MAD3

The Contemporary Status of Agriculture

Thu, 28 May 2026 01:38:51 GMT

Vandana Shiva has been fighting industrialized and commodified food systems since the 1980s. In her presentation at #MAD3 she describes how decades ago her gut feeling led her to become a food activist. Since then she has started Navdanya which to date is made up of 120 community seed banks in 17 states of India. Many seed banks are now running independently of Navdanya’s support. Navdanya has also trained and created awareness amongst 750,000 farmers in seed sovereignty, food sovereignty, and sustainable agriculture over the past two decades, and helped setup the largest direct marketing, fair trade and organic network in the country. More than 4000 rice varieties have been collected, saved, and conserved by Navdanya in last 26 years. Multitudes of food crops left behind by the Green Revolution and monoculture cropping, such as millets, pseudo-cereals, and pulses, have been conserved and promoted by Navdanya.

On Authenticity

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Jonathan Gold was a Los Angeles local writing for the Los Angeles Times (previously LA Weekly and Gourmet). He was also the first food critic to win the Pulitzer Prize in criticism in 2007 and was a finalist again in 2011. He initially began writing the Counter Intelligence column for the L.A. Weekly in 1986, whilst writing about death metal and gangsta rap for Rolling Stone and Spin among other places.

Koomal Dreaming: Cultural Experiences

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

A native of Western Australia, Josh has created his own company to share his indigenous Wardandi Aboriginal knowledge and culture with the world through tours, music, and dance.

Spontaneity in Cusine

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Born in Auvergne, central France, Pascal discovered his passion for food while still a boy, helping his father harvest their own vegetables from their family garden. His career took him from France to Australasia and back again, to Alain Passard’s l’Arpege. In 2000, he opened l’Astrance to instant acclaim. In 2007, he won his third Michelin star, which he maintains today.

Dark Snow

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Jason Box is one of the leading experts of the Greenland ice sheet. Since 1994, he has spent over one-year camping on the inland ice, investigating atmosphere-surface interactions, physical climatology and environmental problems. Box was a contributing author to ‘Climate Change 2007,’ the report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; the IPCC was co-awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with Al Gore. Box’s most recent endeavour is Dark Snow Project, a crowd-funded effort to analyze the role of wildfires and industrial soot in a recent unprecedented melt of the area.

The Perennial Plate

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

This couple makes up ‘Perennial Plate’ – a 2013 James Beard Award-winning online, weekly documentary video series devoted to socially responsible and adventurous eating around the world. Daniel has spent time at some of the world’s best restaurants (St John, Mugaritz, Fat Duck included), Daniel went on to study at NYU before beginning a career in film. Mirra comes from a background in marketing and graphic design – she is also a vegetarian.

On Guts

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Listen to David Chang giving an introduction to MAD Symposium 3 and explaining the theme of the event.

Fermentation Revival

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

In recent years, there’s been much talk of a fermentation revival going on in kitchens across the globe. From South Carolina to Copenhagen, chefs are creating dedicated spaces in which vinegars, misos, and all types of concoctions can bubble away and transform over time, often yielding unfamiliar and delicious results. But as one of the most referenced figures in the fermentation movement explained at MAD, we should remind ourselves that it’s ancient and essential.

Sandor Katz, the author of 2012’s “The Art of Fermentation,” talks about all the ways we can benefit from the process.

Who's Got the Guts?

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Tor Nørretranders is a Danish author of non-fiction and popular science. His books and lectures have primarily been focused on science and its role in society, often with his own advice about how society should integrate new findings in science. Tor has published twenty books and been translated into ten languages. His best-known books are on consciousness (the User Illusion, 1999) and creativity (the Generous Man, 2005), but he has dealt with many other issues such as network technology, the environment, quantum mechanics, joy and children’s questions about the world. Tor holds an M.Sc. in environmental planning from Roskilde University and is honorary professor in the Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy at Copenhagen Business School.

Entrails: The Hidden Side of Cooking

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Heribert Watzke, the scientist credited with establishing the field of food material research, wants to remind people that our guts are more than just plumbing. In twenty minutes at MAD3, Watzke analyzes the constant, dynamic dialogue that takes place between our two brains: the big brain, in our head, which uses up 25 percent of our energy and accounts for only 2 percent of our body mass, and the one below, in our gut.

Xenos

Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 GMT

Born and raised in Denmark, Knud studied comparative literature at university. After years spent as a self-professed failed writer – he entered the advertising industry where he became very successful. However, he soon developed problems with drugs and alcohol that led to the eventual loss of his job and home. Having hit rock bottom, he wrote a famous novel and is now often featured on discussion panels and is a frequent radio commentator. As the first and so far only non-German writer, he was invited to join the prestigious club of authors Lübeck 05 by his idol Günter Grass.

Gut feelings - Love & Betrayal on the Plate

Tue, 08 Jul 2014 00:00:00 GMT

New York’s Jon Reiner reminds us that it actually takes guts to be vulnerable and consider your weaknesses. “When I went through the experience of not being able to eat for six months due to complications of my Crohn’s Disease, I wanted to tell people that I had finally seen the beauty of stoicism and discipline,” says the author of “The Man Who Couldn’t Eat,” in this presentation from MAD3. “But instead I saw that I was weak and that I hated my situation.” While sick, Reiner was unable to handle sitting at the table with his family as they ate and he couldn’t.

The ordeal made him realize what he truly loves about food: the human and emotional experience of sitting down at a table and sharing a meal with those you love.

Knowing Is Half the Battle

Thu, 19 Dec 2013 00:00:00 GMT

At MAD 3, Lucky Peach editor-in-chief Chris Ying and sustainability consultant Peter Freed take a look at the carbon emissions of two well-known restaurants — Noma in Copenhagen and Frankies 457 in Brooklyn — to emphasize how the operations of a restaurant can affect the environment. And it turns out that very often, simple measures can be taken for an establishment to reduce its carbon emissions.

The Passion, the Probe, and the Problem

Thu, 19 Dec 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Margot Henderson, chef at London’s Rochelle Canteen, argues against current trends in fine dining in her MAD3 speech: “I think the male approach dominates and the female one is overlooked. Food in a lot of kitchens is treated as a problem to be solved, something to dominate, something that has to give up its secrets. Kitchens are turned into laboratories, filled with tools and weapons: vacuum packers, sous vides, probes, and all the other stuff. Sometimes the instinctive part gets lost. It almost makes me weep to be told that to confit a duck leg in plastic underwater is just as good as to confit in duck fat.”

Culinary Injustice

Mon, 02 Dec 2013 00:00:00 GMT

The culinary historian Michael Twitty has dedicated his career to celebrating the people whose culinary and agricultural contributions to America have been misappropriated throughout history.

Twitty spoke at MAD 3, imploring the audience to take an honest look at our gastronomic past so that we might be able to bridge “pseudo-boundaries of race,” as well as restore “the emotional and ethical tone” of the food that we make.

Guts and Passion Shaped my Career

Fri, 22 Nov 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Barbara Lynch, who runs Boston's most acclaimed restaurant group. At 2013's MAD 3 Symposium, she discussed her career, and the role guts and passion have played in it.

GO WILD!

Tue, 05 Nov 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Roland Rittman is the forager that transformed Restaurant Noma. In this speech from the MAD 3 Symposium, he explains the need for people to reconnect with nature in the modern world.

A Conversation with Alain Ducasse

Mon, 21 Oct 2013 00:00:00 GMT

The legendary French chef Alain Ducasse sits down for a conversation with David Chang, Daniel Patterson, Chris Ying, and René Redzepi where he discusses his career, risk-taking, fear, and how to use his fame to positively influence diners.

Move Your Guts or Be Gutted

Tue, 15 Oct 2013 00:00:00 GMT

In this video from MAD3, chef Christian Puglisi shares the full story of opening the Michelin-starred Relae on a drug-infested street in Copenhagen and explains what it means to create a restaurant that cuts everything down to its essence.

Feeding Hunger: The Promise of Street Food

Mon, 23 Sep 2013 00:00:00 GMT

L.A.'s Roy Choi, known to most as the man who set in motion the food truck movement with his Kogi BBQ truck, explained at MAD3 that one of his principal motivations for the project was to bring food to areas with more liquor shops than grocery stores.

Carne e Spirito

Tue, 17 Sep 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Descended from a long line of Italian butchers, Dario Cecchini runs a butchery, Antica Macelleria Cecchini, alongside three restaurants all in the small town of Panzano, Chianti. In this presentation from MAD3, Cecchini guts a pig and discusses the importance of craft, of love and of respecting the animals we consume.

Bringing Back Peace & Life to Mogadishu

Mon, 09 Sep 2013 00:00:00 GMT

In this presentation from the third MAD Symposium, chef Ahmed Jama shares his story of deciding to leave London in 2008 to return to his war-torn homeland of Somalia to open up The Village, a restaurant for the people. Since making the move, Jama has been able to open five businesses, the first modern restaurants in Mogadishu.