Eat Your Heartland Out Heritage Radio Network

We travel to the Land of Lincoln to visit Scratch Brewing Company, where brewer and co-owner Marika Josephson gives us a taste of what inspires their unique brewing style that incorporates botanicals and local forged ingredients. Then it’s over to Springfield to meet Amy Beadle, marketing manager of the town’s convention and visitor bureau, who introduces us to the famed horseshoe sandwich that Springfield put on the map.

This episode celebrates the diverse Middle Eastern flavors that are part of the Midwestern culinary landscape. Meet Zehorit Heilicher, a Yemenite raised in Israel who is now a Minnesota based culinary instructor behind the website mideasttomidwest.com. And, get a taste of Galit, a Middle Eastern fine dining restaurant in Chicago. I will talk with their co-owner and chef, James Beard Award winner Zach Engel.

Meet Sabrina Servais, a third-generation farmer and the herd manager at Hamburg Hills, an organic dairy farm and part of the Organic Valley co-op located in Wisconsin. After earning her degree at UW-Madison, she returned to her roots on the farm where she has been caring for animals since she was a child. Sabrina is leading the way for a new generation of young women in farming.

Join us for a deep dive into Iowa’s culinary culture with food historian, author, and Iowa storyteller Darcy Maulsby. We go beyond corn and pork tenderloins to explore everything from indigenous farming traditions to how the chop suey craze swept Des Moines in the early 20th Century.

As an Iowa Storyteller, Darcy believes anyone who eats has a connection to the things she’s passionate about, including food, farming, and history. Darcy writes about the food-to-fork connection for clients through her non-fiction books, including “A Culinary History of Iowa”, “Classic Restaurants of Des Moines and Their Recipes,” and "Iowa Agriculture: A History of Farming, Family and Food."

This episode is a personal one. I’m going to introduce you to my new TV series coming to public television stations nationwide starting in April. America The Bountiful aims to capture the nation’s cultural story by using food as a guide. I will be joined by the show’s director and fellow executive producer Jesse Roesler of Minneapolis-based Credo Nonfiction. And, expect some other special interviews with guests who have previously appeared on Eat Your Heartland Out and will now be featured in America The Bountiful.

Cheese is the star of this episode of the show. I speak with anthropologist and author Heather Paxson. Her book, The Life of Cheese: Crafting Food and Value in America, tells the cultural and economic story of cheese. Then I will introduce you to Andy Hatch, proprietor and master cheesemaker at Uplands Cheese in Wisconsin, for a front row seat to Farmstead Cheesemaking.