Each week, I will contribute an article to my food column: College Cooking, where I will share recipes and opinions on food trends and culture. To see more of what I like to cook and bake, check out my personal food Instagram at @healthy_eclair.
I am a big podcast girl. Whether I am sipping my morning coffee while listening to NPR Up First, or writing an essay while listening to that week’s episode of The Cut, podcasts are perhaps my favorite way to hear news and stay on top of pop culture. It probably comes as no surprise, then, that I listen to my fair share of food-related podcasts. Recently, I have been obsessed with What the F*ck is Sea Moss, hosted by Kate Glavan (@kateglavan) and Emma Roepke (@emma.roepke). Available on Spotify, this weekly show touches on wellness, eating disorders, hormones, veganism, climate change, and more.
How I found Sea Moss was complete happenstance. I saw Lindsey Rem’s (@lindseyrem) Instagram story one day which showed her making vegan pancakes and listening to an episode by Kate and Emma. Figuring that Lindsey hadn’t led me astray with her easy and delicious plant-based recipes, I swiped up and began listening. Flash forward to the first few weeks of the Spring semester and I was catching up on their now 23 episode podcast. The two women also have a meme page @seamossgirlies that does not disappoint with their pointed critique on the wellness industry. Their aim is “to make the wild world of wellness more digestible” and to “challenge the elitist, exclusionary, and confusing aspects of wellness in order to create a health-driven lifestyle that works for you,” as spelled out on their Spotify page. This pod gives zero f*cks when it comes to commenting on the very nutritional seaweed it is named after.
Both Kate and Emma have struggled with eating disorders during their high school and college years, which they do not shy away from being honest about and go into full detail in a podcast episode. Their recovery stories inspire girls and women to seek help if they are suffering from an ED. Although listening to podcasts and following Instagram accounts that do not support diet culture are helpful, Kate and Emma are blunt about the importance of speaking up and seeking help in the form of therapy, a nutritionist, etc. As someone who has struggled with body image since high school, their bluntness on the pod and via their memes is refreshing as they do not shy away from calling out the very industry that markets themselves as ‘healthy.’
While they discuss chlorophyll water, supplements, spirulina, dairy-free cheese alternatives, and their favorite vegan bakery in NYC (@happyzoeveganbakery), Kate and Emma debunk the relationship between food and menstruation, the gut microbiome, how to build immunity during the pandemic, and the intersection between food activism and climate change. Sometimes the two women just hop on the pod vlog-style while walking around the city, or answer questions from viewers about dating and acne. I will be honest that I have submitted a few questions here and there, and they have almost always been answered.
There are a lot of podcasts out there, but if you are looking for one that focuses on anti-diet language and incorporates the perspective of college-aged women, What the F*ck is Sea Moss is the one for you. And you don’t have to like sea moss to listen.