This month, Repast welcomes Sarah Lohman, culinary historian, author, and speaker, about her new book, Endangered Eating: America’s Vanishing Foods. In this book, a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, a Food & Wine Best Book of 2023, and an Eater Best Food Book, Fall 2023, Lohman explores the history and present of certain ingredients from the Ark of Taste, a list put together by Slow Food of important regional foods. She is also the author of Eight Flavors: The Untold Story of American Cuisine, which explores the cultural history behind eight particularly American flavors. Over her career, Sarah’s work has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and more.

You can buy Endangered Eating: America’s Vanishing Foods here.

You can read about Sarah Lohman and her other work here.

Michael T. Roberts is the Executive Director of the Resnick Center for Food Law & Policy at UCLA Law.

Diana Winters is the Deputy Director of the Resnick Center for Food Law & Policy at UCLA Law.

In this episode of Repast, Michael and Diana were delighted to talk with Xaq Frohlich, Professor of History at Auburn University and author of From Label to Table: Regulating Food in the Information Age, recently published by the University of California Press. From Label to Table is a fascinating dive into the historical development of the food label from a multi-faceted perspective. Michael, Diana, and Xaq discuss the historical development of the label, the use of information in regulation, the intersection of power and food, and more.

You can find Xaq Frohlich’s bio here.

https://cla.auburn.edu/directory/xaq-frohlich

You can find From Label to Table here.

https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520298811/from-label-to-table 

Michael T. Roberts is the Executive Director of the Resnick Center for Food Law & Policy at UCLA Law.

https://law.ucla.edu/faculty/faculty-profiles/michael-t-roberts

Diana Winters is the Deputy Director of the Resnick Center for Food Law & Policy at UCLA Law.

https://law.ucla.edu/faculty/faculty-profiles/diana-r-h-winters 

In this episode of Repast, Michael and Diana welcome Dr. Caree Cotwright, the Director of Nutrition Security and Health Equity for the Food and Nutrition Service, USDA.  In her role at USDA, Dr. Cotwright leads a whole-of-department approach at USDA to advance food and nutrition security, which is one of USDA Secretary Vilsacks five core priorities.  

Dr. Cotwright is on leave from her position as an associate professor in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at the College of Family and Consumer Science at the University of Georgia, where she has been since 2013.  She received her undergraduate degree in biology from Howard University before moving on to UGA, where she completed her master’s and doctorate degrees in nutrition.  At the University of Georgia, she conducted early childhood obesity prevention research efforts focusing on youth ages 0-5 using innovative and multidisciplinary methods.

 Here, Dr. Cotwright notes how her personal background influenced her professional direction, and discusses the USDA’s approach to food and nutrition security, scaffolded by the four pillars of (1) providing meaningful nutrition support from pregnancy to birth and beyond; (2) working to connect everyone in this country with healthy, safe, affordable food sources; (3) developing, translating, and enacting nutrition science through partnership including the National MyPlate Strategic Partnerships, and (4) prioritizing equity every step of the way.  She focuses on two specific programs—Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, and the new summer EPT program, scheduled for roll-out in 2024—and how the USDA is working to make MyPlate a household symbol.  

You can find Dr. Cotwright’s UGA profile here.

Michael T. Roberts is the Executive Director of the Resnick Center for Food Law & Policy at UCLA Law.

Diana Winters is the Deputy Director of the Resnick Center for Food Law & Policy at UCLA Law.

You can find more on the USDA’s approach to nutrition security here.

Learn about USDA’s MyPlate initiative here.

Follow the MyPlate Instagram at @myplate_gov.

Or email pictures of MyPlate in the wild or MyPlate feedback to Caree.Cotwright@usda.gov.

You can find the Repast episode with former Director of Nutrition Security and Health Equity, Dr. Sara Bleich, here.