Bad Table Manners pushes the boundaries of food storytelling in South Asia. Despite a universal love of delicious food, South Asian communities’ narratives and food practices maintain social hierarchies, caste inequalities, and racial and gender discrimination. In spanning both “high” and “low” food cultures, this podcast deconstructs monolithic notions of South Asian or “Indian” food by diving into micro contexts of households, restaurants, neighborhoods, streets and communities. It also reveals how hyper-regional and local culinary expressions are shaped by global gastronomic histories and trends.
Hosted by Delhi-based anthropologist Meher Varma, Bad Table Manners is narrator-driven, ethnographic, and playful. It will take you to the seaside, through bustling markets, and the intimacy of the kitchen table in private homes. It reminds you that when good table manners are tossed, great conversation begins.
Bad Table Manners is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Whetstone Radio Collective creates storytelling dedicated to food origins and culture, with original content centering the perspectives of global majority populations and diasporas.
You can learn more about this podcast at whetstoneradio.com, on Twitter @whetstoneradio, on TikTok and Instagram @whetstonemedia and subscribe to our Spotify and YouTube channel, Whetstone Media, for more podcast content. You can learn more about all things happening at Whetstone at WhetstoneMedia.com.
All content for Bad Table Manners is the property of Whetstone Radio Collective and is served directly from their servers
with no modification, redirects, or rehosting. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by Podjoint in any way.
Bad Table Manners pushes the boundaries of food storytelling in South Asia. Despite a universal love of delicious food, South Asian communities’ narratives and food practices maintain social hierarchies, caste inequalities, and racial and gender discrimination. In spanning both “high” and “low” food cultures, this podcast deconstructs monolithic notions of South Asian or “Indian” food by diving into micro contexts of households, restaurants, neighborhoods, streets and communities. It also reveals how hyper-regional and local culinary expressions are shaped by global gastronomic histories and trends.
Hosted by Delhi-based anthropologist Meher Varma, Bad Table Manners is narrator-driven, ethnographic, and playful. It will take you to the seaside, through bustling markets, and the intimacy of the kitchen table in private homes. It reminds you that when good table manners are tossed, great conversation begins.
Bad Table Manners is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Whetstone Radio Collective creates storytelling dedicated to food origins and culture, with original content centering the perspectives of global majority populations and diasporas.
You can learn more about this podcast at whetstoneradio.com, on Twitter @whetstoneradio, on TikTok and Instagram @whetstonemedia and subscribe to our Spotify and YouTube channel, Whetstone Media, for more podcast content. You can learn more about all things happening at Whetstone at WhetstoneMedia.com.
To speak about Indian mangoes may be cliché, but because Indians never seem to tire of the subject, there’s always some juice. London-based writer, Nikesh Shukla, will humorously tell us how to devour one correctly – a skill most South Asians seem to inherently possess – while halfway justifying why our obsession for the fruit can and should live on. A conversation with food historian Vikram Doctor follows as he talks about the colonial legacy that underpins this obsession, and the parochialism that most Indians adopt as they cultivate their specific mango fetishes. I conclude in a kitchen with a Delhi-based pastry chef, Ruchi Vaish, who turns herself in as a Mango Obsessive. For her, mango season is the very best.
Topics covered in this episode:
Min 00:31: Meet Nikesh Shukla
Min 3:27: How to eat a mango properly
Min 4:30: Mango in literature
Min 7:55: Meet Ruchi Vaish
Min 8:02: Ways to cook and bake with mango
Min 9:01: Meet Vikram Doctor
Min 10:30: Alphonso mango, the “king of kings”
Min 12:49: Is mango parochialism political?
Min 17:37: The British love for mango pickles
Min 21:08: Income hanging from a tree
Min 30:20: A mango that’s “good for diabetics”
Min 31:55: Making mango cheesecake with Ruchi
Learn more about this episode of Bad Table Manners at www.whetstoneradio.com, on IG and Twitter at @whetstoneradio, and YouTube at WhetstoneRadio.
Guests: Nikesh Shukla (@nikeshshuklawriter), Vikram Doctor (@vikram.doctor), Ruchi Vaish (@intheknowkitchen)
Bad Table Manners
Bad Table Manners pushes the boundaries of food storytelling in South Asia. Despite a universal love of delicious food, South Asian communities’ narratives and food practices maintain social hierarchies, caste inequalities, and racial and gender discrimination. In spanning both “high” and “low” food cultures, this podcast deconstructs monolithic notions of South Asian or “Indian” food by diving into micro contexts of households, restaurants, neighborhoods, streets and communities. It also reveals how hyper-regional and local culinary expressions are shaped by global gastronomic histories and trends.
Hosted by Delhi-based anthropologist Meher Varma, Bad Table Manners is narrator-driven, ethnographic, and playful. It will take you to the seaside, through bustling markets, and the intimacy of the kitchen table in private homes. It reminds you that when good table manners are tossed, great conversation begins.
Bad Table Manners is part of Whetstone Radio Collective. Whetstone Radio Collective creates storytelling dedicated to food origins and culture, with original content centering the perspectives of global majority populations and diasporas.
You can learn more about this podcast at whetstoneradio.com, on Twitter @whetstoneradio, on TikTok and Instagram @whetstonemedia and subscribe to our Spotify and YouTube channel, Whetstone Media, for more podcast content. You can learn more about all things happening at Whetstone at WhetstoneMedia.com.
