Radio: Pick of the Day

A FOOD programme that cooks with choice words, not gas, The Pleasures of the Table (9.45am R4FM) presents an excerpt from the gastronome Elizabeth David, whose horror at post-war British cuisine led her to recreate spicy dishes from abroad.

The best thing about the Afternoon Play - The Girl from Arles (2.15pm R4) is the incidental music by Bizet, which underscores the passions at work in Alphonse Daudet's melodrama about a young man's unacceptable love for the titular "slut". But Michael Robson's translation also has an impressive sonority.

Popsters will like Lamacq Live (8pm R1) which dissects Everything Must Go by the Manic Street Preachers (right).

Dominic Cavendish