Food Matters Live Podcast

Seven out of ten women say they want to improve their nutrition. The problem isn't knowledge or even willingness, it's time, mental bandwidth and a food system that makes consistently hitting nutritional targets genuinely difficult.
And for women, that target is moving all the time. Nutritional requirements shift across the monthly cycle, through pregnancy, perimenopause and beyond, meaning the standard one-size nutritional recommendation built largely on male data is, at best, a starting point. At worst, it's masking a persistent micronutrient gap that shows up as fatigue, brain fog, poor concentration or even just feeling cold, and gets dismissed as a lifestyle problem when it's actually a nutritional one.
In this episode of the Food Matters Live podcast, made in partnership with Arborea, three experts from the company make the case that microalgae could be a quiet but significant part of the answer. 
We learn about the biochemistry of why minerals such as iron and magnesium and vitamins such as D and B so critical for women specifically, why nutrition is not just what's on the label but what survives processing and can actually be absorbed by your cells, and why uniquely cultivated microalgae may be what it actually takes to get these micronutrients in a bioavailable form into foods that people want to eat.
The Arborea team bring the science to life and into the real world, explaining how their technology can be used to produce clean microalgae at scale.
Guests:

Karen Stetter, Senior Research and Development Programme Manager, Arborea
Ulliana Sampaio, Senior Product Development Scientist, Arborea
Estelle Alexandre, Business Development team, Arborea
Arborea

Arborea uses its patented Biosolar Leaf™ technology to capture and convert carbon dioxide into controlled, highly nutritious, natural food ingredients. It uses sunlight for the industrial photosynthesis and extraction of microalgaeon barren, non-fertile land and thus with zero deforestation and no loss of biodiversity. 
The consistent micro-environment in this contained process ensures uniquely controlled taste and nutritional content. The process is easily scalable, without requiring expensive fermentation tanks, open ponds, internal photobioreactors, pressurised gases, and without risk of any cross-contamination from heavy metals or organic toxins.
Example products include :

BioSolar Spirulina™ bioactive nutrient concentrates rich in iron, magnesium and vitamins but without the ‘fishy’ or ‘earthy’ aftertaste of traditional microalgae production methods

NOvo Protein™, a white, neutral tasting, water-soluble, multi-functional ingredient nutritious protein suitable for any easily incorporated into any food product

Pure Blue™ spirulina extract food colouring.

Find out more at arborea.io

GLP-1 medications are not a silver bullet. That's not a controversial statement, but it is one that tends to get lost in a media narrative that swings between miracle cure and moral panic. 
The more interesting question for the food industry might be: what actually happens to people's diets when they're on these drugs, and what do they need from food, from support services, and from manufacturers, both during treatment and when they come off?
The honest answer, for now, is that the data is thin. People are eating less, but whether they're doing that through smaller portions, skipped meals, or a shift in macronutrient preference is largely uncharted territory.
In this episode of the Food Matters Live podcast, recorded at our London Olympia event, three specialists bring different lenses to the GLP-1 debate.
They cover dietary deficiencies, dietary support alongside the drugs, and how consumers’ tastes are changing as a result of taking GLP-1 medication.
If this has whet your appetite for next year’s Food Matters Live events - you can already register your interest to partner with us in London and Rotterdam. Just head to foodmatterslive.com

In the UK, around a third of the soft drinks market reformulated before the sugar levy even came into force. Most of the change happened in anticipation of the law, not in response to it. So does that prove mandatory regulation works?
The answer, according to the panellists in this session, recorded at the Food Matters Live event at London’s Olympia, is more nuanced than it first appears. 
Mandatory policies level the playing field and remove the competitive anxiety of going first. But our panelists all agree they only work if they're well designed, broadly applied, and given enough lead time for industry to respond. 
In this episode four specialists debate the policy landscape in the food industry right now and what it means in practice. 
They discuss nutrient profiling, GLP-1, new claims challenges, sugar levies and portion size reduction.
We also hear the case for the food industry to engage with regulators much earlier in the development process.
If this has whet your appetite for next year’s Food Matters Live events - you can already register your interest to partner with us in London and Rotterdam. Just head to foodmatterslive.com

Twenty years ago, roughly eight scientific papers a year were being published on the gut microbiome. Scientists barely knew it existed. Today it is one of the most actively researched areas in all of human biology, and what it's revealing is that this community of trillions of microbes living in your lower intestine is not just relevant to digestion. 
It's connected to your immune system, your brain, your metabolism, your mood, your response to stress, and your long-term risk of many major diseases.
In this episode of the Food Matters Live podcast, recorded at our London Olympia event, two scientists approach the gut microbiome from very different angles. 
Dr Emily Leeming, microbiome scientist, registered dietitian and author of Genius Gut and Fibre Power, opens with a compelling and accessible masterclass on what the gut microbiome is, why it matters, and what we can actually do about it. 
Dr Umar Jan, President of European Operations at Sabinsa, then presents the science behind two of Sabinsa's biotics. His presentation addresses a question that sits at the heart of the postbiotic category: when you inactivate a probiotic, what exactly are you left with, and can you prove it's doing something useful?
If this has whet your appetite for next year’s Food Matters Live events - you can already register your interest to partner with us in London and Rotterdam. Just head to foodmatterslive.com

Neil Rankin applied for a job at Pret after the 2008 financial crisis closed his sandwich business. He didn't get it. What followed was seven years in professional kitchens, a Michelin-level career built around fire and meat, and then slowly, a growing conviction that the most important thing he could do with everything he'd learned was to stop cooking meat altogether.
Symplicity started in a home kitchen during Covid, hand-making sausages and shaping burgers with an ice cream tub lid. Its first customers were Soho House, Dishoom and Gordon Ramsay. It is now in Waitrose and 3,000 restaurants across the UK and every product is still made by hand, using wild lacto-fermentation, everyday vegetables, miso, flaxseed and flour. 
In this episode of the Food Matters Live podcast, recorded at our London Olympia event, Neil sits down for an extended conversation about the journey that brought him here and what he's learned along the way. 
He explains why he thinks everything truly delicious in the world has been fermented and why he believes the plant-based industry's fatal mistake was starting with bitter proteins and working backwards. 
He opens up about the genuine tension of being a meat eater building a meat alternative and why retail remains the hardest frontier of all.
If this has whet your appetite for next year’s Food Matters Live events - you can already register your interest to partner with us in London and Rotterdam. Just head to foodmatterslive.com