Fed with Chris van Tulleken

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How chicken got big. Chris van Tulleken unwraps the forces that shape what we eat.

How chicken got big. Chris van Tulleken unwraps the forces that shape what we eat. This is how we changed chicken and chicken changed us.

Fed with Chris van Tulleken is a new food podcast, investigating the entangled web of forces that shape what ends up on our plates. In the first series, Planet Chicken, Chris digs into the story of one of the most widely eaten meats on earth - to try to get to the truth of why we eat so much of it, and what that means for the birds, for us, and for the planet.

If there's one thing Chris knows, it's what he should and shouldn't be eating.

He's across the dangers of ultra-processed foods: those nutritionally empty snacks that fill our supermarket shelves and entrance our kids. And at the same time, he's confident he knows what we should be eating: good, old fashioned whole food - recognisable ingredients, no mysterious additives, no harmful rubbish.

Something like a nice wholesome roast chicken, perhaps? In fact, in the van Tulleken household that's a family favourite.

But recently, Chris has been getting asked more questions - by neighbours, people on the street, even government ministers: and he's realised there's a massive gap in his food knowledge.

Sure, he knows what happens in our bodies once that delicious gravy-drenched chicken dinner passes our lips: but what about everything that comes before that? Where it's from, how it was reared, how it was processed? Can he say what toll the process of getting that chicken from farm to plate might've have taken on the animal, the environment, the nutritional content?
Because in a world where so much food comes via an industrialised, globalised food system; where we're subtly influenced at every turn by advertising and price tags; and where ALL food choices ultimately come with a cost of some sort - how much do any of us really know or want to know about the consequences of our dinner?

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Fed with Chris van Tulleken: Series 1: Planet Chicken: 1. The Invention Of Chicken

1. The Invention Of Chicken

Series 1: Planet Chicken

BBC Radio 4 - Fed with Chris van Tulleken, Series 1: Planet Chicken, 1. The Invention Of Chicken

Dr Chris van Tulleken discovers how we changed chicken, and how chicken changed us.

Dr Chris van Tulleken looks at our relationship with chickens, from the earliest days of co-existence with jungle fowl to the mass production of today.

Dr Chris van Tulleken is on a mission to find out what we’re eating, why, and who or what might be influencing our decisions. And he’s starting his quest to uncover food truths with the most eaten meat in the world, and one of the most numerous animals on our planet: chicken

He’s recently been forced to confront a serious gap in his food knowledge - what happens before it gets to our plates - and has decided this, the world’s most popular meat, is an ideal starting point. 

Chris’ initial investigations reveal the vast scale of modern chicken consumption; and how a once revered jungle fowl was manipulated to become a modern food success story, a fast-growing heavy-breasted beast to feed the masses. 

Now, he's torn: is this a triumph of human ingenuity – or the creation of a monster?

Produced by Lucy Taylor and Emily Knight.


Archive audio:
'Chicken of Tomorrow' (1948) from the Prelinger Archive.
'Fanny Cradock Cooks for Christmas' (1975) from the BBC.

Fed with Chris van Tulleken: Series 1: Planet Chicken

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Fed with Chris van Tulleken

Series 1: Planet Chicken

1. The Invention Of Chicken

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