“This is a story that goes a lot further back than Lehman Brothers, or Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac, to the glory days when America’s leading manufacturing companies were the envy of the world. It’s the story of how this great corporate heritage was squandered, and what this all has to do with the rise of a comparatively new social figure: the professional manager. There’s no doubt that American business has relied heavily on the Masters of Business Administration as a credential. Some say too heavily: 100,000 new MBAs pour out of American business schools each year, and more than 40% of them go into the financial services sector. But now they’re being called the Masters of Disaster. As you’ll hear in this program, some of the leading critics of the MBA culture are actually business school professors who have been raising the alarm for some time.” Stephen Crittenden@abc.net.au

“Anyone interested in historic cooking in Britain soon comes across Ivan Day, an extraordinary man who uses his authentic kitchen equipment and encyclopaedic knowledge to discover how our food has been cooked, eaten and served over the centuries. ‘I could cook a meal from any time from the Battle of Agincourt to the First World War and it’ll be different every 10 years,” Day says. ‘That’s not an idle boast. It’s to illustrate that culinary styles change constantly. They were influenced by whatever also changed our clothes, architecture and lifestyles. I’ve cooked for Marie Antoinette, Jane Austen, Francis Drake and Louis XVI, using the correct table settings and methods. I’ve prepared food for all sorts of people who’ve been dead for centuries. But there isn’t anyone alive who could teach me what I do”.History is the next big thing in food. After roaming around the world for inspiration, we are coming back to our past.” link@telegraph.co.uk