A Persian homecoming, noodle soup dreams, and a natural wine party

Hosted by Evan Kleiman Feb. 09, 2019 Food & Drink

Persian cooking expert Najmieh Batmanglij baking bread. Photo courtesy of Batmanglij

Persian cooking expert Najmieh Batmanglij talks to Evan about what it was like to return to Iran and cook there after years of exile. Noodle soup is the stuff of dreams, for food historian Ken Albala. Richard Parks III takes us on a whirlwind visit to the world’s largest natural wine fair, and a biomolecular archaeologist tells us what kind of alcoholic beverages the ancients drank.

From this Episode:

The queen of Persian cooking goes home for her latest book

Najmieh Batmanglij is perhaps the foremost authority on Persian cuisine in the Western world, if not outside of Iran.

14 min

For some, noodle soup is worth obsessing over

Ken Albala is a noted food historian and prolific cookbook author—and you might call him a noodle soup fanatic. So much that he made a different noodle soup every day, for...

12 min

What’s all the fuss about natural wine?

Natural wine—or wine made with minimal intervention—is a booming industry. And for some obsessives, it’s practically a religion.

12 min

Drinking like the ancients

Humans have been using natural processes to make wine and beer for eons. But what do we know about what they tasted like, and what if we could recreate them today?

10 min