What the Food?
Welcome to What the Food?—the history and comedy podcast that dives into the weird, wild, and fascinating history of food, drinks, and dining cultures around the world. We’re Miles, Andy, and Dom—just three friends with a love for food and a knack for uncovering its untold stories. From surprising food origins to the moments that shaped how we eat, we uncover the strange, unexpected, and often hilarious history behind what ends up on our plates. Join us on our next culinary adventure through time!
What the Food?
Eat Pray Obey: The Worst Cult Diets in History (Part 1)
Ever fancied a spiritual journey that involves applesauce, powdered milk, and starvation so severe you hallucinate a raisin?
In this week’s episode of What The Food, we tuck into history’s most deranged cult diets, from the jungle gruel of Jonestown, to Heaven’s Gate’s death-by-pudding, to the one-grain-a-day enlightenment plan of Aum Shinrikyo.
How do cults use food to control people? Why are so many of them obsessed with purification? And can you really find God on a 500-calorie salad?
Join us as we rank the worst of the worst in a roundtable food fight no one asked for, and uncover why the road to salvation is often paved with beige, boiled suffering.
Trigger warning: This episode contains dark themes including starvation, coercion, and mass death, but we’ll hold your hand through it with our usual dose of British humour and sarcasm.
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Thanks for listening, and we’ll catch you on the next one!
Theme music: “Celebration” by Alexander Nakarada. Available for use under the CC BY 4.0 license (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)