Delicious History

Who doesn't like a good story from Down Under? When the Australian government tried to kill two birds with one stone by helping World War I vets grow large amounts of wheat, they never anticipated the third bird: more than 20,000 emus.

Find out how farmers in Western Australia and the military got in over their heads with the Great Emu War!

Look who's back! After going over the structure of the late Bronze Age in our last episode, we go over what toppled the house of cards that had been set up for centuries.

What finally did it in? Was it the Sea People, food shortages or just own poor planning? We talk about that and more in this week's episode!

How is it possible that one of the greatest fighting forces in the world came toe-to-toe with bee food and lost? In our first full episode, we'll be discussing "mad honey" and the effects it had on Pompey the Great's armies.

Continuing with our theme of food and Italian fascism, we discuss how Futurists set the stage for the new political changes that were about to come. While most of Europe was starting to see their colonialist policies as something of a relic of the past, Italians felt that they had to catch up. How would they get the public on board? The only way they knew how: through their stomachs!

Once again, we are joined by Dr. Diana Garvin, author of Feeding Fascism: The Politics of Women's Food Work and professor of Italian studies at the University of Oregon. This week she goes into great detail about how the Italian Futurists used the strange and wonderful foods of Eastern Africa to set the stage for the horrible atrocities that were to would come.

When you think of Italian food, the first thing that probably comes to mind is pasta. But the truth is that Italian is extremely diverse and that diversity has played a huge part in its development, especially during the fascist regime of Mussolini.

This week we are joined by special guest Dr. Diana Garvin, professor of Italian studies at the University of Oregon and author of Feeding Fascism: The Politics of Women's Food Work. She helps us to understand the role that Italian rice weeders played in changing hearts and minds during some of Italy's darkest days. Plus, how they filled people's stomachs with risotto!