Taste Radio

For Marcus Samuelsson, finding the inspiration to cook new and interesting food is often as simple as opening the front door. Outside, the acclaimed chef, restaurateur and television personality sees a country brimming with vibrant cultures and, with it, an opportunity to learn from their cuisines. His perspective is rooted in the PBS TV series, "No Passport Required," which Samuelsson hosts. An e...

While cold brew has been the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. coffee business in recent years, it's just now starting to heat up across the pond. London-based Sandows is one of a handful of British coffee companies paving a path for cold brew in the U.K. and was first to market in the country, according to co-founder Hugh Duffie. Taking their cue from speciality coffee brands in the U.S., Duffi...

BluePrint founders Zoë Sakoutis and Erica Huss admit they don't drink as much juice as they used to. It may seem odd that the creators of BluePrint, which pioneered the packaged cold-pressed juice category and helped mainstream juice cleansing, have cut back on their consumption of fruit and vegetable blends. However, Sakoutis and Huss point out that since the launch of their brand in 2007, there'...

Jon Sebastiani, the founder of Krave Jerky and Sonoma Brands, might want to invest in your company. Just make sure that you're not chasing the latest hot trend. He's really not into that. Sebastiani founded Sonoma Brands, a unique consumer product incubator and private equity firm, in 2015 following the sale of Krave Jerky to The Hershey Co. for $240 million. Earlier this year, Sonoma Brands launc...

It's hard to overestimate the impact that Patty Spence, the founder of market research firm SPINS and CEO of stevia-sweetened beverage brand Zevia, has had on the natural food industry. With SPINS, Spence transformed the way that natural product sales data is tracked and aggregated and in doing so created a powerful resource for a fast-growing industry. After departing SPINS, Spence became the CEO...

Matt McLean, founder and titular figure of organic beverage company Uncle Matt's, is fond of saying that orange juice is ounce-for-ounce the most nutritious beverage on the market. He might be a little biased; after all, orange juice is the brand's flagship line. There are, however, a few qualifiers to his promotion of orange juice, notably organic sourcing and high quality standards, each of whic...

No matter what you're hired to do at Health Warrior, your first assignment is always the same. The company, which makes plant-based snacks and foods, including a flagship line of chia bars, makes all of its new employees build their own desks, without any building materials or instructions. According to co-founder and CEO Shane Emmett, the DIY activity is designed to instill an entrepreneurial min...

It would be fair to say that things are going well for Country Archer. But it wasn't always that way. A maker of clean-label meat snacks, the brand's flagship jerky line is the fastest growing in its category among natural retailers, and the company recently announced $10 million in new funding from its primary investor, Monogram Capital. Nevertheless, not too long ago, Country Archer faced reject...

It may be hard to imagine, especially for millennials and Gen-Zers out there, but there was a time in the not-so-distant past when organic food, sustainable sourcing and fair trade were uncommon sights in the food and beverage industry. Yet, thanks to innovative entrepreneurs like Marci Zaroff, these concepts have now reached the mainstream. Zaroff has been at the forefront of progressive food and...

According to the Oxford English dictionary, a Renaissance man is defined as "a person with many talents or areas of knowledge." It's an apt description for Ben Branson, the founder and CEO of Seedlip, an innovative brand of non-alcoholic distilled spirits. A branding and design specialist by trade, Branson's passion for botany, history and alchemy led him to distillation, a craft in which he's bec...

In his career as a chef, Roy Choi has broken all the rules and written a few new ones. But the award-winning food truck pioneer and restaurateur still respects some time-honored traditions. Take fermentation, for example. While fermented foods have become trendy in recent years, they've been a staple of Asian cuisine and been a constant presence in his cooking. It's one of the reasons that a recen...

It would seem that Andrew Zimmern, the host and co-creator of the popular television series "Bizarre Foods," is willing to try anything at least once. Over the course of the show's 12 seasons, Zimmern has chowed down on stomach-churning foods like raw pig testicles, a frog's beating heart and cobra penis. Yet for someone with such an adventurous palate, Zimmern is particular about trendy food bran...

Take a stroll down the snack aisle of any grocery store in America and there's a strong chance that you'll spot a row of playfully designed pastel bags emblazoned with the words BOOM CHICKA POP in a large hot pink font. One could read the labels from across a room; according to Angie Bastian, the co-founder of better-for-you snack brand Angie's Boomchickapop, that's the point. "It's our job to del...

Zach Koff, the chief operating officer of beloved and fast-growing burger chain Shake Shack, is well aware that Americans are increasingly health conscious and savvy about what they eat. Yet when it comes to a good, old-fashioned meal of a burger, fries and a shake, Koff believes that most folks will choose to part with their kale and quinoa and opt for an indulgent experience. That perspective, a...

While debate over the country's travel and immigration policies continues to dominate the news cycle, Christopher Kimball is thinking beyond borders. The founder of iconic cooking show "America's Test Kitchen," Kimball believes that all food has a cultural value with the potential to bypass walls and transcend politics. "You almost can experience a culture through the food," he said in an intervie...

Stop us when this sounds familiar: two young entrepreneurs have an idea for a disruptive food concept, but lack experience and need help -- with everything. In the case of Amanda Klane and Drew Harrington, who together launched frozen Greek yogurt brand Yasso while fresh out of college, identifying and aligning with the right partners meant building around their vision of success. "When we started...

When considering business decisions, Rip Pruisken, the co-founder and CEO of fast-growing snack brand Rip Van Wafels, asks himself a simple question: "Is it true?" In an interview included in this episode of Taste Radio, Pruisken stated his belief that at the foundation of every decision is a known truth that, when identified and accepted, will present a clear conclusion. "You're trying to really...

Reflecting on a 31-year-career that has seen him evolve from an acclaimed chef and founder of an award-winning restaurant group to a media personality and successful CPG food entrepreneur, Rick Bayless points to authenticity as the guiding principle in his own journey and as an indispensable element to success in the food business. "I want the real deal," Bayless said in an interview included in t...

Brian Rudolph is a big believer in cold calling. The co-founder and CEO of Banza -- a brand of chickpea-based pasta that's promoted as a protein-rich, gluten-free and nutritious alternative to traditional varieties -- said that while rejection is to be expected with unsolicited outreach, persistence and civility have led to big wins for the company. "We got rejected all the time," Rudolph said in...

A co-founder of Boston Beer Co., the maker of Samuel Adams, Rhonda Kallman has seen her share of success. Yet while she's been to the top of the mountain, she's also seen its nadir. Despite the ups and downs of her nearly three decades in the beverage business, she'll tell you that there's been one constant: there's no substitute for entrepreneurship. Kallman's latest project, Boston Harbor Distil...

Nothing says 4th of July like BBQ, fireworks and a special edition of Taste Radio. In this episode we highlight the insights and business lessons from four remarkable leaders who joined us on the podcast in the first half of 2018:JUST founder and CEO Josh Tetrick offered his take on systemic problems within the current food system and the singular operating principle that drives JUST's mission. RE...

How does an industry insider gauge the viability of up-and-coming trends? Well, if you're Bill Weiland, you draw upon decades of experience... and you absolutely consult with your dogs. A veteran of the natural food business for nearly 40 years, Weiland is the founder and CEO of Presence Marketing, the largest independent broker for natural and organic brands in the U.S. He's also the co-founder o...

When it debuted in 2005, Perfect Bar was a tough sell to retailers unfamiliar with the concept of a refrigerated protein bar. But Leigh and Bill Keith, who co-founded the brand along with four other siblings and developed the products based on a family recipe that uses healthier ingredients, slowly achieved traction for Perfect Bar through persistence and a focused business strategy. The brand is...

A disillusioned accountant quits his job and enters the coffee industry, where he builds a thriving direct-to-consumer business selling high-test coffee beans -- that's the short take on Mike Brown, the founder and CEO of Death Wish Coffee. But there's a longer tale to be told, and in this week's episode we sat down with Brown, who launched Death Wish in 2012, to talk about his unconventional bran...

Even as one of the pioneers of the super-premium coffee set often referred to as "third-wave," Blue Bottle founder James Freeman says he was never interested in being ahead of the curve. For Freeman, creating an innovative and lasting brand is "about working on the negative space." Joining Taste Radio for a conversation in this week's episode, Freeman explained how Blue Bottle has built a unique p...