From the BBC World Service, this is the documentary, the home of original storytelling.

I'm Ruth Alexander here with a bonus episode of the podcast I host, The Food Chain.

We've been going for 10 years, examining the business, science and cultural significance of what we eat

and what it takes to put food on your plate. So this week, we're celebrating the program's

10th anniversary with a pick of some of our favourite moments from the past decade. Fishing to stay

alive, chopping onions in remembrance, and what's so funny about Bolognese? Just a few of the

stories you'll hear in this eclectic mix. Each tells us something about our relationship with food

and how it helps us connect with one another. And just to say, we will be talking about the

sensitive topic of bereavement. Let's start with the basics, when food is life or death.

In survival stories, Fish Bacon for Breakfast, broadcast in 2016, presenter Emily Thomas spoke to

Steve Callahan from the United States. I'm probably best known for being dumb enough to lose my boat in the

middle of the Atlantic and spending the next two and a half months drifting about 2,000 miles

and learning to live like an aquatic caveman. It happened in 1982 when he was 29. In the aftermath

of divorce and business problems, Steve had decided to follow a dream, to build a boat to cross the North Atlantic Ocean. He did it. On his return journey, however, eight days from the Canary Islands as he headed towards the Caribbean, something struck the boat and it began to sink. Steve inflated a life raft and grabbed whatever he could

from the cabin, knowing it would likely be weeks before anyone found him. I had a can of peanuts,

can of beans, I think it was a half a cabbage and basically not much else. Crucially, Steve had some

solar cell contraptions which distilled seawater into

drinking water, but he still needed to eat. The water was filled with Dorado fish, and he had a spear

gun. I was really hungry. It was one of the times I actually broke down on the raft when I caught

the first fish. I couldn't believe at what state of

desperation I had been brought to, and it was a really big day for me to catch that food.

Initially, I just ate the flesh of the fish, and eventually I'd eat basically the entire contents of fish.

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