La Candelaria (Candlemas Day)
When I was doing research for my book, “Food from my Heart,” I uncharacteristically made a trip to Oaxaca in the winter. On every visit to this magical place that is my spiritual home, my first stop is the Benito Juarez market and a stall that sells all types of...
El Pedimento – New Year’s Eve in Mitla and Juquila, Oaxaca
Curiously of all the items I posted in the last year, this piece on El Pedimento, got the most hits . I imagine that its popularity is rooted in magic or wishful thinking. It would be wonderful if our wishes became our realities though there’s that...
Mi Papi -José Martínez Solano
Up until the time of her death my mother was complaining about my dedication in my first book, Food from my Heart. I wrote: ” To my mother who gave me my spirit, my father who gave me my soul, and my children who let me...
Barney Rosset Another Giant Is Gone
When Jamie Gillis, my long-time companion met Barney Rosset it was as if he had met God and he would always sit at his hero’s feet. As founder and editor of Grove Press, Barney almost single-highhandedly did away with censorship in the United States by...
My Mother’s Pantry
My Mother’s Pantry Glistening by the light of a single bare bulb are jars of canned snails from France, saffron and baby eels from Spain, bamboo shoots and plum sauce from China, and grape leaves in brine from the Middle East. Picture these delicacies in the...
The many lives of Zarela Martínez
Culinary legend Zarela Martínez introduced finely tuned, highly researched regional Mexican cuisine to a national stage, and has continued to blaze trails for more than three decades.