This New Docuseries Explores How Climate Change Is Impacting Food
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4 months ago
René Redzepi's new series is out this July
Danish chef René Redzepi has spent the past 20 years transforming his Copenhagen restaurant Noma into one of the best in the world. But now Redzepi hopes to impact the food world in a new way: through an in-depth docuseries for Apple TV+ titled Omnivore. Set to premiere this July, the show will delve into the ingredients which have shaped the world, exploring how they have been affected by climate change.
Omnivore: Everything We Know About René Redzepi’s Apple TV Show
What’s Omnivore About?
Across eight episodes, Omnivore will take viewers around 16 different countries, exploring how food shapes culture and society, as well as looking at how the climate crisis is affecting supply. Each episode will hone in on a different staple ingredient: salt, rice, banana, pig, chili, coffee, tuna and corn – chosen from an initial list of 200, which Redzepi narrowed down over a few months.
The series will look at the pork industry in the Spanish village of La Alberca and coffee forests in Rwanda, explore how kimchi is made in Korea, learn how the monsoons in Asia fuel rice production, look at how chillis spread around the world (via birds and humans) and much more.
Redzepi had the idea for the series for over a decade, and finally had time to get it going during the pandemic. He teamed up with American journalist Matt Goulding – who executive produced Anthony Bourdain: Explore Parts Unknown – to create the project. ‘It was always an idea inspired by shows like Planet Earth,’ said Redzepi. ‘We’d explore the world through the lens of food with a similar scope and appreciation. Both Matt and I believe that food is by far the most important thing on earth.’
‘We want to really get down to the essence of who we are, as told by those ingredients,’ adds Goulding. ‘And sometimes that means really delicious, high-end cooking, but normally it means the everyday heroes that are growing our food.’
While the series is a celebration of different culinary cultures, it also poses important questions about our global food system. Redzepi hopes to highlight the importance of our food choices on communities – and ultimately the planet.
‘Can you look at paprika again, once you’ve seen the curtains of peppers in Serbia? And just have it be that spice package that sits at the back of the cabinet, never used, or do you see people behind it? Do you see an ecology behind it and a culture?’ Redzepi says. ‘How we grow the food dictates more or less how healthy our world is. How we eat, what we choose to eat, really matters tremendously. If we can make people value more, then they take care of things more. We throw away almost 50 percent of our food. You don’t do that with your gold earrings.’
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Noma has always placed high importance on its environmental impact, focusing on provenance of ingredients. Last year, it was announced that the restaurant as we know it is closing its doors, however 2025 will herald the beginning of Noma 3.0, a pioneering test kitchen dedicated to food innovation.
What Is The Release Date?
Omnivore will debut on 19 July 2024.
Where Is It Streaming?
The full series will be available to stream on on Apple TV+.
