What is the ultimate hangover cure?
The Food Chain
BBC
4.7 • 545 Ratings
🗓️ 18 December 2025
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
With the festive season approaching in parts of the world, Ruth Alexander explores what’s actually happening in the body during a hangover, why some people suffer more than others, and whether common remedies make any real difference.
How the body processes alcohol and why that can make you feel so bad is explained by Andrew Scholey, Professor of Human Psychopharmacology at Northumbria University in the UK and member of the Alcohol Hangover Research Group.
Marisa Moll, a registered nutritionist from Paraguay, shares her recommendations on what to consume before you drink alcohol to try to reduce the risk of a hangover.
And Jonathon Shears, Professor of English Literature at Keele University in the UK and author of The Hangover, a Literary and Cultural History, reflects on the cultural history of the hangover.
If you would like to get in touch with the show, please email: thefoodchain@bbc.co.uk.
Producer: Izzy Greenfield Sound engineer: Andrew Mills Image: A woman looks at empty bottles of alcohol (credit: Getty)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:07.0 | I'm no longer ravenous. I'll no longer eat until I fall asleep. |
| 0:11.0 | The Hunger Game, a new five-part series exploring the meteoric rise of weight loss drugs. |
| 0:16.0 | It's been an incredible story with these drugs. |
| 0:18.1 | The uptake, the amount of product that's been sold, the amount of money is cost. What the drugs do, how they work, and the knock-on effects of their widespread |
| 0:26.0 | use. We'll be sitting here in three years' time going, oh, it caused problems that we're now |
| 0:31.2 | going to have to fix. The Hunger Game with me, Professor Gilesio. Listen first on BBC |
| 0:36.5 | Sounds. |
| 0:47.0 | Hello and welcome to the food chain from the BBC World Service. I'm Ruth Alexander. |
| 0:57.7 | In parts of the world, the festive season is underway, a time that often brings over-indulgence and sometimes regret, especially when alcohol is involved. And anyone who's had a bit too much to drink can probably be relied upon to have a |
| 1:03.5 | firm view on what to eat and drink the next day to mitigate the effects. Certainly, the people we |
| 1:09.3 | recently asked at a German market hall in Berlin did. |
| 1:12.9 | Maybe a nice breakfast, you know, like some eggs, bacon, bread, prasand, like a mix of sweet |
| 1:19.3 | and salty. When I'm hung over, I really love a good coffee and I think pizza is really good. |
| 1:25.7 | I love an icy drink. I think it's something with sparkly bubbles. |
| 1:29.3 | I think it's good hydration, but a little bit of char. |
| 1:32.3 | It's good for the stomach as well. |
| 1:34.3 | When I'm hangover, I crave for something very heavy and breezy. |
| 1:40.3 | Today I had a focaccia here in the Mac Calle and was really, really good. |
| 1:47.0 | For hangover food, I love poached eggs with like this creamy sauce on the side. |
| 1:53.0 | And I learned recently if you're really hangover and you can't even get up because you're so dizzy. |
| 1:58.0 | You need to have a black Turkish tea with a lot of sugar. |
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