Esculent – Details, episodes & analysis

Our inaugural episode features a tasting and conversation with Chef Martin Draluck of the Black Pot Supper Club, with a tasting of the inaugural whiskey from Uncle Nearest, the first black-owned whiskey distillery in the U.S.. It honors Nathan 'Nearest' Green, a formative distiller enslaved to Dan Call. Join us as our host Elizabeth McQueen talks with Chef Martin Draluck about the hearth in early American cooking techniques, performing for the camera in Netflix's High on the Hog, and what it means to reconstruct enslaved culinary histories.

Tasting: Uncle Nearest 1856

High on the Hog, Season 1 Episode 3: Our Founding Fathers

Black Pot Supper Club

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.

A pinch of this and a pinch of that captures my conversation with Chef and Artist Minh Phan. We discuss her methods of fermentation all the way to rethinking efficiency in her anti-colonialist mindset. 

Tasting: Los Angeles River Wine Company, Palomino, 2022 Spam Jingle thanks to Janine Sun Rogers Follow Minh Phan on Instagram LA Times Article: This Michelin-starred chef wants to feed people. So she closed her restaurants

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

Welcome to Season 2: Historians! Dr. Shantel George visits Esculent from the University of Glasgow to discuss the history of the Kola nut, West African spirituality in food history, and community in research. 

Tasting: Coca-cola

Viewing: Series finale of Mad Men, Season 7, Episode 14 (AMC)

Read more about Dr. George’s research and publications

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections

We are back! Season 2: Historians, is here. Join us for six episodes exploring food history: from research methods to turning points in the history of chefs to influential commodities and more. 

Read more about Dr. Amr Shahat's research.

Stay up to date with Esculent on our Instagram

Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.

A belated season trailer - we're still getting the hang of it. Listen to find out why season one begins with chefs, and get a hint at what is coming up in 2025! Cooking with Beer on Emeril Live, Food Network (Season 1, Episode 13, 2002) Chef's Table, Netflix (Season 1, Episode 1, 2015)

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.

Our first live podcast welcomes Chefs Norma LIstman and Saqib Keval. Join us as we taste their historically complex dish of fermented peanuts, the first dish served at their restaurant, Masala y Maiz. Our conversation covers their commitments to radical transparency and rethinking the restaurant model, as well as the limits of representation in a capitalist system, including in their most recent appearance on Netflix's Chef's Table. This one is extra long, and extra good.

Check out Masala y Maiz and stay up to date on their Instagram.

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.

What does esculent mean? Why is it the title of this podcast? And what is the seminar that is funding this project? Professor Daniela Gutiérrez-Flores joins Elizabeth McQueen to unpack the word, and why thinking about the esculent might be useful in approaches to food justice, especially in humanities research. This episode is also a preview for the in-person research colloquium, Reimagining the Past through Food Justice, at UC Davis, December 6-7, 2024.

Tasting: Handheld Pies, Davis Rebop Episode: Oakland Community School Huey P. Newton Interview Cooking Against the Grain Library Exhibit (Online version)

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

Back again. This season hosts four thinkers, shaping and questioning the ideas that make food esculent. 

Reading: Excerpt from Professor Kyla Wazana Tompkins' new book, Deviant Matter (NYU Press, 2024)

Tasting: Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant: 2023 Coteaux du Loir Rouge “Cuvée du Rosier”

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections. Season 3 is supported by Professor Daniela Gutiérrez-Flores. 

The celebrity chef is not a modern concept, as we discuss with Paul Freedman, Professor of History at Yale. Joined by podcast regular Professor Daniela Gutiérrez-Flores, we discuss early modern history, how food comes in and out of fashion, and what artistry might indicate in food history. And the conclusion of Season 2: Historians!

Professor Freedman specializes in medieval social history, the history of Catalonia, comparative studies of the peasantry, trade in luxury products, and the history of cuisine.  His latest books are The Splendor and Opulence of the Past: Studying the Middle Ages in Enlightenment Catalonia (Cornell University Press, 2023) and (co-authored with Marc Aronson) Bite by Bite: American History through Feasts, Food, and Side Dishes (Simon & Schuster, 2024). 

Viewing: Mark Bittman visits El Bulli in 2006, NY Times

Tasting: Chateau Thivin Cote De Brouilly Half Bottle, 2022 from Wine on Piedmont

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Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.

What does it take to understand food historically? This episode takes a philosophical turn as Jeffrey Pilcher, Professor of Food History, joins the podcast to discuss what it means to study, write, and taste food history.

Jeffrey Pilcher is a Professor of History and Food Studies at the University of Toronto, Where he directs the Culinaria Research Centre. He is the author of several books, including Food in World History, 3d ed (2023) and Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food (2012), and the newly released Hopped Up: How Travel, Trade, and Taste Made Beer a Global Commodity (2024).

Viewing: Drunk History, Season 4, Episode 8, ‘Food’

Tasting: Stillwater Brewing’s Saké Style Saison Ale (special shout out to Wine on Piedmont for the suggestion!)

Stay up to date with Esculent on our Instagram

Host: Elizabeth McQueen Producer: Stace Baran Theme by Ronan Delisle Audio Support from Jenevieve Bohmann

This podcast is supported by the UC Davis Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.