By Los Angeles County Politics (LACP)
Marc Maron built his podcast empire from a garage in Highland Park. Coline Witt built hers from the Panorama City Mall.
Now Witt has a national award to show for it.
Her show, Eating While Broke, took home Best Food Podcast at the 2026 iHeartPodcast Awards during SXSW in Austin, Texas — a recognition that puts the North Hills-based creator squarely on the national media map.
“Honestly, I didn’t think a show called ‘Eating While Broke’ was going to win anything. I went to Austin thinking it would be a great networking opportunity — I never expected to come home with this,” Witt said.
Now in its sixth season, Eating While Broke launched in 2020 and operates in partnership with Charlamagne Tha God’s Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. The show’s premise is deceptively simple: ask notable guests about the affordable meals they depended on before success, and let the conversation go from there. The result is a platform where food becomes a gateway to candid storytelling about perseverance, identity, and reinvention.
The guest roster reflects the show’s cross-cultural reach — from entertainers including DC Young Fly, Nick Cannon, Ne-Yo, Luenell, Kountry Wayne, B. Simone, Pretty Vee, Raz B, and Lil’ Fizz, to former U.S. Rep. Tony Cárdenas (D-San Fernando Valley) and even Maron himself.
“Being recognized in the Best Food Podcast category carries special meaning because, at Eating While Broke, the dish is more than a meal — it is often the starting point for vulnerability in every guest’s story,” Witt said.
The award arrives at a pointed moment for Los Angeles. County and city officials have spent recent months scrambling to protect LA’s standing as the global media and entertainment capital, accelerating production incentives and broadening their definition of the entertainment economy. Podcast media — now a billion-dollar industry — is increasingly part of that conversation.
For Witt, though, the mission is more personal than economic.
“It is about real life, real stories, and the resourcefulness so many people carry with them every day,” she said. “The food creates a sense of openness, memory, and fun flashbacks, allowing conversations to unfold in a way that feels personal, honest, and deeply relatable.”
Eating While Broke is available on iHeartRadio and wherever podcasts are streamed.
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Disclosure: Coline Witt is the daughter of LACP Publisher & Editor Stephen Witt.
