The Burnt Toast Podcast

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! It's time for your December Extra Butter!  Today, we’re talking about bellies—and how we’ve been taught to dress them. You need this conversation if you have feelings about: Spanx Horizontal stripes The Millennial structured camisole era + long, flowy tops Always tucking in your shirt/never tucking in your shirt And so much more. If you are already an Extra...

It’s time for your November Indulgence Gospel. Today, we’re doing an old fashioned mailbag episode for you. We are going to chat about grocery shopping. We’re going to talk about what to do if you are “not fat enough” to be in a fat space. We are going to talk about how to get divorced. We’re going to talk about a mom who wants to stop her adult daughter from getting diabetes. And we’re both going...

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! It's time for your November Extra Butter!  This month we’re talking about Emily Oster—and her evolving views on kids, weight and health. We recorded this before the election. But as we all continue to grapple with how America slid to the right, the story of a public health advocate and scholar who is now aligned with conservative media feels especially time...

Today Virginia is chatting with Mara Gordon, MD. Dr. Gordon is a family physician on the faculty of Cooper Medical School of Rowan University, as well as a writer, journalist, and contributor to NPR. Dr. Gordon also writes  Chief Complaint , about her efforts to make medicine more fat friendly, and help her patients and herself explore body liberation and radical bodily autonomy. In our conversati...

Today Virginia is chatting with  Amy Palanjian.   You probably already know Amy as Yummy Toddler Food , which is her blog/ Instagram / Tiktok . She’s also the bestselling author of Dinnertime SOS , and writes a great bi-weekly newsletter called YTF Community , which comes with super helpful meal plans.  Some of you may have listened to our old podcast, Comfort Food , or maybe you’ve just heard Amy...

It’s time for your October Indulgence Gospel. And today… we’re going to look back at all of our Butters! If you’re new here, Butter is the recommendation segment that runs at the end of every podcast episode . Butter is sometimes things you can buy, but it can also be a show or book we love, something great that we ate, a current mood, etc. Butter is any small moment of joy. (It can also, ofc, be...

Today Virginia is chatting with the delightful Julia Turshen!  Julia is a New York Times bestselling cookbook author, and today we’re celebrating her brand new cookbook What Goes With What . WGWW is built on the simple premise that if we understand what makes food delicious, we can feed ourselves well. Nobody understands this better than Julia, who has been excavating the rules, limitations, and h...

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! It's time for your October Extra Butter!  This month we’re diving into some big, hard questions, like: How do you mourn big body changes? What happens if your body size really is the reason you can’t do something you used to love? Does the “Health At Every Size” framework ever fail fat people? When is it systemic oppression and when is it just…physics? Or…d...

It's time for your Indulgence Gospel!  And today we’re talking all things Fat Travel! We’ll be answering your questions, sharing travel hacks, and just getting into the nitty gritty of how to be a fat person going places in the world. And so much more! To hear the whole conversation or read the whole transcript, you'll need to become a paid Burnt Toast subscriber.  EPISODE CREDITS Co-hosts: Virgin...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith, and today my guest is Claire Ayoub. Claire is the writer and director of the brand new feature film—opening tomorrow!!— called Empire Waist , a heartfelt comedy about teens learning to love their bodies through fashion design and friendship. I saw Empire Waist a couple of days before I interviewed Claire, and I haven’t been this excited abo...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith, and today my guest is Nicola Salmon . Nicola is a leading voice for fat folks seeking fertility support, and author of the book Fat and Fertile . As a fertility coach and fat activist, Nicola works to challenge the fertility industry’s entrenched weight bias and empower marginalized folks to take control of their reproductive health. (You m...

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! It's time for your September Extra Butter!  Today we are discussing... dating as a fat person! We'll get into navigating the apps, Corinne's rules for first dates, and why do so many cishet men post fishing pictures.  If you are already an Extra Butter subscriber, you’ll have this entire episode in your podcast feed and access to the entire transcript in yo...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith, and today my guest is romance author Nisha Sharma . 🔥 Nisha is a young adult and adult contemporary romance writer whose books have been included in “Best Of” lists by the New York Times , Entertainment Weekly, Cosmopolitan , The Washington Post , Time Magazine and more. When she’s not writing about people of color experiencing radical joy...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay, and it’s time for another Indulgence Gospel. It’s the last week of our summer break, so we’ll be back after Labor Day with all new podcast episodes for you. We so appreciate everyone who has been continuing to listen and support the podcast during our hiatus . It means a lot to know that our community enjoys our work and...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith, and today I am chatting with the brilliant Laura Thomas, PhD. Laura is a Registered Nutritionist who specializes in responsive feeding and anti-diet, body affirming nutrition. Her work centers on helping parents and families end inter-generational dieting and body shame, and work towards a greater sense of embodiment and ease in their relat...

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! This month we’re unpacking content from Rosey Beeme, Brianne Huntsman, and other influencers who long identified as body positive, plus size fashion folks—and now are talking proudly about their intentional weight loss journeys. But it’s not a moral failing if you can’t wipe your own ass. CW: This episode includes some unavoidable discussion of intentional...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith, and today my guest is my good friend Lyz Lenz. lyz is a journalist living in Iowa. She is the writer behind the newsletter Men Yell at Me , and the New York Times bestselling author of This American Ex-Wife: How I Ended My Marriage and Started My Life . In this brave, brilliant, impeccably researched book, Lyz offers us a clear solution to...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay , and it’s time for your July Indulgence Gospel! We’ll be getting into: Millennial vs Gen Z feelings about socks How to even begin a closet reorganization project What to do when the roller coaster doesn’t fit your body. And so much more! This is a paywalled episode. That means to hear the whole thing you’ll need to be a p...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith. Today I’m chatting Anita Bhagwandas, author of Ugly: Giving Us Back Our Beauty Standards . Anita is an award winning journalist who explores beauty culture, unpicks aesthetic standards, and questions how pretty privilege holds the power to shape so much of our lives. Anita also writes The Powder Room , is a beauty columnist for The Guardian...

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! 🧈🧈🧈It’s time for your July Extra Butter! Today we are discussing the intersection of sobriety and diet culture—and taste testing a whole bunch of mocktails! 🍹🍹🧈 To listen to the full episode and read the full transcript, you’ll need to join Extra Butter , our premium subscription tier. In these monthly episodes we get into the GOOD stuff like: Why all...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith. Today I’m chatting with Melissa Walker, head of Giving Circles at The States Project about how to save democracy. And yes, it’s July 4, so we are technically off today—but it is also America’s birthday and a very, very scary and complicated time to be an American. We recorded this conversation before last week’s debate dumpster fire and thi...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! We are Virginia Sole-Smith and Corinne Fay , and it’s time for your June Indulgence Gospel! We’ve got an old-fashioned listener Q roundup today, including: How should we think about breast reductions—are they medically necessary or diet culture or both? How are we solving chub rub this summer? Do they make fat-friendly toilet seats? (Corinne says yes!) And so much...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith. Today I’m chatting with Angel Austin and Ani Janzen from the Association for Size Diversity and Health . ASDAH’s purpose is to create the conditions for people of all sizes, particularly those most impacted by systemic anti-fat bias, to have equitable and barrier free access to the care and healthcare resources we need to support our well-b...

Welcome to Indulgence Gospel After Dark! 🧈🧈🧈It’s time for your June Extra Butter! Today we are giving you a behind-the-scenes look at how we make Burnt Toast. And yes, finally addressing some of the butter-related Internet rumors about Virginia’s personal life. 🧈🧈🧈 To listen to the full episode and read the full transcript, you’ll need to join Extra Butter , our premium subscription tier. Ex...

You’re listening to Burnt Toast! I’m Virginia Sole-Smith. Today I’m chatting with jenn romolini . Jenn is a longtime journalist and magazine editor. She co-hosts the podcast Everything Is Fine with Kim France and writes the Substack extended scenes . And Jenn’s new memoir Ambition Monster is just out this week!  Ambition Monster is a deeply personal memoir about workaholism, the addictive nature o...