DeepSummary
The episode features an interview with co-host Nicola Twilley about her new book 'Frostbite: How Refrigeration Changed Our Food, Our Planet, and Ourselves'. Twilley discusses the history of refrigeration, including key figures like Frederick Tudor, who started the ice trade from New England, and scientists like William Cullen and Polly Pennington, who helped make refrigeration safe and scientific. She also explores the implications of refrigeration on food waste, flavor, the environment, and climate change.
Twilley explains how refrigeration revolutionized food preservation and transportation, enabling year-round availability of fresh produce and the creation of a global food supply chain. However, she also highlights the negative impacts, such as increased energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions from refrigerants, and a disconnect from local, seasonal food systems.
The episode also covers the potential of innovative technologies like Apeel, a company that creates edible coatings to preserve produce without refrigeration. Twilley discusses how solutions like Apeel could help reduce the climate impact of refrigeration while increasing access to diverse, nutritious foods, particularly in developing regions without extensive cold chains.
Key Episodes Takeaways
- Refrigeration is a relatively recent innovation, becoming commercialized in the late 1800s and widespread in homes only in the 1920s.
- While enabling year-round access to fresh foods, refrigeration has negative impacts on the environment through energy use and greenhouse gas emissions from refrigerants.
- Pioneers like Frederick Tudor and Polly Pennington played key roles in developing and scientifically validating refrigeration practices.
- Innovative technologies like Apeel's edible coatings could help reduce reliance on energy-intensive refrigeration while increasing food preservation and diversity.
- As developing regions build out cold supply chains, sustainable alternatives to traditional refrigeration should be explored to mitigate climate impacts.
- Our food systems should be re-examined and redesigned with considerations for resilience, equity, health, and environmental sustainability rather than defaulting to existing refrigeration models.
- Refrigeration transformed food transportation and enabled the creation of a global food supply chain, but also disconnected many from local, seasonal eating patterns.
- Addressing food waste, a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, is both a challenge and opportunity in our refrigerated food systems.
Top Episodes Quotes
- “The first written evidence goes back nearly 4000 years to the Middle east, what is now Syria, on the banks of the Euphrates. There were ice houses, apparently. We don't know what they were using that ice for at all. There's just a written reference to the fact they were there. They were heavily guarded, and they were so in demand that the ice would run out within three days of being brought down from the mountains.“ by Nicola Twilley
- “She redesigned the refrigerated railcars so it actually worked. She made refrigeration scientific.“ by Nicola Twilley
- “The thing that actually makes me personally most excited about what were doing is being able to bring a greater biodiversity of produce to retail shelves, because the number one characteristic that people breed for today is transportability. If it's not transportable, it's not economically viable.“ by James Rogers
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Episode Information
Gastropod
Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley
6/11/24
For as long as we’ve been making Gastropod, co-host Nicky has also been working on another project: writing a book all about refrigeration. Well, time to pop the champagne you’ve had stashed in the icebox, because that book comes out June 25—and we’re giving Gastropod listeners an exclusive preview! This episode, Cynthia and Nicky talk about how a high school dropout's get-rich-quick scheme, some deadly explosions, and lots and lots of beer brought us the humming boxes of cold now ubiquitous in the modern kitchen—and how the proliferation of this portable, on-demand winter has transformed our food (not always for the better) while heating up our planet. It's almost impossible to imagine living without a fridge, but Nicky’s book totally changed the way we look at preserving food. Is there a better way? Listen to find out, and for the rest of the story, be sure to pre-order Frostbite: How Refrigeration Changed Our Food, Our Planet, and Ourselves!
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