In this special year‑end edition of Add Passion and Stir, hosts Billy and Debbie Shore look back at the biggest child hunger stories of 2025—from state momentum for universal school meals in the U.S. to climate‑driven hunger crises around the world. Guests Phoebe Boyer (Children’s Aid), Bruce Lesley (First Focus on Children), Tim Costello, Navyn Salem (Edesia), and former Senator Debbie Stabenow reflect on what changed for kids this year, what’s at risk, and what it will take to build a future where no child is too hungry to learn, grow, or dream.​

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In this very special encore presentation, Jimmy Chen, founder/CEO of Propel and Ofek Lavian, founder/CEO of Forage, return to discuss current trends in using technology to ensure more people can access government food benefits.

“As of January 27, 2025, at least, our plan is to continue to invest in the things that we have confidence that are not going to change over the 20-, 30-, 40-year time horizon, while we stay nimble and adapt to what might change in the next few weeks or months,” says Chen.

“EBT funding is influenced significantly because of macroeconomics, probably to a greater extent than the actual policies of the administration of the White House,” Lavian predicts. Listen to hear about the latest technology trends that are assisting in theend of child hunger in America.

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Host Billy Shore talks with Chef Erik Bruner‑Yang (Maketto, Ours at Manifest) and Immigrant Food co-founder Peter Schechter about immigration enforcement, ICE checkpoints, and what that means for D.C. restaurants and workers. They explain how they use know-your-rights training, ICE location group chats, and Uber rides for staff. 

Gastro‑advocacy tools, like Immigrant Food’s weekly Engagement Menu, are deployed to keep people safe and engaged. Listeners hear how local action, focused on a 20‑block radius, can rebuild community, support immigrant staff, and keep restaurants alive in a very uncertain time.​​

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The current interruption in SNAP benefits are disproportionately impacting the indigenous people of the United States. In this reprised episode of APS, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nicholas Kristof and Johns Hopkins Center for American Indian Health Director Allison Barlow talk about poverty, education and the struggle for social justice in Native American communities.

“The Bureau of Indian Education schools only have a 53% high school graduation rate! We are failing them way before they fail us,” suggests Kristof. “We as a country have had this narrative that when people struggle, it’s because of a lack of personal responsibility and bad choices... It’s because we as a society are making bad choices about healthcare, education and jobs."

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This timely encore of Add Passion and Stir, featuring Princeton poverty expert Kathryn Edin will provide insights from Edin’s book The Injustice of Place. Edin shares compelling data and stories connecting America’s deepest poverty to historical roots in rural communities.

Explore how food insecurity, local action, and social infrastructure shape outcomes for children and families—and learn why addressing these issues is more important than ever. Subscribe, rate, and share to support the fight against child hunger and help build lasting solutions for equity and dignity across America.​​

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Urban Institute senior fellow Elaine Waxman and Jeremiah Program president and CEO Chastity Lord know the power of single moms on the economic mobility of entire communities. “Great moms are dreaming in threes: they dream for themselves, they dream for their children, and they naturally dream for their community,” says Lord.

The Jeremiah Program supports single mothers as they invest simultaneously in their own goals as well as their children’s education. Waxman recently published “Policy Levers to Support Single-Mother Economic Mobility” with support from Share Our Strength. “I always think of food insecurity as the canary in the coal mine. It's often the first symptom of instability to emerge because that's a quick way that people can try to move resources around. It's also often one of the last ones to resolve,” she reports.

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Maine Governor Janet Mills is protecting the rights and benefits of people in her state. “When you're right on the law and you're right on the public policy, why shouldn't you stand up? That's the way bullies act: they don't stop unless you stand up to them. And even then, you've got to fight with all you've got,” she says.

Mills is standing up to the Trump Administration's deep cuts to important benefits like SNAP. “Whatever they do for billionaires - which is another argument, another debate - they shouldn't be slashing food benefits for hungry kids.”

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Australia’s Reverend Tim Costello is the former Chief Executive of World Vision Australia and a lawyer, minister, and social advocate. “A free society is an extraordinary moral achievement… It takes morality,” he says.

“When we start to see morality - which is we, not I - corroding and empathy evaporating, we are in trouble for a free society.” However, he remains hopeful of humanity’s goodness. “Hope is saying there will be love into the future and we're going to act now for that love to be also expressed into the future.”

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Navyn Salem, founder and CEO of the malnutrition social enterprise Edesia, discusses our shared humanity in caring for children all over the world. Edesia produces fortified, peanut-based products like Plumpy'Nut for humanitarian agencies like UNICEF, World Food Programme, and other NGOs working in emergency and conflict zones.

“We feed children everywhere because that's what humanity is, and we do not want to lose our humanity. We are smart enough. We have enough resources. We're creative and innovative enough to feed every child on planet Earth,” Salem asserts.

Edesia has been impacted by Trump Administration decisions around foreign aid in the last seven months. “I started speaking up and explaining to people that huge parts of humanitarian assistance that the US government does are a win-win for the world and they have to be continued,” she says.

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Retired Senator Debbie Stabenow discusses the importance of strong leadership, raising our voices about what we believe is wrong, and her continued advocacy for issues like hunger and mental health.

“I may have retired, but I have not retired my voice. At this time, where so much is at stake, nobody should be retiring their voice,” she says. “We should be electing people that show some leadership,” she continues. “Hunger is pretty basic. This should be a moral issue for all of us. It's a moral issue. It's an economic issue. It's a national security issue. It's about health and well-being.”

Host Billy Shore shares her sentiments. “My mantra has been to be civil but not silent. I think there's a way to talk about these things, but we've got to get people over the fear of speaking up about what they believe in,” he states.

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Chicago chef and restaurateur Curtis Duffy recounts some of the revelations in his new book, Fireproof: Memoir of a Chef on this episode of Add Passion & Stir. Duffy writes about surviving the tragic loss of his parents at a very young age. “If it's helping somebody else get through what they need to get through… and if it helps them, in some way, or if they're able to relate to it somehow, then that's a win for me. That is a big win,” he says about sharing his story.

“I think some of my darkest times are when I've created great food. I've been in a really, really dark place and I will spend the next three days nonstop hauling over an entire menu by myself with zero help from anybody.”

Listen and be inspired.

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