A Splendid Show

I caught The Splendid Table this week, an unusual thing for me. I was glad I did, as the radio show had a few Wasted Food-related scraps.

In this great feature on Tater Tots, we learn that Ore-Ida created potato puffs as a way to put spud scraps to use. Now, the potato castaways that were once fed to livestock are molded into edible cylinders. No wonder school lunches often paired tots with hot dogs–they’re culinary cousins!

The program also features a recurring segment called “Stump the Cook,” which essentially provides advice on how to use up the ingredients you have. Callers give host Lynne Rosetto Kasper five ingredients that they need to use up and she spits out an impromptu meal. This week’s segment involved–no kidding–goat!
The segment reminded me of The Use It Up Cookbook. But more than anything, it made me think of Stump the Chump, on my preferred NPR show, Car Talk.

Unrelated to waste, Rosetto Kasper also interviewed the author of Banana: The Fate of the Fruit That Changed the World. Sounds like it would make for interesting reading. You can listen to the entire show here.