Food

The Chapin Breakfast, served only once a month at Santa Cecilia’s church.

Long before the concept of a pop-up restaurant was even established in 2009 by a certain audacious, Los Angeles French chef, Santa Cecilia’s Catholic Church had already mastered it. In 2001 to be exact, when the South L.A. church’s congregants of various ethnic backgrounds formed four different volunteer cooking groups, as a way …

Mexican Chef with Boyle Heights YouthThe somber cafeteria at White Memorial Hospital in Boyle Heights is perhaps the last place in Los Angeles you would expect to find Aquiles Chavez, the high profile, Mexican celebrity chef that has his own show on the Utilisima network (Mexico’s equivalent to the Food Network). But last week, the Mexico city-born chef that sports dreadlocks and a handlebar …

A Tamal Feast (photos by Javier Cabral)

As part of their new Cultural Continuum series, Mercado La Paloma in South Los Angeles hosted a Tamal workshop last week through their popular Yucatán Restaurant “Chichen Itza,” and we were invited.

Chef Gilberto Cetina Showing Everybody What’s up With Tamales Yucatecos

The Mercado, located across the street from the DMV offices and a stones throw away from USC, …

Maria Rosita Cabral and her proud turkey
Contrary to popular belief, Thanksgiving is not always what you learned about in school. The imagery of overflowing cornucopias and indians eating in peace with pilgrims never existed in my Mexican American upbringing. The paper cut-out “pilgrim” hats that I made in Elementary school had no significance beyond the lesson that day. No, for my family, the only …

“An ethnographic eating tour of some off-the-grid spots serving the best Mexican and Central American food this side of the border” for $250 a person was offered as part our Kickstarter campaign back in August. Surprisingly, we got eight backers for it and found it to be a real success. Pictured above are Tejuinos in Boyle Heights – a sweet and salty fermented corn …