Alice Waters opened her iconic Berkeley, California restaurant Chez Panisse 54 years ago, introducing the concept of farm-to-table eating to Americans and only serving local, seasonal produce at peak ripeness. She’s also a food activist, and through The Edible Schoolyard Project, has spent the past 30 years showing schools how to integrate locally farmed, organic produce into their cafeterias.

On today’s episode, Alice shares two life-changing experiences that inspired her to open her restaurant; what diners thought about being served two figs for dessert in Chez Panisse’s early days; how schools can afford to serve kids farm fresh food; and what she packed in her own daughter’s lunchbox. And we take a peak inside her her new cookbook, A School Lunch Revolution.

Then the Director of Nutrition Services for California’s Sweet Water Union High School district joins the show to talk about how he flipped the district’s lunch program on its head, buying more than half of the food from local farmers and producers or having the students grow it themselves.

• Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media!
• Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle.
• Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings.
• Follow along on Instagram.
• Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.

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This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from chef and best-selling cookbook author Gaby Dalkin, who's known online and on social as What’s Gaby Cooking.

In this week’s lightning round, Gaby and host Rachel Belle bond over their favorite childhood birthday cake, Gaby shares the late-night, stand-over-the-sink snack she’d never put in a cookbook, and surprises Rachel with her answer to the question, “What do you wish people would ask you about in interviews, that’s not related to food?”

• Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media!

• Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle.

• Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings.

• Follow along on Instagram.
• Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.

Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Earlier this month, at Seattle’s Town Hall, Rachel Belle was a guest on a sold-out, live taping of Seattle Eats with host Tan Vinh, the award-winning food and drink writer for The Seattle Times. Bestselling cookbook author and chef, J. Kenji Lopez-Alt was also a guest!

The first segment of the show is dedicated to Thanksgiving: we learn about a local sushi chef’s recipe for teriyaki turkey, how green bean casserole factors into Tan’s immigrant story, and why Rachel has fond Thanksgiving memories of KFC and Celine Dion. Then Tan asks Rachel and Kenji about their Seattle favorites (best pizza, best bagels, best place to take a date) and Rachel gets to express her love for 1980s salad bars and The Baby-Sitters Club.

Seattle Eats is a production of The Seattle Times and KUOW, part of the NPR network.

• Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media!
• Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show, The Nosh.
• Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings.
• Follow along on Instagram.
• Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.

Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.