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By all accounts, 2016 was a bleak year—except when it came to cookbooks. This year bore such a bumper crop of cookbooks that Bite host Tom Philpott had trouble choosing his favorites. After careful consideration, he’s come up with five that make perfect gifts for the home chefs in your life—including one that features a cuisine that you’re unlikely to find even in restaurants. Then, keeping on the book theme, Tom talks about the best books about food politics with author and food activist Anna Lappé.

A question that some people might be asking right now: How can you think about food at a time like this? But actually, food has everything to do with the election of Donald Trump: On this episode, Tom Philpott talks to Tom Colicchio of TV’s Top Chef, about how the mighty food industry is poised to stage a major resistance against some of Trump’s policies. One giant group of people who are wondering what’s in store for them over these next few years is restaurant workers, many of whom are undocumented. We hear from one of them, a waiter in New York City with a complicated immigration status. Also: Jenny talks to the formerly homeless manager of a kitchen at a single room occupancy building about why he voted for Trump.

In this episode, we talk to Sam Kass, who served as the Obamas’ personal chef until early 2015. In addition to whipping up sweet potato fries and other family favorites, Kass directed the First Lady children's health effort Let’s Move!, and served as the senior White House adviser on nutrition policy. Kass tells us about how the Obama administration changed the way Americans eat, as well as his current project: making your fridge smarter. Also: A local bartender whipped up election-night cocktails especially for Bite: the Bad Hombre and the Nasty Woman. Cheers to that.

Nearly every topic you can think of, and many you hoped wouldn’t, have surfaced during the 2016 presidential election. But there’s been almost zero talk by either candidate of the thing that fuels the country: our food system. On today’s episode, Mark Bittman dishes on how the next president might tackle food and agriculture. Bittman is most famous for the Minimalist recipe column he wrote for the New York Times and award-winning cookbooks like How to Cook Everything. He was also the only national newspaper columnist tapped with covering food politics and policy. Also: Tom gives you the low-down on how agribusinesses are spending their campaign money, and Maddie has the scoop on some cooking tips from WikiLeaks.

Manhattan's Chinatown recently made headlines for being the target of an offensive segment on Bill O’Reilly’s Fox News show. Fox missed the real story: the truly special place it occupies in the US food scene. Navigate the narrow, bustling sidewalks Mott Street between Canal and Hester and you'll see food everywhere, from live frogs to whole dragon fruit. What makes culinary Chinatown tick? For answers, we turn on this week's Bite podcast to Valerie Imbruce, author of the new book From Farm to Canal Street. Imbruce argues that Manahttan's Chinatown is a remnant of pre-supermarket New York—and also a viable model for a more tantalizing food future. We also went to San Francisco’s Chinatown to track down the surprising origins of fortune cookies. (Hint: They’re not from China!) And: If you want to spice up a conference panel, invite some angry, chanting vegans. Just ask Tom.

Dine out in any major American city, and you'll notice plenty of restaurants paying tribute to immigrant cuisine: taco stands, Ethiopian joints, Jewish delis, Vietnamese cafés. But there’s one striking omission to this melting pot. "There should be restaurants all over the country showcasing Native American foods,” says our guest Sean Sherman, who goes by the name “the Sioux Chef.” A few years ago, Sherman set out to recreate his ancestors' cuisine, the way it was before Indians were forced onto reservations and frybread became their defining dish. Sherman concocts meals like corn and sumac-seared Walleye and duck and wild rice pemmican, and makes use of foraged plants and native fruits and vegetables. We talked to him about what it was like growing up on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, the history of frybread, and his connection to the Dakota Access Pipeline protest. Also: Kiera and Maddie recap some very weird food news stories, involving drones, gummy candies, and Donald Trump.

Are babies better off on baby food or whole foods? Should they eat all organic? Does a mother’s diet during pregnancy affect her kid’s tastebuds? What’s the deal with alcohol? To try and answer questions like these, parents often have to weigh outdated, loosely researched, or guilt-inducing opinions. Well, today we bring you answers from the authors of The Informed Parent: A Science-Based Resource for Your Child’s First Four Years. Scientists Tara Haelle and Emily Willingham have scoured thousands of studies to come up with up-to-date answers for your trickiest parenting food dilemmas. But even if you don’t plan to have kids, chances are, you like baked goods, right? Don’t miss this episode, because Maddie has a special delivery from the heart of the West.

Tom and Kiera talk to Chef Daniel Patterson about his journey from high-end restaurants to the world of fast food. Jenny checks out an app that connects Silicon Valley's homesick foreign tech workers with food from their homelands, and Kiera wonders: Is it fair to call a soda tax a grocery tax?

Many of the most delectable ingredients, from parmesan cheese to extra-virgin olive oil to tuna sashimi, are deceiving you. Food fraud affects up to 10 percent of the global food supply, and it poses a risk to your health, your taste buds, and your wallet. We chat with Larry Olmsted, author of the book Real Food, Fake Food, about how much of what you eat is a lie, and what you can do about it. Maddie catches up with novelist Margaret Atwood about futuristic pigs, and Tom tells you about the Olympics’ coffee woes.

Luz Calvo and Catriona Rueda Esquibel are co-authors of Decolonize Your Diet. The cookbook draws on ingredients and recipes from ancient Mexico. “We quickly found that foods from the pre-Hispanic era were among the healthiest foods on the planet,” writes Calvo. We talk to the couple about those pre-Hispanic foods and get a mouthwatering summer recipe involving squash blossoms. Plus: Tom gives us the scoop on where Hillary and Donald stand on food and agriculture issues, and Kiera dives into a moral debate involving Malcolm Gladwell and college dining.

Nigerian chef Tunde Wey talks us through some of the paradoxes of cooking while black, wowed us with anecdotes from his two-week stay at a migrant detention center in El Paso—where the chicken wings are apparently pretty good—and tantalized us with the fundamentals of Nigerian cuisine. He left us hungry to read more of his writing—and try his food.

It may not surprise you that food corporations will say pretty much anything to get us to buy their products. They often promote messages like “exercise more” to divert attention from their high-fat or sugar-laden foods. In this week’s episode we talk to one nutritionist whose goal is to flag differences between Big Food’s marketing schemes and actual science. Tired of seeing his industry getting cozy with corporations, Andy Bellatti founded Dietitians for Professional Integrity. He is known for speaking out against flash-in-the-pan diets and corporate sponsorships. In the episode, Andy shares the good points of fad diets like Paleo and gives us his recipe for a guilt-free treat. Plus, we’ve got an update from Tom Philpott on green smoothies and the latest on what one poultry company is doing to get their chickens to play more.

You know Michael Pollan from his blockbuster book The Omnivore's Dilemma or his most recent title, Cooked, which was adapted by Netflix as a documentary series. But the celebrity author hasn't always been so obsessed with what people eat. "Before I started writing about food, my focus was really on the human relationship to plants," Michael tells us. "Not only do plants nourish us bodily—they nourish us psychologically.” Now he's researching flora with psychedelic properties for a new book. Part of the project covers recent experimental trials using psilocybin (a compound found in magic mushrooms) to treat cancer patients' anxiety about death. Plus: How much do you know about ayahuasca? And what Amazonian creature did Michael munch on in Brazil?

Our guest Monica Jain is the founder of Fish 2.0, a competition that connects seafood businesses with investors. The conference places emphasis on social and environmental impacts in an attempt to spark responsible innovation in the industry. Monica gives us the scoop on some new technologies helping make the fish you eat safer, and also tells us about a tasty ocean creature she recently dined on. Plus: Wacky new food products, news about an ominous merger in the works, and tips for avoiding seafood fraud.

This week, we talk to a guy who deals with food gone bad. Tainted hamburgers, sour burritos, salmonella-laced chicken: Food poisoning attorney Bill Marler confronts the aftermath of foodborne illnesses. Since gaining a reputation through his litigation during the infamous 1993 Jack-in-the-Box E.coli outbreak, Marler has worked on cases involving companies like McDonald’s, Odwalla, and most recently, Chipotle. He’s also a major force in food safety policy and runs a website called Food Safety News. During our conversation, he traces the rise of illnesses like E.coli and salmonella (“We have to keep up with these bugs”), gives us some tips on avoiding them, and reveals the real scoop on thrice-washed-spinach. We also explore some news about the superbugs emerging from antibiotic resistance in the livestock industry, and discover how food changes when in flight.

We're bringing together a professional vegetarian and a professional carnivore. And not just any vegetarian—Amanda Cohen is the chef-owner of the celebrated restaurant Dirt Candy on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Without braising a single pork belly since it opened in 2008, Dirt Candy remains one of New York's hottest restaurants. Our other guest, Adam Danforth, isn't your everyday carnivore. A butcher by trade, Adam has written a James Beard Award-winning guide to meat cutting and worked at New York culinary temples Marlow & Daughters and Blue Hill. Despite his food's popularity, he's the butcher who thinks we should all be eating less meat. Plus: Smoothies! Reality TV! Pig tails!

Did you know that servers and other tipped restaurant workers survive on wages as low as $2.13/hour? That’s the tipped minimum wage, which has remained measly in many states since the early 1990s—and it’s keeping people in poverty. Our guest on this week’s episode, Saru Jayaraman, advocates for better treatment and pay for the country's 11 million restaurant workers. Her latest book, Forked: A New Standard of American Dining, examines the fascinating history of tipping in the United States and how restaurants can take the higher road when it comes to labor standards. We also expose some cracks in the farm-to-table movement, and catch up with some Bay Area restaurateurs about what life is like after abolishing tipping.

Think back to the days of mystery meat, tater tots, and suspicious-looking Jello—we’re taking you inside the school cafeteria. Today’s guest, Bettina Elias Siegel, is an intellectual-property lawyer obsessed with school food. Her blog, The Lunch Tray, dives into topics like the corporations infiltrating our education system and the political battles waged over what kids eat. We’ll also get you up to speed on a juicy new start-up, and hear from our listeners about their favorite school lunch memories.

More than two million years ago, early humans started eating meat. Now considering the harsh climate they inhabited, where every day was a fight for survival, you’d think people turned to eating animals just to stay alive, right? Think again. As journalist and author Marta Zaraska puts it, "man's love affair with meat was as much about politics and sex as it was about nutrition.” Zaraska is the author of the new book Meathooked: The History and Science of our 2.5-Million-Year Obsession With Meat. On today’s episode, we talk to her about the cultural traditions, chemical pull, and masterful advertising that have made meat-eating such a worldwide obsession over the ages. We also get the scoop on why agribusiness is salivating over Cuba and learn some tips on understanding the labels on your egg carton.

Professor Brian Wansink is an expert in eating behavior and the director of Cornell University’s Food and Brand Lab. Brian reveals some of the fascinating insights from his research, like how you can better arrange your kitchen to avoid eating too much. And you’ll never guess what animal part he dined on during a recent trip to Norway. We’ll also dig into news about the vegan food lobby and give you some tips on how to make green treats on St. Paddy’s Day without using artificial food dyes.