Best of 2019: podcasts we loved this year (volume I)

This week on Podcast Playlist, part one of our two-part extravaganza sharing the best podcasts of the year! 

Podcasts featured this week:

1619 (Lindsay Michael's pick) – 1619 is a new podcast from The New York Times that re-examines the history and the present day consequences of slavery. The result is also highly personal. As host, Nikole Hannah-Jones also weaves her own experiences into show.

Finding Fred (Podcast Gumbo creator Paul Kondo's pick)  – "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was not a simple show. And Fred Rogers was not a simple man. He was radical. Spiritual. Revolutionary. Maybe even subversive. Bestselling author and cultural critic Carvell Wallace hosts this 10-part series about the life, thinking and work of Fred Rogers, and asks what the cardigan wearing host of a decades-old children's show can tell us about how to get by in today's chaotic world."

Crackdown (Julian Uzielli's pick)  – "In 2014, British Columbia switched nearly 15,000 methadone patients to a new formulation called Methadose. In Crackdown's second episode, Garth Mullins, Laura Shaver, and their colleagues at British Columbia Association of People on Methadone (BCAPOM) investigate what happened after the switch."

Scam Goddess (TK Matunda's pick) – Host Laci Mosley chats with comedian, writer, and podcaster James Mastraieni (Too Effin' High, Florida Girls) to talk about "romance scams."

What podcasts were your absolute favourite this year? Email us, tweet us @PodcastPlaylist, or find us on Facebook.

For more great podcasts, check out CBC's podcast portal, subscribe in Apple Podcasts.