Touring America on 12 Meals a Day

NPR | By Liane Hansen

Published May 7, 2006 at 8:26 PM EDT

They pen a column in Gourmet magazine, but the husband-and-wife food-critic team Jane and Michael Stern prefer Mom and Pop joints to restaurants with linen napkins and expensive wine lists.

For the past 30 years, they have traveled America's back roads looking for the perfect meal, producing 20 books in addition to the magazine column.

For their latest effort, Two for the Road: Our Love Affair with American Food, the couple covered more than three million miles, sometimes eating 12 times a day as they navigated quirky, out-of-the way kitchens and roadside barbecue stands.

Among their favorite haunts: Ben's Chili Bowl in Washington, D.C. Ben's has served chili hot dogs, half-smokes and cheese fries, among other roadhouse delicacies, since 1958.

Liane Hansen

Liane Hansen has been the host of NPR's award-winning Weekend Edition Sunday for 20 years. She brings to her position an extensive background in broadcast journalism, including work as a radio producer, reporter, and on-air host at both the local and national level. The program has covered such breaking news stories as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the capture of Saddam Hussein, the deaths of Princess Diana and John F. Kennedy, Jr., and the Columbia shuttle tragedy. In 2004, Liane was granted an exclusive interview with former weapons inspector David Kay prior to his report on the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The show also won the James Beard award for best radio program on food for a report on SPAM.

Federal funding is gone.

Congress has eliminated all funding for public media.

That means $2.1 million per year that Connecticut Public relied on to deliver you news, information, and entertainment programs you enjoyed is gone.

The future of public media is in your hands.

All donations are appreciated, but we ask in this moment you consider starting a monthly gift as a Sustainer to help replace what’s been lost.

Donate

SOMOS CONNECTICUT is an initiative from Connecticut Public, the state’s local NPR and PBS station, to elevate Latino stories and expand programming that uplifts and informs our Latino communities. Visit CTPublic.org/latino for more stories and resources. For updates, sign up for the SOMOS CONNECTICUT newsletter at ctpublic.org/newsletters.

SOMOS CONNECTICUT es una iniciativa de Connecticut Public, la emisora local de NPR y PBS del estado, que busca elevar nuestras historias latinas y expandir programación que alza y informa nuestras comunidades latinas locales. Visita CTPublic.org/latino para más reportajes y recursos. Para noticias, suscríbase a nuestro boletín informativo en ctpublic.org/newsletters.

Federal funding is gone.

Donate