October 25, 2019 • 45 mins
This winter squash and its pie spice blend have a rep for being basic, but in our classic episode, Anney and Lauren go behind the gourd to explore pumpkin's history as food, decor, and phenomenon.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hello, I'm welcome to save a prediction of I Heart
Radio and Steffidia. I'm Annyis and I'm Lauren Vogelbaum, and
today we have for you a classic fall themed episode
about pumpkin, one of the great loves of my life. Yeah,
oh god, yeah, oh my god. Um. I haven't carved
my pumpkin yet, have you? No, I haven't. Um, I
(00:28):
haven't done my whole like like fall. It's been so
warm here today that we are recording. This is literally
the first day that the temperature has been anywhere near
fall like. According to me, I had to go back
inside and get a jacket before I left. A jacket,
a jacket, sweater weather what So yeah, um, because ay
(00:49):
we we you know this. This is an older episode
from way backing off food stuff days. Um and and
be yeah, pumpkins, good times, so much to be said,
they're oh my heck, there is yes um And also,
I guess it's just been kind of like in my
head since we did our Turnip episode and did that
(01:09):
rerun of the Stingy Jack telling. So you get to
listen to that again if you want to skip past it,
do what you want. I can't tell you what to do.
I think you should definitely listen again and then send
in your your take off. That would be so good. Yes,
do you know, Lauren and I love anything that's kind
(01:29):
of spooky, creepy, all that realm, So we would love
that absolutely. So we're going to let former Annie and
Lauren take it away. Hello, and welcome to food Stuff.
(01:54):
I'm Annie Reeve and I'm Lauren vocal Bam and today
it's the pumpkin episode. Yes, but don't roll your eyes
and click away just yet. So don't I know, it's
pumpkin everything, and it's kind of an overdone trend at
this point really, but yeah, it's pumpkin is really interesting
when you think about it, because it's a food and
a decoration and it feels kind of new to me.
(02:14):
I mean, does it feel near to you apart from
now we're reaching saturation point? But yeah, yeah, aside well,
I mean, I don't know. Yeah, it's it's it's got
such a long history. It's one of the first cultivated
foods ever. Yeah, and we just I feel like in
the United States we haven't been eating it that long
and we still kind of don't utilize it. We kind
(02:36):
of go back and forth about it. Yeah, there we
have periods of eating it and then just table decoration.
It's it's really okay. So I checked Google trends, and
the search graft for pumpkin is just hilariously peaked. Um.
Every October the search is spike like one thousand nine.
That is quite a percent versus the rest of the year. Yeah,
(02:58):
it's it's nuts. Um we peak pumpkin searches. By the way,
it's never pumpkin search. Searches for pumpkin spice, meanwhile, have
been trending upward since Google started recording data in two
thousand four, with really huge yearly jumps again in October
starting starting mostly um. Also, no one outside of the
(03:20):
United States in Canada gives a single fig about pumpkin
spice anything, according to Google. So really, yeah, it's just
a low, steady burn trend. Yeah. I like the measurement
of fig as well. We should adopt that. How many
figs do I get? Three figs? Three figs like pumpkin. Yeah,
(03:41):
let's talk about it. Let's let's do that thing. If
you're if you're from the United States anyway, that the
word pumpkin probably evokes a really specific image like a
large squash that has this hard, smooth ribbed, orange colored
shell that's harvested in the fall. But the term can
actually refer to this really ridiculous number of different species
(04:02):
and cultivars within that species, cultivars being strains that have
been bred by humans for specific properties. They're all in
the genus Cucurbita probably um, and most are in the
species Cucurbita peppo, which is actually just this tremendously huge category. Technically,
zucchini a k a. Corgette for many of our European listeners,
(04:24):
is the same species as pumpkin, really same species. They
don't look anything alike, Nope. Cultivars uh squash in general
are are categorized as summer or winter varieties based on
when they're harvested. The summer types, like zucchini, have soft
skins and soft seeds and are harvested in the summer.
(04:46):
The winter types tend to have these hard, kind of
gordy skins, which are natural preservers um. If you keep
them in a cool, dark place, they'll hold up for
at least two months without any kind of intervention, and um.
The seeds are a little bit harder to they should
really be cooked in some way before you consume them. Yeah,
but what is it? What is it? Well, pumpkin is
(05:07):
a fruit botanically speaking, a berry. Actually, what it's like tomatoes? Uh,
they're they're the ovary of the pumpkin flower that has
grown large enough to contain, protect the growth of, and
hopefully distribute lots of seeds. Uh. These flowers and their
resulting fruit grow on vines, and the fruit gets really
big if you give them enough resources to do so.
(05:29):
The biggest on record is from a Belgian grower in
his pumpkin weigh two thousand, six hundred and twenty four
pounds a k A like one thousands a k A,
just a little bit less than a Honda Civic. WHOA,
So you and I both have Honda Civics, and I'm
just trying to imagine replacing my Honda Civic with AIG
(05:53):
and then the weight being similar. That is enormous. We
could certainly both fit with cargo room inside of one
of these pumpkins. All you're worth looking into talk about Cinderella, right, Yeah,
pumpkins are grown all over the world, by the way.
The only continent they can't grow on is Antarctica. Let
(06:15):
I mean, I suppose that indoors in a greenhouse, you
could probably make it happen. Probably, I guess not too
much grows in Antarctica when you think about it. Um,
and they're grown for multiple uses, animal feed decoration and
human feed consumption. Yeah, they grow during a single season.
Seeds planted in late spring will mature to full fruit
(06:36):
by fall. This reminds me. I have a friend who
angrily threw her jack o lantern once and it still
has seeds in it, and she ended up growing like
several pumpkins, which I thought it was kind of bizarre
because I feel like I've thrown pumpkin seeds out and
nothing's happened. But maybe she had the right just had
(06:57):
the right conditions for the right velocity of throw. Oh
and it just worked out, I guess. And uh like
we kind of hit on it. It's kind of a
new trend in the US, but I've seen pumpkin and
grocery stores and in both sweet and savory dishes when traveling,
especially in Asia and Australia. I remember the first time
(07:18):
I saw it in a store in Australia. It was
just in chunks like packaged chunks um, and you can
find small hole pumpkins in Japanese savory dishes like tempura
um roasted like any other vegetable in Australia, New Zealand
as a sweet in India and the Middle East, in
pastas in Italy. In places like China and Kenya, the
(07:38):
leaves are steamed and eaten. Pumpkin and squash blossoms are
very popular in Mexico and the southwestern US. You find
it and most parts of it used every which way,
from super sweet candies and Tomali's. I've even heard there's
a tour through Mexico where you just go and try
all the different types of pumpkin, all the different color bezas. Yeah, exactly,
(08:00):
that sounds delicious. Um. And there's this pumpkin soup. I
still regret not trying. I was hiking in the Andes
and crew, but I got altitude sickness the one day
they served pumpkin soup and they served it in the
pumpkin and I love pumpkin and soup, and I was
so upset that there was no way, no way. I
(08:24):
was like seeing spots falling slowly out of my chair.
Now next, next time, next time. Next time I'm hiking
in the Andies, I will not get out to sickness.
Certainly not on Pumpkin Soup Day. Yes, of all the days,
the pumpkin industry is having a bit of a heyday.
(08:44):
In the US, pumpkin production went from around a seventy
five million dollar industry in two thousand and one to
at three million dollar one. It's quite the jump, And
most of the pumpkins were buying in the store. Are
are the big Halloween pumpkins that we think of, Yes,
generally the big orange ones. And then the second type
(09:06):
you're most likely to encounter in a grocery store is
a processing pumpkin processing, Yes, which I believe is so
named because a majority of them end up in processing
plants where their flesh is processed, canned, and shipped to
grocery stores as pie filling, pipe filling, or the like.
(09:27):
So that sounds kind of horrifying the use of the
word flesh generally. Yeah. Most pumpkins candor otherwise in the
US also come from Illinois. Illinois lead the way in
US pumpkin production, with million pounds of pumpkin produced. Also,
the seeds pumpkin seeds are eaten as snacks, roasted, usually
(09:51):
either by themselves or as ingredients and stuff like like granola.
They're also processed into seed oil, which can be used
in cooking, as a health supplement of dubious health property um,
and in beauty products. The global pumpkin seed industry is
reportedly growing fast. For all y'all investors out there, I
know there's so many listening and like, I gotta get
(10:11):
in on this pumpkin business right now. Uh. Pepita's, by
the way, are a type of pumpkin seed that comes
from a particular varietal of pumpkin that produces seeds that
do not have holes. Um. So, so they're the little
green kind of thing. That's a that's a holeless pumpkin seed.
The white variety that you'd find in your carving pumpkins
have the hall on them. That's the whole party. Um.
(10:33):
They're especially popular in Mexico, where where cucabita peppo originated
as both a snack and a recipe ingredient um, either
whole or ground up into a nice little paste. I
do love pumpkin seeds. Oh yeah. We have to have
a sweet recipe and a savory recipe. Very good. I've
never made a sweet recipe work anyway anyway. Yes, Also,
(10:54):
the can pumpkin is probably mostly not pumpkin. Other squashes,
yeah at least Yeah, if you look on the back
it says um but a lot of and a lot
of instances United States canned pumpkin is some other kind
of winter squash. Yeah, there's usually a little bit of
pumpkin in there, but mostly not. Grocery stores are lying
(11:15):
twists again, surprise, surprise. So that's briefly what pumpkin is.
But let's talk about the history of pumpkin as a
food because this is a food show. We're we're also
going to talk a little bit about the history of
pumpkins decoration. Well, yeah, I can't not talk about it,
I mean absolutely, But first we're going to take a
quick break for a word from our sponsor, and we're back.
(11:47):
Thank you sponsor. So, the oldest evidence archaeologists have found
of pumpkins comes from the Wahaka Highlands of Mexico, dating
back seven thousand, five hundred years, pretty long time, where
they discovered the domesticated pumpkin seats, and these early pumpkins
(12:09):
were most likely at smaller and bitterer er, but they
were really durable and they could survive the winter. Because
of this, they were probably some of the first crops
consumed in North America, and the Native Americans would pound
strips of pumpkin flat and weave them into mats, so
not just for food, but they would also eat the
(12:30):
dry stops for consumption. Yeah, pumpkins so interesting. Ye supposedly
if you if you just boiled them, they tasted quite pleasant. Yeah,
they'd roast them. They'd roast chunks of pumpkin over fires,
bake them, dry them, grind them up and use them
as flour. Very versatile. Um. Pumpkin seats were a favorite
of the Aztecs and the Mayans would cook the fruit
(12:50):
into sauces, toast and grind up the seeds and use
the dried out empty pumpkins to drink out of ours
bowls or other storage containers which I never considered, but yeah, oh,
of course totally. Containers shaped huge, huge history of gourds
as containers love it. With the advent of maze to
the region, farmers discovered the benefits of the three sisters formation,
(13:12):
which I'd never heard of. The three sisters here are
squash maze and beans, and like any good sisters, they
help each other grow out. It's something good sisters. The
beans grow up and along the corn stalks, using them
like a natural trellis, and the bean roots they release
nitrogen into the soil, which has beneficial for the corn.
(13:33):
The pumpkins and or squash vines provided shelter for the
roots and kept the moisture in the soil. It sounds
like a pretty sweet set up to me. Absolutely. When
the Spanish arrived in the Yucatan in the native people
served them a dish of corn tor tillas and pumpkin
sea sauce called food for the Lords. It sounds pretty good.
(13:55):
The Spanish must have liked it because they took the
seeds back to Spain where it's spread and diversified and
lots of New World foods took a while to catch on,
like remember the tomato, But the pumpkin was similar enough
to squashes that already existed in the Old World, but
kind of had a better flavor, so so it caught
on pretty much immediately. Yeah, they didn't have to wait
(14:15):
around popular and this is a roundabout the time the
word pumpkin first appeared. It originates from the Greek word
meaning large melon. Makes sense. In fifteen forty seven, the
English started using pompignons or pompion. I'm saying this is
the French accent that the English certainly didn't use, but
(14:37):
it didn't appear in written records until sixty seven, and
that term comes from the French. Pompillon is yes, the
French word for for pumpkin um. And it was around
that time that a bunch of European recipes for pumpkin
custards began to appear within the lower classes. Anyway, through
the seventeen hundreds, upper class Europeans referred to pumpkins as ordinary,
(14:59):
me unsubstantial, and frequently cultivated by the country people who
plant them upon their dunghills. I'm taking this as a
personal affront. I am very offended, and I can't understand
why people keep insulting foods. I just never salted of food,
been like that food is mean, unsubstantial. I guess I've
(15:22):
gotten kind of mad at like, I don't know, maybe
something that I couldn't eat if it's difficult to peel.
Sometimes I get frustrated, but I don't that pain melon.
Pain melon that was rough, but I mean, I don't
blame the pain melon. I wouldn't want to get eaten necessarily. Okay,
well that's fair. Yeah anyway. Um. Once the Pilgrims started
(15:45):
settling in North America, they wholeheartedly embraced the pumpkin, which
the Native Americans introduced them too, in part due to
its hardiness. They used it in desserts and side dishes
and soups. The pumpkin was the star the first Thanksgiving.
As evidence spout is sixteen thirty three poem entitled New
(16:05):
England's Annoyances for pottage and puddings and custards and pies
are Pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies. We have pumpkins
at morning and pumpkins at noon. If it were not
for pumpkins, we should be undoone, which is undone. Yeah yeah,
(16:28):
I love it. Yeah, but they weren't using it in
a way most of us are familiar with the pumpkin. Yes,
the pumpkin. Yes. What they would do is cut off
the top, move the seeds, and then they'd fill the
inside its eggs, cream, honey, and other spices. Then they'd
bury the whole thing in the hot ashes of fire. Wait,
till it was done. I don't know how they knew,
(16:48):
but all right, and they scoop out the inside, including
the pumpkin flesh, and serve it as sort of a custard,
kind of an early version of the pumpkin pie kind of. Yeah,
and they wouldn't have had apple pie at early probably
a you know, because squash can grow in a season,
but decent cooking apples take years and years. As we
have discussed before, Yes we have. Early New England colonist
(17:10):
also used the pumpkin for a haircut template. I want
to know so much about this. They did it to
make sure they achieved a clean uniform cut, which earned
which earned them the name the nickname pumpkinheads. I know,
I just don't know how, but anyway, I will look
into that after this um. In the sixteen seventies, one
(17:33):
of the first published pumpkin recipes appeared in John Jocelyn's
New England Rarities discovered. The recipe called for cooking down
right pumpkin for a day and then adding butter and spices.
That's pretty much it. Yeah. Simple. The Pilgrims were also
known to make pumpkin beer by fermenting it along with maple, sugar, hops,
(17:54):
and per simmons, and through the seventeen and eighteen hundreds,
pumpkin was a relatively common ingredient in beers in the
UH pre United States, I suppose, um, due to its availability,
whereas malt and hops were a little bit more rare.
Um that there's recipes for mashing out pumpkin juice the
same way that you would do with apples, then hopping
and fermenting that juice as you would with a beer,
(18:15):
and uh for beers that start with malt and hops
and dried apple and pumpkin plus other stuff like rye
and birch and other flavorings. There's actually a later verse
of that pumpkin Louding poem or pumpkin annoyance poem, like
like why are there all of these effing pumpkins everywhere? Uh?
That freeds thus lee. If Barley be wanting to make
(18:36):
into malt, we must be contented and think it no fault,
for we can make liquor to sweeten our lips of
pumpkins and parsnips and walnut tree chips liquor to sweeten
our lips. No, I have to say, I like this
poem and also pumpkins seems to show up in a
lot of poems, because we were talking about some more later. Yeah, fun,
fun thing to look out for. Uh. Pumpkin did fall
(18:59):
out of prevalent in beer here in the Americas until
the nineteen eighties or so in the craft beer movement.
More about that in a little bit. Yes, speaking of
pumpkin pie. What about pumpkin pie. Yeah, there were recipes
for a stud and sweetened pumpkin mixture wrapped in pastry
all the way back to medieval times. Yeah, a lot
(19:21):
of the recipes you find in medieval European cookbooks were
modernized and later prints by replacing squash with pumpkin, because,
as Lauren said earlier, when pumpkin came around, it was
kind of a just seen as a tastier replacement for squash. Yeah.
In sixteenth and seventeenth century England, some of them more
well off. We're familiar with the type of pumpkin pie
that sometimes involved stuffing apples into the shell of a pumpkin,
(19:44):
so using the pumpkin as the coffin in this and
that it went out of fashion into in the eighteenth century,
and of note, as the sixteen fifties passage by Edward
Johnson about a sign of progress in New England being
that people were eating quote apples, pears, and quin starts
instead of their former pumpkin pies. So a k. They
(20:07):
were eating the more civilized European non native not that
mean unsubstantiated pumpkin Yeah, jeez, tough crowd. However, the eighteen
hundreds is just about the time that the American columnist
started the trend of serving a sweetened pumpkin dish at
holiday gatherings like Thanksgiving. In Amelia Simmons's cookbook American Cookery,
(20:33):
which I'm pretty sure we mentioned before, had a recipe
for pumpkin puddings that were baked in a crust similar
to what we would have today. And there's a fun
story about a small town in Connecticut in eighteen hundreds
they postponed Thanksgiving a week to wait out a molasses
shortage that impacted pumpkin pie. It was so important to
(20:54):
the meal. They were like, what hold up, Yeah, we're
gonna have to put this off for a week every
and I hope we're all the same page here, because
I'm not doing Thanksgiving without my pumpkin pie. That's blasphemy.
I feel the same way. I didn't until recently. I
actually I love pumpkin but I've only kind of been
newly introduced to it. Anyway, back to the pumpkin pie.
(21:16):
It even popped up during the Civil War. This dessert
was far more near and dear to the hearts of
New Englanders, and since many of the most outspoken abolitionists
were from New England, pumpkin pie would feature in some
of their writings. Lydia Marie Child's eight forty two poem
about Thanksgiving in New England ended with the line Hurrah
(21:36):
for the pumpkin Pie. On top of that, Sarah jo
Sifa Hale, who as we've mentioned before, is considered the
mother of Thanksgiving and it's one of my favorite, most
bizarre things I ever got to work on for stuff
Mom never told you are her story segments, So go
check that out on YouTube if you if you're interested,
it's hilarious. She included a brief mention of pumpkin pie
(21:56):
in her eighteen twenty seven anti slavery novel Northwood Quote.
Yet the pumpkin pie occupied the most distinguished niche after
Abraham Lincoln designated Thanksgiving a national holiday in eighteen sixty
three due to this lady's her campaigning campaign. Um uh,
(22:18):
and he did that. He gave in to this letter
writing campaign in part as an attempt to heal the
country after the Civil War. Angry Southerners saw it as
a way for Northerners to impose their traditions on them. Yeah,
I know, with one editorial out of Virginia claiming, quote,
this is an annual custom of that people, heretofore celebrated
(22:40):
with devout oblations to themselves of pumpkin pie and roast turkey. Wow. Disgusting,
I know, how dare they? However, with the help of
recipes and write ups printed in women's magazines, pumpkin pie
spread throughout the land became a traditional holiday dessert. Its
(23:02):
status further solidified with the nine introduction of Libbies Canned pumpkin,
which made pumpkin pie baking all the easier. And by
the way, Libbies currently dominates the canned pumpkin market North
America over nine pumpkin monopoly. Quite a corner on the
market there. Yeah, way to go, Libby's, I guess I suppose. Okay,
(23:29):
So let's let's step back a bit and look at
the other holiday pumpkins are associated with Halloween. It's my
favorite Holida to The earliest jack o lanterns come to
us courtesy of the Scottish and Irish, who originally carved
turnips and potatoes. The English might have used beats man.
(23:51):
Then they would put hot coals inside these root vegetables,
but it sounds kind of difficult. Yeah, you know what
might be here? Literally anything? Yeah, not literally anything, but
probably a pumpkin, Probably a big, fat, round pumpkin. When
European immigrants arrived to the colonies, they saw the cheaper,
(24:13):
more easily sourced, and more easily carvable pumpkins, and they
made the switch. I would imagine it didn't take much.
The first written instance of jack o' lantern in the
context of a carved fruit or vegetable, by the way,
was in seven and the pumpkin association first was recorded
in eighteen sixty six and etymological note why jack in
(24:37):
jack o lantern? Well? Since the or so in England
and later in the United States, the name jack was
applied as a generic term for any male human person,
hence Jack of all trades, every man, Jack, Jack the ripper,
and etcetera. So so Jack o Lantern was just Jack
of the lantern, like you know, like the dude with
(24:57):
the lantern. So yeah, fun naming note. Okay for someone
who loves Halloween. I actually didn't know the myth, the
story behind the Jack liner. Yeah, so this is super fun.
This is really fun one to research. Yeah, it's a
it's a terrific old folk story. Um and it comes
(25:17):
to us from the seventeenth century Irish tale of Stingy Jack. Yes,
Stingy Jack. So let's let's set the mood here. Let's
set the scene. Jack was a drunk and the ultimate manipulator.
And when Satan, yes that's Satan, got wind of this fella,
(25:37):
he was a bit jealous. He wanted to prove he
was superior and evilness and debauchery to this Jack. So
one night, when Jack was drunkenly stumbling around as he
was wont to do, he ran into Satan looking to
collect his soul. Jack convinced Satan to allow him one
(25:58):
last drink. But when the bill comes to when don't
you know it, but Jack doesn't have any money. That's
where the cingey bit comes in. I'm guessing. So he
convinced the seemingly gullible Satan to turn into a silver
coin to pay for said drink, but instead Jack pocketed
(26:18):
Satan in his now coin form next to his handy
crucifix in his pocket so Satan couldn't transform back. Jack
would only set him free after he convinced Satan to
leave him and his soul alone for one or ten
depending which story you look at years. How he had
this negotiation with a coin that's beyond me anyway, when
(26:43):
Satan came at the end of their agreed upon term,
Jack tricked Satan again again by getting him to climb
a tree for a piece of fruit that Jack wanted
as his last meal. And then Jack quickly placed a
bunch of crucifixes to keep Satan up up, stuck in
the tree like a kitten. I know, kind of adorable,
(27:06):
and I really want more details on that conversation. How
did he convince him to climb a tree for this
piece of fruit? Anyway, this time, Jack bargain with Satan
to never take his soul to Hades, and what I
imagine as a hand thrown up type move, Satan agreed
alas when Jack finally drank himself to death. Years later,
(27:27):
he was refused entrance into heaven for his deviousness, and
as for the deal he struck with Satan, he couldn't
go to Hades either. Satan's still mad about how foolish
all the trickery had made him look, sentenced Jack to
wander a never ending night with only a litt coal
as his light. Jack placed the coal in a hollowed
out turnip and went about his miserable way for all eternity.
(27:50):
The Irish gave him the name Jack of the Lantern,
later shortened to Jack o Lantern and the tradition of
carving root vegetables, and later the pump in with scary
faces was meant to frighten stingy Jack and other spirits
like him away. Oh yeah, that gets you all ready
for October for the Fall. I love that story so
(28:14):
much and I can't believe I've never heard it. It's wonderful. Yeah.
Also also vaguely related to Halloween. Um, if you ever
have the chance to check out Dellas Morthos Festival, look
for a sweet treat called Calabaza and it's a soft,
semi candied pumpkin preparation that involves unrefined sugar syrup and
guava and cinnamon, and it's studs of the pumpkin fibers.
(28:37):
Soak up all of that flavor. Oh that sounds good.
I've always wanted to check that out. Okay, now I'm
kind of like spooked out. Here's something to kind of
bring bring you back. Bring you back. The global pumpkin
growing competition market uh huh may have been kick started
by the World's Fair in Paris in nine and the
(29:00):
showing there of a four hundred pound pumpkin specimen. It's
about a hundred and eighty one. Wow. Well from there,
let's jump skip to nineteen o three and the home
of a large pumpkin cannary, E Sears Canning in Circleville, Ohio.
Each fall farmers whose wagons overfloweth with pumpkins, they would
(29:23):
make the check to the Canary to get their products canned.
In response, in nineteen o three, the mayor announced Circleville
would hold an annual autumn produce festival with pumpkin in
starring role. During the Great Depression, e Sears Canning was
forced to shut her its stores, but the festival still
continues to this day under the name the Pumpkin Show,
(29:44):
the largest pumpkin festival of its time. There's the largest
pumpkin contests, largest pumpkin pie contest. I want to be
involved in that so badly. And a miss Pumpkin pageant.
I love these like little small festivals are ye, and
there are as I'm sure you could guests, many many, many,
many many pumpkin festivals, Pumpkin chunkin the Art and Pumpkin
(30:06):
Festival in California. And there's some amazing, just truly stunning
Jack O'landard displays at a lot of these. I recommend
looking them up. I want to see one in real
life so badly. Oh yeah, I have a friend she
sent me a video of when she was out last year.
I think she was in Salem. Oh man, I was
so jealous. If you guys have any good photographs of
(30:28):
that kind of thing, send send them on in. Yeah. Um,
pumpkins is a food meanwhile, we are still a food show.
Um in the United States. Anyway, fell out of fashion
for a bit between World War One and World War Two,
but picked up again with the surge in trick or
treating that came about during the post World War two era,
which was that Golden Age, when the streets were paved
(30:50):
with candy and young baby boomers not literally paved, that
would be griss um. There was another bit of a
dip in pumpkin eating around here from the nineteen seventies
through the nineties, as the squash was bred more for
for carve ability than for a taste and texture. But
another trend would bring it back from the ashes yet again.
(31:11):
I wonder what it could be. Well, we'll find out
after another quick break for a word from our sponsor,
and we're back, Thank you sponsor. Okay, so it's time
(31:31):
to talk about pumpkin spice. Pumpkin pie spice. Pumpkin spice. Yes,
that whole uh pumpkin pie flavor, combination of of sweet slash,
savory squash plus not meg plus cinnamon. Yeah uh. And
I bet a lot of you can guess what started
this trend. The two thousand three release of the Starbucks
(31:54):
Pumpkin Spice Latte. Those PSL's yes, trending on Twitter probably
as we speak. Between launch and Starbucks sold two hundred
million pumpkin spice lattes. And that that was as I'm
sure it's a lot more these days. Yeah uh. And
that's extra not bad for a product that Starbucks wasn't
(32:17):
even sure about to begin with, UM, given that the
flavor overpowers that of coffee and is more easily reproducible
than high quality coffee, which ostensibly Starbucks wants to be
known for primarily you would think ostensibly, yes, once it
caught on, they were like, oh, well that's fine, Yeah, okay,
we'll just keep going with this one. Sales of pumpkin
(32:41):
spice flavored products jumped to almost fifty million dollars in
the United States. Most of that was pumpkin pie filling,
but Show Bonnie announced that it's limited release A Pumpkin
Spy Show was the most successful in its history. Yeah,
my goodness. And here's a number for you. That's the
(33:05):
increase of pumpkin as an ingredient in beverages since two
thousand and six, and pumpkin use on menages just beverages,
And I really do think Starbucks is like but that
was the pinnacle it all met at this point. Now
we're still living with the consequences UM, and pumpkin use
(33:26):
on menus has risen by ten times since two thousands
and six. A majority of pumpkin spice products sales do
you take place in the fall, falling between September and November,
and a survey conducted in found that thirty of the
little over one thousand of adult participants named pumpkin spices
(33:48):
the number one flavor they associated with fall. Yeah, it
makes sense. Sure. In the midst of all of this,
pumpkin beers have enjoyed some serious seasonal resurgence. Starting two
thousand four, Seattle brewery Elysian has hosted a Great Pumpkin
Beer Festival every September and or October, which this year
will feature over eighty individual pumpkin bruise. Beer Advocate dot com,
(34:12):
a great website, currently lists one thousand, three hundred and
ninety nine examples of pumpkin ale having been professionally produced
and sold worldwide. WHOA, that's a lot. Yeah, many of
them were probably like one time offerings, but nonetheless like
pumpkin and or pumpkin spice in general, these beers are
a divisive. Yeah. Many are just super sweet and or
(34:38):
super spiced and can arrange in flavor closer to like
Yankee candle than beer. My current favorite pumpkin beer diss
comes from the Paste magazine review of Southern Tier Warlock
Imperial Pumpkin Stout, which it said tastes like quote decades
old easy bake oven brownie mix, rehydrated with lack liquorice, liqueur,
(35:01):
harsh words. If you have either a favorite brand or
a favorite diss, right, and let us know. I love
that you have a favorite diss I've read a lot
of them. I kind of I'm not a fan of
pumpkin beer. I have some that I like. I I yeah,
I like very dry flavored alcohols, so I do too,
(35:21):
and I love pumpkin and it is difficult to get
a pumpkin beer right. But I have had no bad,
like a handful that I like. And I do this
thing every Labor Day weekend where I get summer beer
and usually pumpkin beer or fall beer, and I say
goodbye to summer and hello to fall, even though fall
doesn't technically start thin. That's just my tradition. No, that's lovely.
(35:43):
I thank you. And here is a quick list of
some of the weird pumpkin items you might encounter in
the fall. You've got pumpkin spice, marshmallows, peeps, pumpkin spice, yogurt,
pumpkins by sandwich bread, pumpkin spice, popcorn pumpkins spice, chips,
pumpkin spice, almonds, pumpkin spice, morsels, pumpkins spy, sprinkles, pumpkin spicewod,
(36:03):
pumpkin spice, white powder, pumpkins spice areas, pumpkin spice, freada
cheeny pumpkin spice, go, bonzo beans, and it goes on
and on. I had to cut myself off. I'm sure
you guys have seen these products. There's an astonishing amount
of Yeah, and then we didn't. I mean, if we
go into like lotions and perfumes as a whole, another thing,
air fresheners. O. Yeah. Also I stumbled a grass and
(36:27):
tutorial on how to turn a pumpkin into a beer gang.
Ohh um that that Great Pumpkin Beer Festival features a
giant pumpkin every year. Um from their website, a several
hundred pound pumpkin that is scooped, scorched, filled with Elysian
pumpkin beer, sealed, conditioned, and then tapped at the fest
for all to enjoy. Okay, now I want to check
(36:49):
this out. There are so many things I want to
see field tripped Seattle. Yes. Also, apparently pumpkin pie kit
cat bars are coming to the United States this fall.
I might try one of those. I've had the pumpkin
pie reesus like my two favorite candy to pumpkin spice. Aside,
(37:10):
eating pumpkins is actually pretty good for you. Um. I mean,
you know, before you've added crap tons of sugar and
cream or butter or whatever into them. Um. Pumpkins are
high in fiber, They've got a touch of protein, and
they're low in sugars and fats, which means that they
are low calorie but super filling. Um. They've also got
a ton of bated caroteen and are good sources of
(37:30):
a bunch of other vitamins and minerals like like vitamin
C and potassium. Because of the moisture and pumpkin pumpkin puree,
it can be used as a as a good substitute
for cooking fats in baked goods, especially quick breads like
muffins or banana bread type things, and you can make
your own puree if you want. Carving pumpkins, for example,
are totally edible, but pie pumpkins are also widely available
(37:51):
in the United States and have a nicer flavor slash texture.
Due to their fiber content, pumpkin is also really great
for controlling both constipation and diarrhea. Uh uh. Fiber gets
the bowels moving and also absorbs excess water in the bowels.
For that reason, it's a popular treatment for digestive problems
and pets. Just a teaspoon or too mixed in with
your catadog's food can work. Wonders. Yeah, I did come
(38:13):
across that a lot when I was researching this episode.
There you go, yeah, yeah, uh. The seeds are a
little less healthy, but still a totally decent snack. They're
they're high in good fats and have a good good
amount of like high quality proteins um. The type of
the white holes are a better source of fiber than
pepitas and thus are a little bit more filling. I
(38:34):
I always clean the seeds from my carving pumpkins and
roast them, usually just with a sprinkle of like vegetable
oil and salt. One of my favorite things. Huh. And
as we said earlier, you can also eat pumpkin blossoms. Yeah,
like zucchini blossoms. They're pretty excellent breaded and fried, not
so healthy, but that's fine. Um. Or you can use
them the way that you would any other delicate green
(38:54):
like I think like spinach in a in a super
a stew. I have three recipes. I go too fairly
often with pumpkin pumpkin bread I love um, pumpkin enchiladas
also good, pumpkin enchiladdos good, and pumpkin chili versable it
is I'm not goodness, okay, okay, So that brings us
(39:16):
to our culture. Bit yeah, okay. So first pumpkin chuckin, Yes,
punkin chunkin. Yeah. So in a blacksmith by the name
of John Ellsworth started what would become the World Champion
punkin Chicken, an annual event in which growers and engineers
come together to see who can hurl a pumpkin the
(39:36):
furthest with neither electricity nor explosives involved, just the brain
because we can. Yes, the competition claims to be the
oldest of its kind, and I couldn't find any evidence
to the contrary. Though the sport has spread the United
States certainly, and has even popped up in Europe. Teams
build whatever kind of device they want within the parameters. Catapultster,
(39:59):
trebishe air cannons and send their weight specified pumpkins of flying.
The industry standards seems to be eight ten pounds per pumpkin. Yeah,
I'm glad they've got a standard. Yeah. The record distance
according to Guinness is just over five thousand, five hundred
and forty five ft, which is about one thousand six
(40:20):
so unsubstantial at all. A medieval Europeans take that, huh. Unfortunately,
the original World Championship is canceled this year due to
an injury at last year's competition and some pending litigation.
But we hope that that everyone everyone is mentally and
(40:40):
physically doing better next year and able to come back
to us. Yes, and speaking of competitions giant pumpkins, there
are both regional and global pumpkin growing competitions and they
are a serious obsession for the growers who enter. Uh.
Careful genetic cultivation has grown the field explosively in the
(41:05):
past couple of decades. Just fifteen years ago, one thousand
pounds was this unheard of goal, and now the top
winners are more than double that. These giant pumpkins can
grow up to fifty pounds per day per day during
peak growth season. Apparently, the secrets aside from starting with
like perfectly cultivated seeds, are pruning your vines to just
(41:28):
a few fruits, getting the right amount of sun cover,
feeding and watering them constantly, using friendly fungi to help
nutrient transfer into the roots, and uh protecting their skins
from cracks and covering them overnight to keep them at
the right temperature, which just sounds so dear uh using
(41:49):
using genetics. Some growers and researchers are hoping to push
growth even further, and there doesn't seem to be an
eminent end to how big they could get. A paper
published in the International Journal of Non Linear Mechanics estimated
that giant pumpkins of the proper shape could hold up
their own weight up to twenty thousand pounds a k
(42:11):
a like nine thousand kilograms. No, if I saw twenty
pound pumpkin, is there a horror movie about this? Because
if not, there should be. Oh yes, oh, let's write it.
Oh I can use that jack o lantern myth. Oh
it'll be so good, uh stingy jack and the twenty
pound pumpkin. Oh, it's going to be excellent. Look out
(42:33):
for you guys. Yeah, oh, but yeah, yeah, people get
so excited about this. There's there's a yearly cruise for
giant pumpkin growers. Um and and I wanted to kind
of end this our pumpkin episode on a quote from
from one such grower. There was an article about these
competitions in Time magazine and uh. One grower by the
(42:53):
name of Ron Wallace was quoted as saying, have you
ever heard anybody say a bad word about a pumpkin? No?
Pumpkins could solve the world's problems. Honestly, everybody loves the pumpkin.
They do. And to see one grow that big, my
heart is warm. It's so sweet. It is Okay, I
(43:14):
have to say, if I was at a party and
I overheard someone saying that they grew giant pumpkins, it's
like a hobby. I'm going to go talk to that first.
I want to know more about you and your hobby.
Do you think you can reach twenty pounds? You know? Yeah,
these are important party conversation topics. They are um and
(43:34):
you are welcome for learning from us about these party topics. Yeah,
there's so much we could have impacted in this episode.
I think the pumpkin spice latte alone Um, it's a
deep cultural phenomenon, it is, and over on stuff I
never told you. We did one kind of about the
assumptions that come with it, like basic thing. Yeah, so
(44:00):
maybe we'll revisit some of this stuff because there's there's
a lot surprisingly about the pumpkins, about the humble pumpkin,
I know. And that brings us to the end of
this classic false the episode. It does. Um, you enjoyed it,
We we do. Yeah. Um. Oh, if you have any
(44:24):
pumpkin carvings, oh my gosh, yes, or pumpkin recipes or
anything to do with pumpkins, I suppose yeah, that's true.
Somebody did send us a pretty epic pumpkins soup last
time we did. Oh yeah, I'm really jealous of I
have a friend who lives up north and they have those,
um like jack o lanterns, like thousands of them. You know.
(44:45):
I always want to see one of those. Field trip. Yes,
if you've been to one, you can send pictures our way,
and you can do that at our email Hello at
saberpod dot com. You can also find us on social media.
We are on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. You can find
us there at savor Pod. We do hope to hear
from you. Savor is production of I Heart Radio and
(45:08):
Stuff Media. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, you
can visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thank you, as
always to our super producers Dylan Vagan and Andrew Howard.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way.
Hello, I'm welcome to save a prediction of I Heart
Radio and Steffidia. I'm Annyis and I'm Lauren Vogelbaum, and
today we have for you a classic fall themed episode
about pumpkin, one of the great loves of my life. Yeah,
oh god, yeah, oh my god. Um. I haven't carved
my pumpkin yet, have you? No, I haven't. Um, I
(00:28):
haven't done my whole like like fall. It's been so
warm here today that we are recording. This is literally
the first day that the temperature has been anywhere near
fall like. According to me, I had to go back
inside and get a jacket before I left. A jacket,
a jacket, sweater weather what So yeah, um, because ay
(00:49):
we we you know this. This is an older episode
from way backing off food stuff days. Um and and
be yeah, pumpkins, good times, so much to be said,
they're oh my heck, there is yes um And also,
I guess it's just been kind of like in my
head since we did our Turnip episode and did that
(01:09):
rerun of the Stingy Jack telling. So you get to
listen to that again if you want to skip past it,
do what you want. I can't tell you what to do.
I think you should definitely listen again and then send
in your your take off. That would be so good. Yes,
do you know, Lauren and I love anything that's kind
(01:29):
of spooky, creepy, all that realm, So we would love
that absolutely. So we're going to let former Annie and
Lauren take it away. Hello, and welcome to food Stuff.
(01:54):
I'm Annie Reeve and I'm Lauren vocal Bam and today
it's the pumpkin episode. Yes, but don't roll your eyes
and click away just yet. So don't I know, it's
pumpkin everything, and it's kind of an overdone trend at
this point really, but yeah, it's pumpkin is really interesting
when you think about it, because it's a food and
a decoration and it feels kind of new to me.
(02:14):
I mean, does it feel near to you apart from
now we're reaching saturation point? But yeah, yeah, aside well,
I mean, I don't know. Yeah, it's it's it's got
such a long history. It's one of the first cultivated
foods ever. Yeah, and we just I feel like in
the United States we haven't been eating it that long
and we still kind of don't utilize it. We kind
(02:36):
of go back and forth about it. Yeah, there we
have periods of eating it and then just table decoration.
It's it's really okay. So I checked Google trends, and
the search graft for pumpkin is just hilariously peaked. Um.
Every October the search is spike like one thousand nine.
That is quite a percent versus the rest of the year. Yeah,
(02:58):
it's it's nuts. Um we peak pumpkin searches. By the way,
it's never pumpkin search. Searches for pumpkin spice, meanwhile, have
been trending upward since Google started recording data in two
thousand four, with really huge yearly jumps again in October
starting starting mostly um. Also, no one outside of the
(03:20):
United States in Canada gives a single fig about pumpkin
spice anything, according to Google. So really, yeah, it's just
a low, steady burn trend. Yeah. I like the measurement
of fig as well. We should adopt that. How many
figs do I get? Three figs? Three figs like pumpkin. Yeah,
(03:41):
let's talk about it. Let's let's do that thing. If
you're if you're from the United States anyway, that the
word pumpkin probably evokes a really specific image like a
large squash that has this hard, smooth ribbed, orange colored
shell that's harvested in the fall. But the term can
actually refer to this really ridiculous number of different species
(04:02):
and cultivars within that species, cultivars being strains that have
been bred by humans for specific properties. They're all in
the genus Cucurbita probably um, and most are in the
species Cucurbita peppo, which is actually just this tremendously huge category. Technically,
zucchini a k a. Corgette for many of our European listeners,
(04:24):
is the same species as pumpkin, really same species. They
don't look anything alike, Nope. Cultivars uh squash in general
are are categorized as summer or winter varieties based on
when they're harvested. The summer types, like zucchini, have soft
skins and soft seeds and are harvested in the summer.
(04:46):
The winter types tend to have these hard, kind of
gordy skins, which are natural preservers um. If you keep
them in a cool, dark place, they'll hold up for
at least two months without any kind of intervention, and um.
The seeds are a little bit harder to they should
really be cooked in some way before you consume them. Yeah,
but what is it? What is it? Well, pumpkin is
(05:07):
a fruit botanically speaking, a berry. Actually, what it's like tomatoes? Uh,
they're they're the ovary of the pumpkin flower that has
grown large enough to contain, protect the growth of, and
hopefully distribute lots of seeds. Uh. These flowers and their
resulting fruit grow on vines, and the fruit gets really
big if you give them enough resources to do so.
(05:29):
The biggest on record is from a Belgian grower in
his pumpkin weigh two thousand, six hundred and twenty four
pounds a k A like one thousands a k A,
just a little bit less than a Honda Civic. WHOA,
So you and I both have Honda Civics, and I'm
just trying to imagine replacing my Honda Civic with AIG
(05:53):
and then the weight being similar. That is enormous. We
could certainly both fit with cargo room inside of one
of these pumpkins. All you're worth looking into talk about Cinderella, right, Yeah,
pumpkins are grown all over the world, by the way.
The only continent they can't grow on is Antarctica. Let
(06:15):
I mean, I suppose that indoors in a greenhouse, you
could probably make it happen. Probably, I guess not too
much grows in Antarctica when you think about it. Um,
and they're grown for multiple uses, animal feed decoration and
human feed consumption. Yeah, they grow during a single season.
Seeds planted in late spring will mature to full fruit
(06:36):
by fall. This reminds me. I have a friend who
angrily threw her jack o lantern once and it still
has seeds in it, and she ended up growing like
several pumpkins, which I thought it was kind of bizarre
because I feel like I've thrown pumpkin seeds out and
nothing's happened. But maybe she had the right just had
(06:57):
the right conditions for the right velocity of throw. Oh
and it just worked out, I guess. And uh like
we kind of hit on it. It's kind of a
new trend in the US, but I've seen pumpkin and
grocery stores and in both sweet and savory dishes when traveling,
especially in Asia and Australia. I remember the first time
(07:18):
I saw it in a store in Australia. It was
just in chunks like packaged chunks um, and you can
find small hole pumpkins in Japanese savory dishes like tempura
um roasted like any other vegetable in Australia, New Zealand
as a sweet in India and the Middle East, in
pastas in Italy. In places like China and Kenya, the
(07:38):
leaves are steamed and eaten. Pumpkin and squash blossoms are
very popular in Mexico and the southwestern US. You find
it and most parts of it used every which way,
from super sweet candies and Tomali's. I've even heard there's
a tour through Mexico where you just go and try
all the different types of pumpkin, all the different color bezas. Yeah, exactly,
(08:00):
that sounds delicious. Um. And there's this pumpkin soup. I
still regret not trying. I was hiking in the Andes
and crew, but I got altitude sickness the one day
they served pumpkin soup and they served it in the
pumpkin and I love pumpkin and soup, and I was
so upset that there was no way, no way. I
(08:24):
was like seeing spots falling slowly out of my chair.
Now next, next time, next time. Next time I'm hiking
in the Andies, I will not get out to sickness.
Certainly not on Pumpkin Soup Day. Yes, of all the days,
the pumpkin industry is having a bit of a heyday.
(08:44):
In the US, pumpkin production went from around a seventy
five million dollar industry in two thousand and one to
at three million dollar one. It's quite the jump, And
most of the pumpkins were buying in the store. Are
are the big Halloween pumpkins that we think of, Yes,
generally the big orange ones. And then the second type
(09:06):
you're most likely to encounter in a grocery store is
a processing pumpkin processing, Yes, which I believe is so
named because a majority of them end up in processing
plants where their flesh is processed, canned, and shipped to
grocery stores as pie filling, pipe filling, or the like.
(09:27):
So that sounds kind of horrifying the use of the
word flesh generally. Yeah. Most pumpkins candor otherwise in the
US also come from Illinois. Illinois lead the way in
US pumpkin production, with million pounds of pumpkin produced. Also,
the seeds pumpkin seeds are eaten as snacks, roasted, usually
(09:51):
either by themselves or as ingredients and stuff like like granola.
They're also processed into seed oil, which can be used
in cooking, as a health supplement of dubious health property um,
and in beauty products. The global pumpkin seed industry is
reportedly growing fast. For all y'all investors out there, I
know there's so many listening and like, I gotta get
(10:11):
in on this pumpkin business right now. Uh. Pepita's, by
the way, are a type of pumpkin seed that comes
from a particular varietal of pumpkin that produces seeds that
do not have holes. Um. So, so they're the little
green kind of thing. That's a that's a holeless pumpkin seed.
The white variety that you'd find in your carving pumpkins
have the hall on them. That's the whole party. Um.
(10:33):
They're especially popular in Mexico, where where cucabita peppo originated
as both a snack and a recipe ingredient um, either
whole or ground up into a nice little paste. I
do love pumpkin seeds. Oh yeah. We have to have
a sweet recipe and a savory recipe. Very good. I've
never made a sweet recipe work anyway anyway. Yes, Also,
(10:54):
the can pumpkin is probably mostly not pumpkin. Other squashes,
yeah at least Yeah, if you look on the back
it says um but a lot of and a lot
of instances United States canned pumpkin is some other kind
of winter squash. Yeah, there's usually a little bit of
pumpkin in there, but mostly not. Grocery stores are lying
(11:15):
twists again, surprise, surprise. So that's briefly what pumpkin is.
But let's talk about the history of pumpkin as a
food because this is a food show. We're we're also
going to talk a little bit about the history of
pumpkins decoration. Well, yeah, I can't not talk about it,
I mean absolutely, But first we're going to take a
quick break for a word from our sponsor, and we're back.
(11:47):
Thank you sponsor. So, the oldest evidence archaeologists have found
of pumpkins comes from the Wahaka Highlands of Mexico, dating
back seven thousand, five hundred years, pretty long time, where
they discovered the domesticated pumpkin seats, and these early pumpkins
(12:09):
were most likely at smaller and bitterer er, but they
were really durable and they could survive the winter. Because
of this, they were probably some of the first crops
consumed in North America, and the Native Americans would pound
strips of pumpkin flat and weave them into mats, so
not just for food, but they would also eat the
(12:30):
dry stops for consumption. Yeah, pumpkins so interesting. Ye supposedly
if you if you just boiled them, they tasted quite pleasant. Yeah,
they'd roast them. They'd roast chunks of pumpkin over fires,
bake them, dry them, grind them up and use them
as flour. Very versatile. Um. Pumpkin seats were a favorite
of the Aztecs and the Mayans would cook the fruit
(12:50):
into sauces, toast and grind up the seeds and use
the dried out empty pumpkins to drink out of ours
bowls or other storage containers which I never considered, but yeah, oh,
of course totally. Containers shaped huge, huge history of gourds
as containers love it. With the advent of maze to
the region, farmers discovered the benefits of the three sisters formation,
(13:12):
which I'd never heard of. The three sisters here are
squash maze and beans, and like any good sisters, they
help each other grow out. It's something good sisters. The
beans grow up and along the corn stalks, using them
like a natural trellis, and the bean roots they release
nitrogen into the soil, which has beneficial for the corn.
(13:33):
The pumpkins and or squash vines provided shelter for the
roots and kept the moisture in the soil. It sounds
like a pretty sweet set up to me. Absolutely. When
the Spanish arrived in the Yucatan in the native people
served them a dish of corn tor tillas and pumpkin
sea sauce called food for the Lords. It sounds pretty good.
(13:55):
The Spanish must have liked it because they took the
seeds back to Spain where it's spread and diversified and
lots of New World foods took a while to catch on,
like remember the tomato, But the pumpkin was similar enough
to squashes that already existed in the Old World, but
kind of had a better flavor, so so it caught
on pretty much immediately. Yeah, they didn't have to wait
(14:15):
around popular and this is a roundabout the time the
word pumpkin first appeared. It originates from the Greek word
meaning large melon. Makes sense. In fifteen forty seven, the
English started using pompignons or pompion. I'm saying this is
the French accent that the English certainly didn't use, but
(14:37):
it didn't appear in written records until sixty seven, and
that term comes from the French. Pompillon is yes, the
French word for for pumpkin um. And it was around
that time that a bunch of European recipes for pumpkin
custards began to appear within the lower classes. Anyway, through
the seventeen hundreds, upper class Europeans referred to pumpkins as ordinary,
(14:59):
me unsubstantial, and frequently cultivated by the country people who
plant them upon their dunghills. I'm taking this as a
personal affront. I am very offended, and I can't understand
why people keep insulting foods. I just never salted of food,
been like that food is mean, unsubstantial. I guess I've
(15:22):
gotten kind of mad at like, I don't know, maybe
something that I couldn't eat if it's difficult to peel.
Sometimes I get frustrated, but I don't that pain melon.
Pain melon that was rough, but I mean, I don't
blame the pain melon. I wouldn't want to get eaten necessarily. Okay,
well that's fair. Yeah anyway. Um. Once the Pilgrims started
(15:45):
settling in North America, they wholeheartedly embraced the pumpkin, which
the Native Americans introduced them too, in part due to
its hardiness. They used it in desserts and side dishes
and soups. The pumpkin was the star the first Thanksgiving.
As evidence spout is sixteen thirty three poem entitled New
(16:05):
England's Annoyances for pottage and puddings and custards and pies
are Pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies. We have pumpkins
at morning and pumpkins at noon. If it were not
for pumpkins, we should be undoone, which is undone. Yeah yeah,
(16:28):
I love it. Yeah, but they weren't using it in
a way most of us are familiar with the pumpkin. Yes,
the pumpkin. Yes. What they would do is cut off
the top, move the seeds, and then they'd fill the
inside its eggs, cream, honey, and other spices. Then they'd
bury the whole thing in the hot ashes of fire. Wait,
till it was done. I don't know how they knew,
(16:48):
but all right, and they scoop out the inside, including
the pumpkin flesh, and serve it as sort of a custard,
kind of an early version of the pumpkin pie kind of. Yeah,
and they wouldn't have had apple pie at early probably
a you know, because squash can grow in a season,
but decent cooking apples take years and years. As we
have discussed before, Yes we have. Early New England colonist
(17:10):
also used the pumpkin for a haircut template. I want
to know so much about this. They did it to
make sure they achieved a clean uniform cut, which earned
which earned them the name the nickname pumpkinheads. I know,
I just don't know how, but anyway, I will look
into that after this um. In the sixteen seventies, one
(17:33):
of the first published pumpkin recipes appeared in John Jocelyn's
New England Rarities discovered. The recipe called for cooking down
right pumpkin for a day and then adding butter and spices.
That's pretty much it. Yeah. Simple. The Pilgrims were also
known to make pumpkin beer by fermenting it along with maple, sugar, hops,
(17:54):
and per simmons, and through the seventeen and eighteen hundreds,
pumpkin was a relatively common ingredient in beers in the
UH pre United States, I suppose, um, due to its availability,
whereas malt and hops were a little bit more rare.
Um that there's recipes for mashing out pumpkin juice the
same way that you would do with apples, then hopping
and fermenting that juice as you would with a beer,
(18:15):
and uh for beers that start with malt and hops
and dried apple and pumpkin plus other stuff like rye
and birch and other flavorings. There's actually a later verse
of that pumpkin Louding poem or pumpkin annoyance poem, like
like why are there all of these effing pumpkins everywhere? Uh?
That freeds thus lee. If Barley be wanting to make
(18:36):
into malt, we must be contented and think it no fault,
for we can make liquor to sweeten our lips of
pumpkins and parsnips and walnut tree chips liquor to sweeten
our lips. No, I have to say, I like this
poem and also pumpkins seems to show up in a
lot of poems, because we were talking about some more later. Yeah, fun,
fun thing to look out for. Uh. Pumpkin did fall
(18:59):
out of prevalent in beer here in the Americas until
the nineteen eighties or so in the craft beer movement.
More about that in a little bit. Yes, speaking of
pumpkin pie. What about pumpkin pie. Yeah, there were recipes
for a stud and sweetened pumpkin mixture wrapped in pastry
all the way back to medieval times. Yeah, a lot
(19:21):
of the recipes you find in medieval European cookbooks were
modernized and later prints by replacing squash with pumpkin, because,
as Lauren said earlier, when pumpkin came around, it was
kind of a just seen as a tastier replacement for squash. Yeah.
In sixteenth and seventeenth century England, some of them more
well off. We're familiar with the type of pumpkin pie
that sometimes involved stuffing apples into the shell of a pumpkin,
(19:44):
so using the pumpkin as the coffin in this and
that it went out of fashion into in the eighteenth century,
and of note, as the sixteen fifties passage by Edward
Johnson about a sign of progress in New England being
that people were eating quote apples, pears, and quin starts
instead of their former pumpkin pies. So a k. They
(20:07):
were eating the more civilized European non native not that
mean unsubstantiated pumpkin Yeah, jeez, tough crowd. However, the eighteen
hundreds is just about the time that the American columnist
started the trend of serving a sweetened pumpkin dish at
holiday gatherings like Thanksgiving. In Amelia Simmons's cookbook American Cookery,
(20:33):
which I'm pretty sure we mentioned before, had a recipe
for pumpkin puddings that were baked in a crust similar
to what we would have today. And there's a fun
story about a small town in Connecticut in eighteen hundreds
they postponed Thanksgiving a week to wait out a molasses
shortage that impacted pumpkin pie. It was so important to
(20:54):
the meal. They were like, what hold up, Yeah, we're
gonna have to put this off for a week every
and I hope we're all the same page here, because
I'm not doing Thanksgiving without my pumpkin pie. That's blasphemy.
I feel the same way. I didn't until recently. I
actually I love pumpkin but I've only kind of been
newly introduced to it. Anyway, back to the pumpkin pie.
(21:16):
It even popped up during the Civil War. This dessert
was far more near and dear to the hearts of
New Englanders, and since many of the most outspoken abolitionists
were from New England, pumpkin pie would feature in some
of their writings. Lydia Marie Child's eight forty two poem
about Thanksgiving in New England ended with the line Hurrah
(21:36):
for the pumpkin Pie. On top of that, Sarah jo
Sifa Hale, who as we've mentioned before, is considered the
mother of Thanksgiving and it's one of my favorite, most
bizarre things I ever got to work on for stuff
Mom never told you are her story segments, So go
check that out on YouTube if you if you're interested,
it's hilarious. She included a brief mention of pumpkin pie
(21:56):
in her eighteen twenty seven anti slavery novel Northwood Quote.
Yet the pumpkin pie occupied the most distinguished niche after
Abraham Lincoln designated Thanksgiving a national holiday in eighteen sixty
three due to this lady's her campaigning campaign. Um uh,
(22:18):
and he did that. He gave in to this letter
writing campaign in part as an attempt to heal the
country after the Civil War. Angry Southerners saw it as
a way for Northerners to impose their traditions on them. Yeah,
I know, with one editorial out of Virginia claiming, quote,
this is an annual custom of that people, heretofore celebrated
(22:40):
with devout oblations to themselves of pumpkin pie and roast turkey. Wow. Disgusting,
I know, how dare they? However, with the help of
recipes and write ups printed in women's magazines, pumpkin pie
spread throughout the land became a traditional holiday dessert. Its
(23:02):
status further solidified with the nine introduction of Libbies Canned pumpkin,
which made pumpkin pie baking all the easier. And by
the way, Libbies currently dominates the canned pumpkin market North
America over nine pumpkin monopoly. Quite a corner on the
market there. Yeah, way to go, Libby's, I guess I suppose. Okay,
(23:29):
So let's let's step back a bit and look at
the other holiday pumpkins are associated with Halloween. It's my
favorite Holida to The earliest jack o lanterns come to
us courtesy of the Scottish and Irish, who originally carved
turnips and potatoes. The English might have used beats man.
(23:51):
Then they would put hot coals inside these root vegetables,
but it sounds kind of difficult. Yeah, you know what
might be here? Literally anything? Yeah, not literally anything, but
probably a pumpkin, Probably a big, fat, round pumpkin. When
European immigrants arrived to the colonies, they saw the cheaper,
(24:13):
more easily sourced, and more easily carvable pumpkins, and they
made the switch. I would imagine it didn't take much.
The first written instance of jack o' lantern in the
context of a carved fruit or vegetable, by the way,
was in seven and the pumpkin association first was recorded
in eighteen sixty six and etymological note why jack in
(24:37):
jack o lantern? Well? Since the or so in England
and later in the United States, the name jack was
applied as a generic term for any male human person,
hence Jack of all trades, every man, Jack, Jack the ripper,
and etcetera. So so Jack o Lantern was just Jack
of the lantern, like you know, like the dude with
(24:57):
the lantern. So yeah, fun naming note. Okay for someone
who loves Halloween. I actually didn't know the myth, the
story behind the Jack liner. Yeah, so this is super fun.
This is really fun one to research. Yeah, it's a
it's a terrific old folk story. Um and it comes
(25:17):
to us from the seventeenth century Irish tale of Stingy Jack. Yes,
Stingy Jack. So let's let's set the mood here. Let's
set the scene. Jack was a drunk and the ultimate manipulator.
And when Satan, yes that's Satan, got wind of this fella,
(25:37):
he was a bit jealous. He wanted to prove he
was superior and evilness and debauchery to this Jack. So
one night, when Jack was drunkenly stumbling around as he
was wont to do, he ran into Satan looking to
collect his soul. Jack convinced Satan to allow him one
(25:58):
last drink. But when the bill comes to when don't
you know it, but Jack doesn't have any money. That's
where the cingey bit comes in. I'm guessing. So he
convinced the seemingly gullible Satan to turn into a silver
coin to pay for said drink, but instead Jack pocketed
(26:18):
Satan in his now coin form next to his handy
crucifix in his pocket so Satan couldn't transform back. Jack
would only set him free after he convinced Satan to
leave him and his soul alone for one or ten
depending which story you look at years. How he had
this negotiation with a coin that's beyond me anyway, when
(26:43):
Satan came at the end of their agreed upon term,
Jack tricked Satan again again by getting him to climb
a tree for a piece of fruit that Jack wanted
as his last meal. And then Jack quickly placed a
bunch of crucifixes to keep Satan up up, stuck in
the tree like a kitten. I know, kind of adorable,
(27:06):
and I really want more details on that conversation. How
did he convince him to climb a tree for this
piece of fruit? Anyway, this time, Jack bargain with Satan
to never take his soul to Hades, and what I
imagine as a hand thrown up type move, Satan agreed
alas when Jack finally drank himself to death. Years later,
(27:27):
he was refused entrance into heaven for his deviousness, and
as for the deal he struck with Satan, he couldn't
go to Hades either. Satan's still mad about how foolish
all the trickery had made him look, sentenced Jack to
wander a never ending night with only a litt coal
as his light. Jack placed the coal in a hollowed
out turnip and went about his miserable way for all eternity.
(27:50):
The Irish gave him the name Jack of the Lantern,
later shortened to Jack o Lantern and the tradition of
carving root vegetables, and later the pump in with scary
faces was meant to frighten stingy Jack and other spirits
like him away. Oh yeah, that gets you all ready
for October for the Fall. I love that story so
(28:14):
much and I can't believe I've never heard it. It's wonderful. Yeah.
Also also vaguely related to Halloween. Um, if you ever
have the chance to check out Dellas Morthos Festival, look
for a sweet treat called Calabaza and it's a soft,
semi candied pumpkin preparation that involves unrefined sugar syrup and
guava and cinnamon, and it's studs of the pumpkin fibers.
(28:37):
Soak up all of that flavor. Oh that sounds good.
I've always wanted to check that out. Okay, now I'm
kind of like spooked out. Here's something to kind of
bring bring you back. Bring you back. The global pumpkin
growing competition market uh huh may have been kick started
by the World's Fair in Paris in nine and the
(29:00):
showing there of a four hundred pound pumpkin specimen. It's
about a hundred and eighty one. Wow. Well from there,
let's jump skip to nineteen o three and the home
of a large pumpkin cannary, E Sears Canning in Circleville, Ohio.
Each fall farmers whose wagons overfloweth with pumpkins, they would
(29:23):
make the check to the Canary to get their products canned.
In response, in nineteen o three, the mayor announced Circleville
would hold an annual autumn produce festival with pumpkin in
starring role. During the Great Depression, e Sears Canning was
forced to shut her its stores, but the festival still
continues to this day under the name the Pumpkin Show,
(29:44):
the largest pumpkin festival of its time. There's the largest
pumpkin contests, largest pumpkin pie contest. I want to be
involved in that so badly. And a miss Pumpkin pageant.
I love these like little small festivals are ye, and
there are as I'm sure you could guests, many many, many,
many many pumpkin festivals, Pumpkin chunkin the Art and Pumpkin
(30:06):
Festival in California. And there's some amazing, just truly stunning
Jack O'landard displays at a lot of these. I recommend
looking them up. I want to see one in real
life so badly. Oh yeah, I have a friend she
sent me a video of when she was out last year.
I think she was in Salem. Oh man, I was
so jealous. If you guys have any good photographs of
(30:28):
that kind of thing, send send them on in. Yeah. Um,
pumpkins is a food meanwhile, we are still a food show.
Um in the United States. Anyway, fell out of fashion
for a bit between World War One and World War Two,
but picked up again with the surge in trick or
treating that came about during the post World War two era,
which was that Golden Age, when the streets were paved
(30:50):
with candy and young baby boomers not literally paved, that
would be griss um. There was another bit of a
dip in pumpkin eating around here from the nineteen seventies
through the nineties, as the squash was bred more for
for carve ability than for a taste and texture. But
another trend would bring it back from the ashes yet again.
(31:11):
I wonder what it could be. Well, we'll find out
after another quick break for a word from our sponsor,
and we're back, Thank you sponsor. Okay, so it's time
(31:31):
to talk about pumpkin spice. Pumpkin pie spice. Pumpkin spice. Yes,
that whole uh pumpkin pie flavor, combination of of sweet slash,
savory squash plus not meg plus cinnamon. Yeah uh. And
I bet a lot of you can guess what started
this trend. The two thousand three release of the Starbucks
(31:54):
Pumpkin Spice Latte. Those PSL's yes, trending on Twitter probably
as we speak. Between launch and Starbucks sold two hundred
million pumpkin spice lattes. And that that was as I'm
sure it's a lot more these days. Yeah uh. And
that's extra not bad for a product that Starbucks wasn't
(32:17):
even sure about to begin with, UM, given that the
flavor overpowers that of coffee and is more easily reproducible
than high quality coffee, which ostensibly Starbucks wants to be
known for primarily you would think ostensibly, yes, once it
caught on, they were like, oh, well that's fine, Yeah, okay,
we'll just keep going with this one. Sales of pumpkin
(32:41):
spice flavored products jumped to almost fifty million dollars in
the United States. Most of that was pumpkin pie filling,
but Show Bonnie announced that it's limited release A Pumpkin
Spy Show was the most successful in its history. Yeah,
my goodness. And here's a number for you. That's the
(33:05):
increase of pumpkin as an ingredient in beverages since two
thousand and six, and pumpkin use on menages just beverages,
And I really do think Starbucks is like but that
was the pinnacle it all met at this point. Now
we're still living with the consequences UM, and pumpkin use
(33:26):
on menus has risen by ten times since two thousands
and six. A majority of pumpkin spice products sales do
you take place in the fall, falling between September and November,
and a survey conducted in found that thirty of the
little over one thousand of adult participants named pumpkin spices
(33:48):
the number one flavor they associated with fall. Yeah, it
makes sense. Sure. In the midst of all of this,
pumpkin beers have enjoyed some serious seasonal resurgence. Starting two
thousand four, Seattle brewery Elysian has hosted a Great Pumpkin
Beer Festival every September and or October, which this year
will feature over eighty individual pumpkin bruise. Beer Advocate dot com,
(34:12):
a great website, currently lists one thousand, three hundred and
ninety nine examples of pumpkin ale having been professionally produced
and sold worldwide. WHOA, that's a lot. Yeah, many of
them were probably like one time offerings, but nonetheless like
pumpkin and or pumpkin spice in general, these beers are
a divisive. Yeah. Many are just super sweet and or
(34:38):
super spiced and can arrange in flavor closer to like
Yankee candle than beer. My current favorite pumpkin beer diss
comes from the Paste magazine review of Southern Tier Warlock
Imperial Pumpkin Stout, which it said tastes like quote decades
old easy bake oven brownie mix, rehydrated with lack liquorice, liqueur,
(35:01):
harsh words. If you have either a favorite brand or
a favorite diss, right, and let us know. I love
that you have a favorite diss I've read a lot
of them. I kind of I'm not a fan of
pumpkin beer. I have some that I like. I I yeah,
I like very dry flavored alcohols, so I do too,
(35:21):
and I love pumpkin and it is difficult to get
a pumpkin beer right. But I have had no bad,
like a handful that I like. And I do this
thing every Labor Day weekend where I get summer beer
and usually pumpkin beer or fall beer, and I say
goodbye to summer and hello to fall, even though fall
doesn't technically start thin. That's just my tradition. No, that's lovely.
(35:43):
I thank you. And here is a quick list of
some of the weird pumpkin items you might encounter in
the fall. You've got pumpkin spice, marshmallows, peeps, pumpkin spice, yogurt,
pumpkins by sandwich bread, pumpkin spice, popcorn pumpkins spice, chips,
pumpkin spice, almonds, pumpkin spice, morsels, pumpkins spy, sprinkles, pumpkin spicewod,
(36:03):
pumpkin spice, white powder, pumpkins spice areas, pumpkin spice, freada
cheeny pumpkin spice, go, bonzo beans, and it goes on
and on. I had to cut myself off. I'm sure
you guys have seen these products. There's an astonishing amount
of Yeah, and then we didn't. I mean, if we
go into like lotions and perfumes as a whole, another thing,
air fresheners. O. Yeah. Also I stumbled a grass and
(36:27):
tutorial on how to turn a pumpkin into a beer gang.
Ohh um that that Great Pumpkin Beer Festival features a
giant pumpkin every year. Um from their website, a several
hundred pound pumpkin that is scooped, scorched, filled with Elysian
pumpkin beer, sealed, conditioned, and then tapped at the fest
for all to enjoy. Okay, now I want to check
(36:49):
this out. There are so many things I want to
see field tripped Seattle. Yes. Also, apparently pumpkin pie kit
cat bars are coming to the United States this fall.
I might try one of those. I've had the pumpkin
pie reesus like my two favorite candy to pumpkin spice. Aside,
(37:10):
eating pumpkins is actually pretty good for you. Um. I mean,
you know, before you've added crap tons of sugar and
cream or butter or whatever into them. Um. Pumpkins are
high in fiber, They've got a touch of protein, and
they're low in sugars and fats, which means that they
are low calorie but super filling. Um. They've also got
a ton of bated caroteen and are good sources of
(37:30):
a bunch of other vitamins and minerals like like vitamin
C and potassium. Because of the moisture and pumpkin pumpkin puree,
it can be used as a as a good substitute
for cooking fats in baked goods, especially quick breads like
muffins or banana bread type things, and you can make
your own puree if you want. Carving pumpkins, for example,
are totally edible, but pie pumpkins are also widely available
(37:51):
in the United States and have a nicer flavor slash texture.
Due to their fiber content, pumpkin is also really great
for controlling both constipation and diarrhea. Uh uh. Fiber gets
the bowels moving and also absorbs excess water in the bowels.
For that reason, it's a popular treatment for digestive problems
and pets. Just a teaspoon or too mixed in with
your catadog's food can work. Wonders. Yeah, I did come
(38:13):
across that a lot when I was researching this episode.
There you go, yeah, yeah, uh. The seeds are a
little less healthy, but still a totally decent snack. They're
they're high in good fats and have a good good
amount of like high quality proteins um. The type of
the white holes are a better source of fiber than
pepitas and thus are a little bit more filling. I
(38:34):
I always clean the seeds from my carving pumpkins and
roast them, usually just with a sprinkle of like vegetable
oil and salt. One of my favorite things. Huh. And
as we said earlier, you can also eat pumpkin blossoms. Yeah,
like zucchini blossoms. They're pretty excellent breaded and fried, not
so healthy, but that's fine. Um. Or you can use
them the way that you would any other delicate green
(38:54):
like I think like spinach in a in a super
a stew. I have three recipes. I go too fairly
often with pumpkin pumpkin bread I love um, pumpkin enchiladas
also good, pumpkin enchiladdos good, and pumpkin chili versable it
is I'm not goodness, okay, okay, So that brings us
(39:16):
to our culture. Bit yeah, okay. So first pumpkin chuckin, Yes,
punkin chunkin. Yeah. So in a blacksmith by the name
of John Ellsworth started what would become the World Champion
punkin Chicken, an annual event in which growers and engineers
come together to see who can hurl a pumpkin the
(39:36):
furthest with neither electricity nor explosives involved, just the brain
because we can. Yes, the competition claims to be the
oldest of its kind, and I couldn't find any evidence
to the contrary. Though the sport has spread the United
States certainly, and has even popped up in Europe. Teams
build whatever kind of device they want within the parameters. Catapultster,
(39:59):
trebishe air cannons and send their weight specified pumpkins of flying.
The industry standards seems to be eight ten pounds per pumpkin. Yeah,
I'm glad they've got a standard. Yeah. The record distance
according to Guinness is just over five thousand, five hundred
and forty five ft, which is about one thousand six
(40:20):
so unsubstantial at all. A medieval Europeans take that, huh. Unfortunately,
the original World Championship is canceled this year due to
an injury at last year's competition and some pending litigation.
But we hope that that everyone everyone is mentally and
(40:40):
physically doing better next year and able to come back
to us. Yes, and speaking of competitions giant pumpkins, there
are both regional and global pumpkin growing competitions and they
are a serious obsession for the growers who enter. Uh.
Careful genetic cultivation has grown the field explosively in the
(41:05):
past couple of decades. Just fifteen years ago, one thousand
pounds was this unheard of goal, and now the top
winners are more than double that. These giant pumpkins can
grow up to fifty pounds per day per day during
peak growth season. Apparently, the secrets aside from starting with
like perfectly cultivated seeds, are pruning your vines to just
(41:28):
a few fruits, getting the right amount of sun cover,
feeding and watering them constantly, using friendly fungi to help
nutrient transfer into the roots, and uh protecting their skins
from cracks and covering them overnight to keep them at
the right temperature, which just sounds so dear uh using
(41:49):
using genetics. Some growers and researchers are hoping to push
growth even further, and there doesn't seem to be an
eminent end to how big they could get. A paper
published in the International Journal of Non Linear Mechanics estimated
that giant pumpkins of the proper shape could hold up
their own weight up to twenty thousand pounds a k
(42:11):
a like nine thousand kilograms. No, if I saw twenty
pound pumpkin, is there a horror movie about this? Because
if not, there should be. Oh yes, oh, let's write it.
Oh I can use that jack o lantern myth. Oh
it'll be so good, uh stingy jack and the twenty
pound pumpkin. Oh, it's going to be excellent. Look out
(42:33):
for you guys. Yeah, oh, but yeah, yeah, people get
so excited about this. There's there's a yearly cruise for
giant pumpkin growers. Um and and I wanted to kind
of end this our pumpkin episode on a quote from
from one such grower. There was an article about these
competitions in Time magazine and uh. One grower by the
(42:53):
name of Ron Wallace was quoted as saying, have you
ever heard anybody say a bad word about a pumpkin? No?
Pumpkins could solve the world's problems. Honestly, everybody loves the pumpkin.
They do. And to see one grow that big, my
heart is warm. It's so sweet. It is Okay, I
(43:14):
have to say, if I was at a party and
I overheard someone saying that they grew giant pumpkins, it's
like a hobby. I'm going to go talk to that first.
I want to know more about you and your hobby.
Do you think you can reach twenty pounds? You know? Yeah,
these are important party conversation topics. They are um and
(43:34):
you are welcome for learning from us about these party topics. Yeah,
there's so much we could have impacted in this episode.
I think the pumpkin spice latte alone Um, it's a
deep cultural phenomenon, it is, and over on stuff I
never told you. We did one kind of about the
assumptions that come with it, like basic thing. Yeah, so
(44:00):
maybe we'll revisit some of this stuff because there's there's
a lot surprisingly about the pumpkins, about the humble pumpkin,
I know. And that brings us to the end of
this classic false the episode. It does. Um, you enjoyed it,
We we do. Yeah. Um. Oh, if you have any
(44:24):
pumpkin carvings, oh my gosh, yes, or pumpkin recipes or
anything to do with pumpkins, I suppose yeah, that's true.
Somebody did send us a pretty epic pumpkins soup last
time we did. Oh yeah, I'm really jealous of I
have a friend who lives up north and they have those,
um like jack o lanterns, like thousands of them. You know.
(44:45):
I always want to see one of those. Field trip. Yes,
if you've been to one, you can send pictures our way,
and you can do that at our email Hello at
saberpod dot com. You can also find us on social media.
We are on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. You can find
us there at savor Pod. We do hope to hear
from you. Savor is production of I Heart Radio and
(45:08):
Stuff Media. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, you
can visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thank you, as
always to our super producers Dylan Vagan and Andrew Howard.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way.
Savor News
Hosts And Creators
Anney Reese
Lauren Vogelbaum
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.