I was born in Houston, Texas, a place rich with Mexican American (Tex-Mex), and authentic Mexican cuisine. It is cheap, widely available, and delicious. I was raised in a home where “violet water” (a cologne that smells of violets) is put on babies since they are born and are taught to eat guava pastries or drink milk with coffee (café-con-leche) at breakfast because it was part of “being Cuban”. My first language was Spanish. I did not learn to read or write English until I was six. My mom kept me home instead of sending me to kindergarten so that I would know how to read Spanish before I learned how to read and write in English because she did not want me to lose my Spanish.
Being black or mulatto is like having emigrated twice even though born in the USA: a minority within the Cuban community in the United States. So, growing up, you want to fit in. You want to show that you are Cuban. You envy the relatives born there that had the good fortune of living there before the revolution, and you wish you wish you had as much firsthand knowledge of your roots as the ones you arrived from Cuba more recently.
You grow up wanting to be more relatable and food is a significant part of that; from what you eat, to how you eat, to how much you eat, to who you eat it with.
We moved to Hialeah when I was 16, in the middle of my junior year in high school and I was suddenly inundated with Cuban store owners, Cuban neighbors, Cuban restaurants, Cuban everything, 24/7. Until then, I had lived in Texas all my life and during the eighties, Cubans were few and far between in Houston, TX.
In Hialeah, even then it was a very common occurrence to witness your vecino (neighbor) sacrificing a goat in their yard. It is also usual to see the same viejitos (old men) playing domino outside. My dad used to make a daily trip to buy fresh pan de agua (water bread) to a little bodega called, “El Cañonazo” or “El Cañon” for short, and eating an entire loaf of bread between the two of us before we reached home, which was just minutes away. He would eat the crust and did not like the soft doughy part. I loved the fluffy part inside. We made a perfect team. It was not just about the bread. It was about getting to go with dad, the experience we shared, the trip to the little Cuban store. Eating together was just a way to bond.
Cuban foods are carbohydrate and starch heavy. Rice, yucca, yams, and plantains are considered staples and consumed across all the social classes in Cuba in similar amounts.
So, talking to your family about diabetes prevention or dietary swaps twenty years ago, when I was first diagnosed was unheard of. Many things have changed since then. People are more aware and open to change, but there are still a lot of stigmas, myths, and misinformation attached to Diabetes. The Latin culture still looks at you sideways if you turn down rice and you do not even blame them. You find yourself asking, “If I do not eat rice, what am I going to eat with the beans or the meat? So many dishes are rice-based. It is a culture shock for most of us. One we never quite get used to.
It was in that same little bodega that I heard a little boy, maybe eight or nine years old, talk to his dad with that same Cuban accent my older brother and cousins had – one I never had but wished I did. It was the first time I realized just how different I was.
I grew up used to being unrelatable to most and not quite fitting in anywhere but having to eat differently than everyone else around me was and is uncomfortable and a constant reminder that, “I am not really Cuban”. I am far passed the point of craving sweets. I have gotten sick enough that I instinctively shun certain foods because I view them as poison and routinely go without foods that I once thought I could never go without – but rice is not one of those. I certainly eat less of it, but I have yet to let it go completely. Because “I am not really American” either. I am not a “lover of Latin food”. I am a Latina. What I eat is part of who and what I am.
Not to say that it is unique to being Cuban or Latina. We all grow up eating the food of our culture. We associate food from our childhood with warm feelings and good memories and it ties us to our families, holding a special and personal value, and that food becomes the comfort food we want when we grow up.
I cannot smell oranges without thinking of my dad because I would sit in bed between him and my mom, and he would peel mom and me oranges while we watched television. I did not eat a mango cubed or with utensils for years because Dad said the only way to properly enjoy a mango is with the juice dripping down and around your chin and hands – this from a man who only ever ate with a fork and knife (even pizza!). When I was in middle school, my mother would cook chicken soup almost every day so I could have something after school. I lived across the street from the school and my friends would come over and eat with me. The smell and taste of the soup became something very familiar to me. Now, when I feel tired or stressed, I remember the soup my mom used to make for me, and I want some.
Food is an important part of a culture, an expression of cultural identity. Immigrants bring the food of their countries with them wherever they go and cooking traditional food is a way of preserving their culture when they move to new places. My family was no exception.
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