Podcast
Food Sleuth Radio
Hosted by Melinda Hemmelgarn · ENGLISH
Dietitian Melinda Hemmelgarn helps listeners “think beyond their plates,” connect the dots between food, health and agriculture, and find food truth.
891episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Leo Horrigan, Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future, and author of What if Soil Microbes Mattered? Our Health Depends on Them
Oct 3100:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know that soil health is integral to life on earth? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Leo Horrigan, MS, Food System Correspondent for the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future, and author of What if Soil Microbes Mattered? Our Health Depends on Them. Horrigan explains how and why successful farming starts below ground. He describes the symbiotic relationship between soil microbes and plants to support human and planetary health. He also explains how common practices used in conventional/chemical agriculture (synthetic pesticides, fertilizers and tillage) harm soil microbes. On a positive note, regenerative/organic agriculture offers great potential for a brighter farming future.Related Websites: https://clf.jhsph.edu/sites/default/files/2025-08/what-if-soil-microbes-mattered-1.pdf/
Transcribe →Mariana Chilton, PhD, MPH, author of The Painful Truth About Hunger In America: Why We Must Unlearn Everything We Think We Know -- and Start Again.
Oct 2300:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know that the solution to hunger is solidarity, not charity? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Mariana Chilton, PhD, MPH, Professor, U. of Mass Amherst School of Public Health and Health Sciences, and author of The Painful Truth About Hunger in America: Why We Must Unlearn Everything We Think We Know and Start Again. (MIT, 2024). Chilton discusses the trauma of hunger, the structural issues that undergird hunger, the devastating impact of hunger on children, and who really benefits from keeping people in a state of precarity. She explains how the solutions to hunger lie far beyond food, and are based in compassion, empathy, solidarity and loving kindness.Related Websites: www.drmarianachilton.com
Transcribe →Charlotte Vallaeys, MS, discusses the multiple benefits of organic, and confusion over “regenerative agriculture.”
Oct 1700:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know organic agriculture has a legal definition, but “regenerative” agriculture does not? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Charlotte Vallaeys, MS, independent consultant, advocate, and champion of organic agriculture. Board member of Organic Voices and the Organic Farming Research Foundation, Vallaeys discusses the definition of organic, its multiple benefits to health, environment and climate, and consumer confusion over the term “regenerative agriculture.” Related Websites: Real organic podcast: https://realorganicproject.org/charlotte-vallaeys-outcome-based-agriculture-pitfalls-episode-one-hundred-eight/
Transcribe →Heather Norman-Burgdolf, PhD, University of Kentucky, author of “Food Allergens: Alpha Gal.”
Oct 900:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know that the sugar responsible for alpha-gal allergy is widespread in processed food products, drugs and dietary supplements? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Heather Norman-Burgdolf, PhD, Associate Extension Professor in the Department of Dietetics and Human Nutrition at the University of Kentucky, and author of “Food Allergens: Alpha Gal.” Norman-Burgdolf discusses ways to navigate the alpha-gal allergy, which ranks as the tenth most prevalent food allergy in the United States.Related Websites: https://publications.ca.uky.edu/sites/publications.ca.uky.edu/files/FCS3646.pdf
Transcribe →Sharon Forsyth, patient advocate for the Alpha-gal syndrome community.
Oct 300:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know that a tick bite could lead to a food allergy? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Sharon Forsyth, conservationist and patient advocate for the alpha-gal syndrome community. Forsyth created Alpha-gal Information.org, a comprehensive informational resource on AGS. She discusses how to avoid tick bites and the challenges of living with alpha-gal food allergy (also known as mammalian meat allergy).Related Websites: https://alphagalaction.org/
Transcribe →Stephan van Vliet, PhD, Director of the Center for Nutrition Studies at Utah State University explains how farming practices impact nutrition quality of food.
Sep 2600:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know that agricultural practices influence the nutritional quality of our food? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Stephen van Vliet, PhD, Assistant Professor and Director of the Center for Nutrition Studies at Utah State University. Van Vliet explains his investigation into how farming practices impact our environment, nutrient density, and nutritional quality of foods.Related Websites: https://stephanvanvliet.com/
Transcribe →Katherine Pryor, children’s book author, discusses her latest title: Attack of the Hangries
Sep 2000:28:09Tap to summarizeDid you know that being hungry can affect our mood and behaviors? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Katherine Pryor, award-winning children’s book author, and good food advocate, whose latest title: The Attack of the Hangries, helps parents, teachers and children understand what happens when our fuel supplies run low, and how to stay well nourished. Beyond education and entertainment, this book can be used to help support food assistance programs (which serve one out of every 5 children in the United States), universal school meals, and school food policies.Related Websites: www.katherinepryor.com
Transcribe →Todd Larsen, MA, Executive Co-Director for Green America discusses child labor in the industrialized livestock industry
Sep 1200:28:14Tap to summarizeDid you know that Tyson, Perdue, Cargill, and JBS have all been found to have children working in their meat processing facilities? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Todd Larsen, MA, Executive Co-Director for Green America, who will explain how and why U.S. children are working in agriculture, restaurants, and meatpacking industries.Related Websites: www.enduschildlabor.org
Transcribe →Joseph Llobrera, PhD, Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, discusses cuts to food assistance programs in the GOP’s Budget Reconciliation Bill.
Sep 500:28:14Tap to summarizeDid you know that one in five children in the U.S. receives food assistance? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Joseph Llobrera, PhD, Director of Research for the Food Assistance Team at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. Llobrera discusses low-wage workers who depend on SNAP, and the far-reaching economic and health impacts of cuts to both food assistance and health care in the GOP’s Budget Reconciliation Bill. ImpactsRelated Websites: https://www.cbpp.org/sites/default/files/5-29-25sfp-factsheets_rev8-1-25-national.pdf
Transcribe →Terrence Collingsworth, Founder and Executive Director of International Rights Advocates
Aug 3000:27:53Tap to summarizeDid you know that some of the most popular brands of chocolate rely on child labor/slavery on cocoa plantations? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Terrence Collingsworth, Founder and Executive Director of International Rights Advocates, which works globally to stop corporate human rights abuses and end modern day slavery. Collingsworth will discuss how children are kidnapped, taken to cocoa plantations, and the conditions of their forced labor. He exposes chocolate brands to avoid, and how to find chocolate that is free of child slavery. See: https://www.slavefreechocolate.org/ethical-chocolate-companies. To see films exposing child labor in the chocolate industry, see the Dark Side of Chocolate: https://www.slavefreechocolate.org/dark-side-of-chocolate and The Chocolate War: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9K2yevB8IURelated Websites: https://www.internationalrightsadvocates.org/
Transcribe →