{"id":11453,"date":"2026-09-18T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/18\/the-sweetest-thing\/"},"modified":"2026-09-18T17:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T14:00:00","slug":"the-sweetest-thing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/handoli.com\/index.php\/2026\/09\/18\/the-sweetest-thing\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sweetest Thing"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhat is the sweetest thing in the world?\u201d After co-host Latif Nasser\u2019s sons ask him this deceptively simple question, he goes on a quest to find it. Is it a West African Katemfe berry? Or an industrial sugar substitute cooked up in a lab? Or an ingredient hiding in plain sight in all of our pantries? A simple mystery that will make you question what sweetness even is, how our tongues (and other body parts you wouldn\u2019t expect) determine what we like, and how far you would go to taste something sweeter than anyone has ever experienced.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Thank you to Latif\u2019s sons for indulging us, to Nicola Twilley and Cynthia Graber at Gastropod, to Anni Laffitte, Nazli Parvizi at Museum of Food and Drink, to food icons Claire Saffitz and Sam Seneveratne who did a live show version of this episode with us at the Tribeca Festival. And thank you to Davy Gardner and his wonderful team of audio folks at the Tribeca Festival.<\/i><\/p>\n

Thank you to Jialin Deng who composed the song that was our \u2018sonic seasoning\u2019. And to Laura Rickman and everyone else at Columbia University\u2019s Mortimer B Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute for hosting us.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n

And big thanks to experimental psychologist Charles Spence at Oxford, sweetness chemist Grant DuBois, Danielle Reed at Monell Chemical Senses Center, and nutritional scientist Sarah Berry at King\u2019s College London who all talked to us about their research. And Brian Everett of <\/i>Honest Organic Farms<\/u><\/i><\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n

And a very special thanks to Sean Oomens, inventor of producer Jess Yung\u2019s favorite candy, nerd gummy clusters
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EPISODE CREDITS:\u00a0<\/strong>
Reported by – Latif Nasser
with help from – Jessica Yung
Maria Paz Gutierrez, Jessica Yung, Ekedi Fausther-Keeys, Natalia Ramirez??
Produced by – Jessica Yung\u00a0
with help from –\u00a0 Mona Madgavkar, Maria Paz Gutierrez, Gabby Santas, and Maia Appleby Melamed
with mixing help from – Jeremy Bloom
Fact-checking by – Sophie Samiee
and Edited by\u00a0– Pat Walters<\/p>\n

EPISODE CITATIONS:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Videos:<\/strong><\/p>\n