The 21st Show

Cooking With Cannabis; Julia Sweeney In Hulu’s Shrill; CSO Strike; Birds In Danger When Migrating

By Niala Boodhoo, Alan Montecillo and Robin Linn
 

Kitchen Toke

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Illinois could legalize recreational marijuana this year, but there’s already a whole world of edibles that includes chefs, writers, and manufacturers. Plus, writer and comedian Julia Sweeney talks about her role as the mom in the new Hulu series, ‘Shrill.' And, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra has been on strike for five weeks. Plus, a recent study found that Chicago is actually the most dangerous city for migratory birds in both the fall and the spring.

We’ve been hearing a lot about the legalization of marijuana here in Illinois and what that will mean for our criminal justice system, and our economy. But with marijuana already legal in many states, and medical marijuana legal here and many more places, the question is often not if you can use it, but how. For many people the answer to that question is eating it. Edible pot has come a long way from brownies and cookies. There’s a whole industry of gourmet cooks and manufacturers dedicated to making restaurant-quality food, that happens to also be dosed with drugs.

Mindy Segal is a James Beard Award-Winning Pastry Chef, and the owner of Hot Chocolate in Chicago. She’s also the creator of Mindy’s Edibles. Joline Rivera is the founder of Kitchen Toke, a national magazine based in Chicago that is devoted to cooking with cannabis. Both join us on the line. 

Plus--

If you’ve started to do your Mother’s Day card shopping early you’ve probably seen words like loving, warm, nurturing. You definitely haven’t seen any terms like nagging, micromanaging or shrill. That's the name of a new series on Hulu that is getting a lot of acclaim for its humor, its writing, and its performances by actress Julia Sweeney, who, you guessed it, plays a mother.

Julia Sweeney joins us on the show for more. 

And-- 

Over the past month, there have been two major strikes in the city of Chicago. One was at UIC where grad students went on strike over salary and student fees. That ended this past Friday. But there doesn’t seem to be any end in sight for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Yesterday, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts in Urbana announced a performance by CSO musicians scheduled for next week has been cancelled. In fact, all performances until April 23rd have been canceled. The musicians have been on strike since March 10th after contract negotiations which have been going on since the spring of 2018. On Monday, musicians overwhelmingly rejected an offer management described as their “last, best, and final offer.”

Cynthia Yeh is the principal percussionist for the orchestra. Gina DiBello is a violinist. They’re both members of the CSO’s negotiating team, and they join us with more information about the strike. 

Also-- 

Every spring, billions of birds migrate across the United States, and many of them wind up passing through Illinois. We expect this migration every year and birds have evolved to be able to migrate even at night. But it turns out our cities, and especially our lights, play a big role in disrupting this migration and actually lead to millions of bird collision deaths each year. A recent study found that Chicago is actually the most dangerous city for migratory birds in both the fall and the spring.

We're joined by Kyle Horton, the lead author of this study. He’s a postdoctoral fellow at Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology. 

Story source: WILL