." A three-time guest on Copper & Heat, we first chatted with her 5 years ago about imposter syndrome after winning a James Beard Award for her blog post about Mario Batali's cinnamon rolls, and then again 2 years ago after her blog post about her disastrous meal at Bros in Italy went viral.  Geraldi...

In this episode, Katy talks with chefs Reem Assil of Reem’s California in San Francisco, and Carlo LaMagna of Magna Kusina in Portland, OR, and Magna Kubo in Beaverton.  Reem is a Palestinian-Syrian chef and activist who was a semifinalist for the James Beard Foundation Best Chef West award in 2018 and ‘19 and a finalist for the Outstanding Chef award in 2022. She won a 2023 IACP award for her coo...

In this episode, Katy talks with chefs Ana Castro of Lengua Madre in New Orleans, and “G” Benchawan Painter from Street to Kitchen and Th_Prsrv in Houston. Ana was one of the 2022 Food & Wine Best New Chefs and Lengua Madre was a Bon Appetit 50 Best New Restaurant. G won the 2023 James Beard Award for Best Chef: Texas. In this episode, Katy, Ana, and G talk about dealing with bad customers and rev...

In this first episode, Katy talks with chef and co-owner Emmanuel Chavez of Tatemó in Houston. Emmanuel was recognized as one of the 2023 Food & Wine Best New Chefs, and Tatemó was named a finalist for the 2023 James Beard Foundation Award for Best New Restaurant. In this episode, Katy and Emmanuel talk about his journey to quitting drinking, the responsibilities of leading and taking care of your...

In this last episode of our 5 Year Reflection miniseries, we catch up with Kiah Fuller, co-owner of Far Out Catering in the Bay Area. Plus, we ask the question of all three of our interviewees: what's your biggest takeaway from the last 5 years? 

In this episode, we catch up with Courtney Moisant, former pastry chef of Manresa Restaurant, pastry consultant, and founder of soon-to-open Gelato Coco. When Manresa Restaurant closed for good at the end of 2022, she decided to leave fine dining for good to start her own thing, a trend that Katy & Rachel explore more in the later part of this episode. 

In this episode, we catch up with Edalyn Garcia. Of the 5 women we interviewed in Season 1, she is the only one still working full-time in restaurants and she's worked her way up to Executive Chef. Plus, Katy and Rachel get some updates on the stats of women working their way up the brigade in restaurants in the past 5 years. Last, we talk about why women chefs don't get as much media attention an...

Today's episode is from our friends over at The Sporkful .  Zahra Tabatabai’s parents grew up in an Iran that would be unrecognizable today. “The pictures I see of my family in Iran in the sixties and seventies, they're in bikinis at the beach, drinking beer,” she says. Now, after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, women are legally required to wear hijabs and alcohol is banned. A few years ago, Zahra b...

We have a guest episode this week from our friends at Opening Soon.  In this season of Opening Soon, we’re undertaking a project we’ve been wanting to do for years. In The Build, we’re going to follow one chef’s journey to open a brand new restaurant as it’s happening. From the moment that they signed the lease until the doors are actually open, you’ll get to witness the emotional highs and the lo...

Less than $2. That’s how much the Santa Ana Unified school district can afford to spend on one student’s lunch each day. The $14 billion budget of the National School Lunch program stretches thin, and school nutrition workers are often the target of kids’ complaints. Reporter Jessica Terrell explores the cultural figure of “the lunch lady,” and how students and workers lose when bureaucrats focus...

When Katy was working in the Bay Area in her early 20s, she would have given the Michelin Guide 3 stars, because those were the restaurants she felt like she had to work to learn about the most innovative and interesting food. How has that changed? In this last episode of our fourth season, Katy and Rachel dig into the history, the data, and the money behind the Michelin Guide in the U.S. with hel...

Telly Justice and Mike Sheats worked together at Five & Ten in Athens Ga., where Justice worked her way up to chef de cuisine and Sheats was an AM chef. Once they started their own projects, the chefs knew that the strict brigade system, codified by Georges-Auguste Escoffier more than a hundred years ago, wouldn’t be the right fit for their businesses. “In the kitchens that Mike and I came up in,...

The United States is the top producer of corn in the world, yet only 40% of that corn is destined for someone’s plate. The industrialization of corn in the Americas is a story of colonization, appropriation, and capitalism. But there are also stories of people finding ways to celebrate biodiversity, culture, and history through great corn products.  In this episode, we talk with Pedro Ferbel-Azcar...

Welcome to the Copper & Heat audio tasting menu. This 6-course experience takes you through dishes from pivotal points in the history of the modern tasting menu.  Vote for us in the first inaugural Signal Awards! We were nominated for a Signal Award in the Food & drink category, and we need your help! Vote for us for the Listener’s Choice Award at the link above.  Guests: Beth Forrest Her faculty...

Is culinary school worth the investment in terms of money and time?  This is a question posed by hundreds of thousands of people as they enter the culinary field. Is it worth spending the money to go to culinary school when I can just work my way up in the industry?  Culinary schools have long been more of a trade school to train potential cooks in the culinary field. However, in the ‘90s, the Cul...

Meat in the U.S. has had a complicated history which in recent years has spurred on the resurgence of interest in whole animal butchery and neighborhood butcher shops. But even as meat prices have risen, how have the people working behind the counter been affected? In this episode, we speak with 2 butchers who have had very different careers within the world of butchery. There’s Edgar (he/him), wh...

As cooks and others from the restaurant industry leave traditional jobs to strike out on their own, what does it mean for the craft of cooking? Food is an inherently sensual thing. Sure, it needs to look visually appealing, but that doesn't necessarily say that you are good at the craft of cooking. Does it taste good? Does it smell good? As social media becomes increasingly essential to growing a...

In this re-release of the first episode of our second season, we’re going to Boise, Idaho to talk with the team at Kin Restaurant. In a small city that’s growing and changing rapidly, what does a small, fine-dining, tasting menu restaurant do to not only educate diners on the value of good food but also educate their employees about the value of themselves as restaurant workers? You can find KIN: ...