Minnesota food systems, from kitchen to capitol.
Food Freedom Radio treats food as a civic question, not just a personal habit. Episodes move from kitchen organizing and bulk cooking to nitrates, pollinators, perennial agriculture, supplements, tea, and Minnesota state capitol action.
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Food Freedom Radio is food radio with a civic conscience. It begins with meals, gardens, kitchens, farms, and markets, then follows those subjects outward into water quality, soil health, public policy, culture, and community trust. The show’s center is Minnesota. Minneapolis small businesses, state capitol hearings, local food coalitions, urban agriculture projects, and farm systems all appear as part of the same conversation. The tone is reflective and active at once. Laura Hedlund often frames episodes through nature-led gardening, seasonal observation, and a belief that food systems can be repaired through practical, communal work. Recent conversations show the show’s range. One episode brings in Colleen Waterston for a candid kitchen intervention, treating clutter, cooking, and household rhythm as part of food freedom. Another turns to nitrates in drinking water, fertilizer and manure runoff, cancer concerns, and environmental impact statements for large feedlots. Episodes on perennial agriculture linger over Living Roots, Kernza, deep taproots, commodity crop pressures, and the infrastructure needed to move novel grains from field to market. The show also gives time to pollinators and pesticide policy, including neonics, cleaner seed legislation, trout habitat, farms, and advocacy coalitions. Health is part of the frame too, especially in a conversation about nutrient supplements, pharmacology, trust, and the difference between support and treatment. Culture and local enterprise come through in the Blue Horn Tea episode, where Minneapolis, small businesses, halal stores, and BIPOC food entrepreneurs sit at the center. Food Freedom Radio is not polished lifestyle content. It is warmer, more local, and more morally urgent than that. It favors guests who are doing visible work: organizing homes, writing cookbooks, farming, researching, advocating, starting companies, or building community projects. The show is best for listeners who want food connected to ecology, public health, and neighborly responsibility. It asks how kitchens and landscapes might both become places of repair.
Made for: For listeners who care about sustainable food, local agriculture, environmental health, and community-rooted change. It also suits home cooks and gardeners who want household practice connected to bigger questions.
What sets it apart: The show links intimate food spaces with public systems: a cupboard, a garden bed, a farm field, a policy hearing, and a neighborhood store can all belong to one conversation. Its Minnesota focus gives broad food-system issues a specific local pulse.
Food Freedom Radio envisions a food system respectful of water, soil, planet and people. We work towards a historic transformation. How do we move from food production being a source of economic, social and ecological destruction? How do we move towards a food system which is a source of clean water, healthy soil, and a toxin-free environment? Host Laura Hedlund. Laura earned a certificate in Urban Farming from PRI Cold Climate, helped to start a community garden in 2008 which is now part of the Open Door Pantry and grows blueberries, hazelnuts, gooseberries and more. She has worked at AM950 since 2004. She served as Deputy Press Secretary for Paul Wellstone’s 1990 US Senate campaign, Press…
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Laura Hedlund connects gardens, kitchens and food choices to the policies and local systems shaping them.
Food Freedom Radio lets Laura Hedlund begin with something tangible, such as strawberries overtaking a garden path, then widen the conversation through guest interviews.
Strawberries have taken over Laura Hedlund's path; your kitchen cupboards may be next.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A Minnesota clean water discussion connects nitrate pollution, a state hearing, and a proposed feedlot requirement.
Laura Hedlund asks how Minnesota can lift up people instead of polluters. Laura Schreiber, government relations director for the Land Stewardship Project, turns to nitrates in drinking water, usually from fertilizer or manure runoff.
A kitchen intervention starts with an honest look at the mess.
Laura Hedlund can clear her kitchen, put on music, and settle into bulk cooking. Keeping the space that way between sessions is another matter. Her strawberries are taking over the walking paths, too, and she says the kitchen needs an intervention.
Lina draws on traditional remedies and pharmacology research to discuss trust in supplements.
Laura Hedlund opens with her thoughts on living in trust, then asks which supplements deserve it. Her guest Lina, a pharmacology PhD and co-founder of Canamix, which launched WhatToTrust.com, traces her interest in the subject to growing up with traditional remedies in India.
Laura Hedlund and conservation advocates discuss neonics, insects in water, and a targeted policy campaign.
Laura Hedlund begins this Food Freedom Radio conversation with the sound of bees in her garden. From there, the discussion turns to neonicotinoid pesticides and what happens to insects on land and in water.
A tea founder asks listeners to visit the small grocery stores that carry his tea.
Blue Horn Tea founder Yubi Hassan tells Laura Hedlund about finding a sense of home in Minneapolis and starting a tea company to share his culture. He then turns to the mom-and-pop halal grocery stores in the Twin Cities that carry his tea.
Midlife, made practical and alive.
Real-time resets for real-life mess.
Food Freedom Radio’s September 26, 2026 episode honors Minnesota legislator Karen Joy Clark through memorial recollections and a 2020 interview.
Laura Schreiber says repairing nitrate damage in Minnesota could cost $1 billion a year, while about 9,000 southeast Minnesota residents already drink water above the EPA's 10 parts per million nitrate guideline.
Laura Hedlund and Colleen Waterston turn a messy-kitchen consult on Food Freedom Radio into an argument about shame, function, and everyday systems.
Laura Hedlund interviews Beth Dooley about perennial agriculture and the hopeful movement around Kernza and living roots.
Laura Hedlund interviews authors Liz Carlisle and Aubrey Streit-Krug about their new book 'Living Roots' on perennial agriculture and land stewardship.
A panel discussion on urban agriculture and community food systems featuring multiple guests working on local food initiatives.
Food Freedom Radio host Laura Hedlund interviews Lina Pradhan-Nabzik — Harvard Medical School faculty member since 2005 and co-founder/CEO of Canamix and WhatToTrust.com — about how to evaluate dietary supplements in a $60 billion annual U.S.
Food Freedom Radio host Laura Hedlund convenes a panel on neonicotinoid pesticides with Lucas Rhodes (senior attorney, Natural Resource Defense Council), Monta Hainer (Twin Cities Trout Unlimited), and Lori Cox (owner-operator, Roots Return Heritage Farm).
Yubi Hassan, founder of Blue Horn Tea in Hopkins, Minnesota, ties Somali tea rituals to hospitality, memory, and daily life.
Laura Hedlund discusses economic inequality and introduces organic farmer Dan Moe to talk about the elderberry cooperative as a solution.
Laura Headland discusses the connection between individual health, water quality, and the food system, highlighting microplastics in bottled water and promoting the film 'Water is Love' for World Water Day.
Laura Hedlund reflects on the beauty of nature while expressing concern over political and environmental crises, including federal funding cuts and climate change.
Laura Hedlund interviews Joey Bauer about his gardening radio show and his journey from YouTube to TV.
This episode discusses challenges facing Minnesota farmers and introduces the upcoming Ag for All conference.