Centerpoint:
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!Food is The Language of Love
A Black Voice News Special Report
By Luca Martinez
A Black Voice News report funded by the California “Stop the Hate” project.
According to the National Restaurant Association, 80% of consumers eat at least one ethnic cuisine per month and are willing to pay more for ethnic foods. And yet, some people easily separate their love of ethnic food from the people it represents. The disconnect between ethnic food consumption and hate crimes raises questions about how effectively food is facilitating barrier breaking and bridging cultural connections. This series, Food is The Language of Love, aims to help bridge those connections by focusing on a variety of Latinx neighbors in the Inland Empire, now the largest demographic in the area, and highlighting their pride in culture, love of family, hopes, dreams and the expanded selection of cultural cuisine they add to the rich variety of ethnic foods available in this region.
Food is the Language of Love” is part of the Black Voice News series, Centerpoint: The Healing Power of Cultural Connections, funded by Ethnic Media Services Stop the Hate campaign administered by the California State Library.
Everything Revolves Around Food
Luca Martinez As a child, Yvette Marquez-Sharpnack would begrudgingly help her mother Vangie and grandmother Jesuista in the kitchen. Cooking Mexican food was a significant element of her Mexican family and their El Paso, Texas home. But unlike her two elders, Marquez-Sharpnack didn’t feel a connection to the food in her younger years. Back then,…
A Restaurant Unlike Any Other
Luca Martinez Nearly 22 years ago, Jose and his wife Antonia Toledo made a gamble. The two natives from Oaxaca began serving food from their backyard, committed to sharing the authentic tastes of their homeland with the world. The gamble has since paid off for the couple. Today, Jose and Antonia along with a handful…
The Taste of “Little Thumb”
Luca Martinez As a young girl growing up in La Libertad, a city in El Salvador, Patricia Castellanos recalls her grandmother waking up at 5 a.m. to make pupusas. The food would serve as breakfast and lunch for the family whether they were out working at a coffee plantation or exploring the country’s capital for…
Spreading Nicaraguan Culture through a Dream Come True
Luca Martinez | Photos by Aryanna Noroozi You could call it a restaurant founded on a gamble and rooted in authenticity. You should call it the first of its kind. But more than anything, you must call Daysi’s Gusto Nicaraguan Cuisine the culmination of one woman’s lifelong dream. The dream, after some initial pandemic and…