When I was young,\nno matter the occasion, Mexican mothers almost always talked about one thing at\nleast once; they always talked about the price of limes. The price of limes\nalways meant something more. It always indicated to some extent the current\nsocial and political climate, the economy, and how people were faring in day to\nday life. After all, everyone needs limes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For as long as I have been alive the lime has been a reminder of my Mexican roots. I have eaten them for what seems like most of my life, and it\u2019s always been an apparent fact that every Mexican household has at least two or three limes on hand. Used for all kinds of dishes, like seviche<\/em>, where it\u2019s used to cure raw shrimp, or squeezed onto a chili-powder covered tostada for a spicy and tangy mid-summer snack. Mexican cuisine is filled with all sorts of dishes that leaving your mouth tantalizing for just a little more: fresh goat, beef and pork stews with meat so tender and juicy that it melts into your mouth with every savory bite, lollipops covered in thin layers of hot spices and sour salts that would make your mouth shrink faster than cursing in church. There are a huge variety of conchas<\/em>, a type a sweetbread caked in powdered sugar, and tres leches<\/em> cakes sold at every local corner panaderia<\/em>. Every dish holds its place in history and tradition with recipes rarely being written down but instead passed on verbally from generation to generation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My eating history\nbegins not with me, but with my parents. Both coming from low-income families\nliving in rural Mexico in the state of Michoac\u00e1n, food and money had always\nbeen tight for them growing up. Most of their meals consisted of pinto beans\nand rice. Seasonal crops as well as a wide assortment of fresh fruits like\nstarfruit, tamarind, guava and so many more that I honestly can’t recall their\nnames, filled out their diet. Meats like goat and beef were also common during\ntimes of celebrations and whenever they could afford it. They grew up with\nenough to eat, but still, it wasn’t easy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I have never been\na particularly “picky eater”. I will eat almost anything that is put\nin front of regardless of how it tastes or what it looks like. Growing up, my\nparents never liked seeing food go to waste, so they always asked us to eat\nwhat we can and not to worry about what we couldn\u2019t or didn\u2019t want to. But us\nnot wanting to disappoint our parents, we always ate everything. To this day, despite\nalways having enough with every meal, I still eat everything regardless of how\nfull I feel or how the food may taste. Even now, I finish my food and try to eat\nevery bit. It\u2019s interesting to see that the lessons that my parents taught us\nabout food are still with me with every meal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some of the\nearliest memories I have associated with food unsurprisingly come from my\ngrandfather. I can remember drinking coffee under my grandfather\u2019s chair when I\nwas young; he would sneak us a little bit once in a while when my grandmother\nwasn\u2019t looking. She would scold him saying that coffee wasn\u2019t for kids, but he\nwould give it to us anyway since he knew that we liked the taste of it. The\ncoffee itself wasn\u2019t anything special, it was the local brand instant coffee\nthat everyone and their mother drank. We drank the coffee with two tablespoons\nof sugar, and a piece of freshly baked birote<\/em>, a type of bread with a\nhard exterior similar to that of a French baguette, but inside was sweet, soft,\nand fluffy. These two always paired nicely for starting the daily morning\nroutine; it was simple, but nonetheless good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My grandfather by trade was a salesman. He owned his warehouse where he sold and distributed a wide assortment of spices, and herbs, like oregano, parsley, cayenne pepper; you name it he sold it. Spices happened to be one of the things we never lacked around the house. To the benefit of the children of the family, herbs weren\u2019t the only things he sold; he also distributed candy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2004, shortly\nafter I turned six, my grandfather passed away. He was the only one holding my\nmother\u2019s family together. My parents decided that it was time for us to come to\nAmerica; after all, America was a place of opportunity. If it were up to him,\nwe would have never left Mexico. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Coming to America\nwas a huge culture shock in terms of food. I had a Burger King whopper for the\nfirst time, twice the size of any burger I had ever seen in my life,\naccompanied by a tall cup of Pepsi and a heaping portion of fries to match. I\nwas blown away by the huge amounts of food that stores like WinCo and Walmart\nhad in stock. It was strange to see such large stores dedicated to food, and\nalmost all of it was alien to us, except my father who had spent some time\nliving in Washington working in the fields before we came. But I still felt that\nhe didn\u2019t know the foods that he ate. I never really tried to understand it all\nanyway. In our home, we ate very closely to the way we ate in Mexico, with\ntraditional foods. Coming to America also introduced us to the amazing world of\ncheap snacks! Of course, there were snacks in Mexico, but the extent that\nAmerica had to offer was insane: sugar aisles as far as the eye could see, and chip\nbags with so many different flavors that we couldn\u2019t ever really keep track of\nwhich ones we had tasted. Sugary cereals of all sorts come to mind. A new world\nopened up for us that was full of delicious junk foods to consume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Entering school\npushed me into the world of American cuisine. School lunches were made up of\nall sorts of foods. I ate all sorts of things for the first time like corndogs,\nstrange burritos, lasagnas and ribs. Things that are commonplace now but back\nthen were literally foreign to me. Gone were the days of beans and tortillas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Somehow, even with\nthe alien foods at her disposal, my mother still figured out how to create the\nsame foods we ate in Mexico. She cooked foods like posle<\/em> which is a type\nof stew containing hominy and beef chunks, and menudo<\/em> which was a stew\nthat was made from cows\u2019 stomach as well as other foods like tacos, enchiladas,\nand from time to time carne asada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She cooked a lot\nof different recipes throughout the years but one of my favorites by far was\nenchiladas. Hers were nothing like the cheese-covered burritos they served to\nus in school lunches that they called enchiladas, no, these were the real deal.\nThe enchiladas my mother made were called enchiladas dulces<\/em>. She would\nheat tortillas in vegetable oil, then, while still warm, would dip them in a\nsauce made from a type of pepper named chilaquiles<\/em>. For the sweetness,\nshe would then add a bit of dark chocolate. The sauce added an element of\nsavory sweetness with a hint of spice. On the inside was a combination of peas,\nground beef, and diced carrots. The sweet sauce these enchiladas were covered\nin still holds a place in my heart to this day. Someday soon I\u2019ll be able to\nrecreate them for myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Leaving home and\ncoming to college also meant that I was leaving behind home-cooked Mexican\nmeals, and my eating habits have changed; I feel that I no longer have the same\nconnections to the foods that I used to eat. Life taught us that things like sugary\nsweets only lead to diabetes and other health ailments for us. The food I eat\nnow are nothing like the food of my past. Of course, I have since had a chance\nto experience wonderfully tasteful foods, but none compare in taste or\nnostalgia to that of Mexican cuisine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since the beginning of Comparative Eurasian Foodways, the image I have had in my head as to what food is and what it can be has changed drastically. If I am being honest, I never really thought of much about food until I started the program. All I knew was that noodles came in a box, and meat came from farms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In the beginning weeks of the class, we spoke about the role that food played in early cultures. All of this history was foreign to me. It may have been the fact that I had a spiritual connection with my food and not understanding the reasoning behind it. Looking at my food as a part of a cycle instead of just as an object that had no inherent life after it passed through me really struck me. I realized that we as a society have given up our connection to the food that we once ate. It was quite disappointing to learn that there has always been that connection with our foods until just recently in history. I question the reason as to why; I think it may have to do with the fact that we no longer have a reason to think of our food as part of the system of nature, and instead think of food more as a means of continuation in this society of excess and deficiency. Food, in a way, has taken the role of batteries: we plug it into ourselves to later discard without a second thought. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Cooking has never been exactly my strong suit, at least that’s what I believed; in actuality cooking has a lot more to do with repetition and trial and error than actually being “good”. I realized after the pasta cooking lab that with simple directions you can make something fantastic. I never thought that creating pasta from scratch could be as easy and delectable as it was. I truly did not understand the work and patience that goes into creating a satisfying meal. Being introduced to Chinese cooking blew me away; again I was being introduced to a new philosophy of food. The flavors in Chinese food come from a balance of the ingredients and the spices; the texture of the belt noodles was thick and chewy while the bok choy provided a slight saltiness with a taste I was not accustomed to of balanced greens. By far the most exciting portion of the dish was the sauce! The combination of red pepper, garlic, salt, and Chinese soy sauce added something that completely changed the composition of the dish. It was interesting for me because in a strange way it felt familiar; there is a parallel between the two cuisines in that Mexican food also heavily relies on the spices and the ingredients working together to create something greater than the sum of its parts. I found a cuisine that at least in principle matched my own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The bitter greens\nlab was also rather interesting, to say the least; again I was exposed to using\ningredients I was unfamiliar too. To me the most surprising ingredient was the\nuse of oyster sauce, a sauce full of savory umami I was unaccustomed to tasting;\nit turned the already delicious baby bok choy into a dish worthy of recreating.\nAgain, the combination of the two stood out to me as a balance of flavors that\nworked in tandem to create something great. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The Italian bitter\ngreens which were stewed in a bit of vinegar and then topped with lemon was a\ndish that brought me back to my favorite tastes of tangy sourness accompanied\nby a soft bland texture that I was so accustomed to. I enjoyed this dish in\nparticular because it reminded me much of my cuisine preference, specifically\nof the limes of my childhood. <\/p>\n\n\n\n We created\nmeatballs using freshly ground meat. The flavor was much different than any\nmeatball I had ever tasted; these meatballs had deep earthy flavors with the\ngreater definition than any other meats that I had come across. The lamb\nmeatballs had a texture and taste that was at the same time overwhelming but\npleasant. As it turns out, unsurprisingly, there’s more than one way to create\na meatball; every culture has their own techniques and mixture of spices are\nunique to them. The more times we run these labs, the more I realize that the\nrecipe is only part of the story when it comes to the taste of the actual dish.\nThe missing piece of the puzzle is the ingredients. The dish is only as great\nas the sum of its parts, so we must take into consideration the quality and freshness\nof the ingredients. For example, baby bok choy is softer and less bitter than\nits adult counterpart. The fresh meats we used simply tasted better than the\nmass-produced meats we eat regularly. It’s fascinating to me that I haven’t\nthought about the importance of how the quality of the ingredients we use and\nhow that could affect the taste. I spoke to my mother recently and asked her\nwhere the meat we used to eat in Mexico came from, and she responded and said\nthat it was the meat of the day. This meant that the meat was butchered that\nmorning and sold to customers that day. Looking back, it is unsurprising the\nreason as to why authentic Mexican food tastes better: it’s simply that the\ningredients are far fresher than anything that can be found here in the United States.\nThis also extends to every single ingredient we have used in our own cooking\nlabs. It never crossed my mind that the food we eat daily comes from thousands\nof miles away and was butchered or picked months prior to the day it enters our\nmouths.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My hungry ghost is\nfresh food. Even now, every time I eat my so-called favorite foods, I always\nfeel that something is missing. Eating here is not the same as eating there;\nthere just isn’t any way. Only do I feel satisfied when I have the chance to\neat something fresh and tasteful. In fresh food, there is a quality that simply\ncannot be found in the foods we eat on a daily basis. Fresh food is simply not\navailable to us. Prior to eating the fresh meats we had during lab, I can only\nrecall one instance in recent years when I felt satisfied with the food that\nentered my mouth. The summer before I came to Evergreen, I decided to try my\nhand at gardening. The garden I created was pretty simple, with only peppers,\nsome parsley, and a huge abundance of tomatoes growing. Those fresh tomatoes I\nate that summer were some of the most delicious things I had tasted in a very long\ntime: small, juicy, and filled with the sour flavor I craved so much. Only then\nin the garden did I satisfy the hunger for fresh food that I so badly wanted to\nappease. Eating the fresh food of my childhood just isn’t possible. <\/p>\n\n\n\n During the\nprogram, we had the chance to taste sugarcane in class. I watched my classmates\nmarvel as they ate sugar cane for the first time and enjoyed every bite. They\nboasted at how sweet it was, but when I tasted it, I only tasted a tart\nunsweetened piece of something that resembled sugarcane. I thought quietly to\nmyself that they didn\u2019t know the true taste of sugar cane; they’ve never tasted\nfresh sugar cane. The sweetness takes over your mouth like liquid honey, each\nbite into the tender flesh releases more delicate sweetness into your mouth,\nlike the warmth of the morning sun, no they couldn\u2019t know. It made me sad to\nknow that they did not know the joy of fresh sugar cane that I so craved. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This class has\ntaught me a lot about the food I eat: I have learned that it’s not as difficult\nto recreate the foods that I want, it’s not difficult to create pasta from\nscratch, time-consuming yes, but it is possible, and god is it worth it. I wish\nto eat fresh foods. I’ve realized that it is possible to feed my hungry ghost,\nbut the difficulties are great and so are the costs. I’ve learned so far, that the\nexcess and deficiency of food is deeply cemented in our world: a product of the\nsystem that we live in. Is it wrong to want fresh food? Is it possible for my\npeers to experience the bliss that comes from something as simple as eating\nfresh sugarcane? The excess and deficiency that we see are inherent truths of the\nfood we eat. Ask me if it’s possible to live in a world where fresh food is\navailable to everyone regardless of where they come from. I’ve learned that I\nwant to live in a system where that’s a possibility. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In conclusion,\nfood plays a much larger role then I could have ever expected. The food itself\nis a symbol of life, it stands for much more than I thought possible. At its\ncore, food is part of an everlasting idea ingrained into us that ultimately\ndetermines our survival in more than ways then we could have imagined. After\nall, everyone needs to eat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Carlos Orozco When I was young, no matter the occasion, Mexican mothers almost always talked about one thing at least once; they always talked about the price of limes. The price of limes always meant something more. It always indicated to some extent the current social and political climate, the economy, and how people […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"geo":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":176,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175\/revisions\/176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.evergreen.edu\/cefie-portfolio-s20-arn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}