Voices in the Kitchen: Views of Food and the World from Working-Class Mexican and Mexican American Women (Volume 9)

Rio Grande/Río Bravo: Borderlands Culture and Traditions

by Meredith E. Abarca

“Literally, chilaquiles are a breakfast I grew up eating: fried corn tortillas with tomato-chile sauce. Symbolically, they are the culinary metaphor for how working-class women speak with the seasoning of their food.”—from the Introduction

Through the ages and across cultures, women have carved out a domain in which their cooking allowed them to express themselves, strengthen family relationships, and create a world of shared meanings with other women. In Voices in the Kitchen, Meredith E. Abarca features the voices of her mother and several other family members and friends, seated at their kitchen tables, to share the grassroots world view of these working-class Mexican and Mexican American women.

In the kitchen, Abarca demonstrates, women assert their own sazón (seasoning), not only in their cooking but also in their lives. Through a series of oral histories, or charlas culinarias (culinary chats), the women interviewed address issues of space, sensual knowledge, artistic and narrative expression, and cultural and social change. From her mother’s breakfast chilaquiles to the most elaborate traditional dinner, these women share their lives as they share their savory, symbolic, and theoretical meanings of food.

The charlas culinarias represent spoken personal narratives, testimonial autobiography, and a form of culinary memoir, one created by the cooks-as-writers who speak from their kitchen space. Abarca then looks at writers-as-cooks to add an additional dimension to the understanding of women’s power to define themselves.

Voices in the Kitchen joins the extensive culinary research of the last decade in exploring the importance of the knowledge found in the practical, concrete, and temporal aspects of the ordinary practice of everyday cooking.

Genres: Nonfiction, Cookbooks, Gender

264 pages, Hardcover

First published March 16, 2006

Reviews

[Kylah F · Rating 3 out of 5]

The stories of the women in this book are amazing and so, so interesting. I loved hearing about their lives and the hardships they went through, only for them to still end up loving food and loving life as a result of the culture and community in their kitchens.
HOWEVER. My main gripe with this book is that the author is *unbearable.* The writing style, her analysis, everything made it almost impossible to finish this book. The writing is so pretentious and “academic”, but for the most part says absolutely nothing. The same goes for her analysis and interpretations. I would end up skipping a lot of what she was saying just so I could move on.
I think it would’ve been a 5* if it wasn’t for the author, so 3* overall.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book’s methodology captures exactly what I hope to do in my own work: bridge extensive understandings of theory and history with real experience, ideally presented through the voices of those whose expertise is often marginalized in formal discourse about food and meaning. The women she interviews are conveying their stories and experiences with food in a way that is both ordinary and profoundly reflective of their interior lives. And yet we have to think about how to read those women in the context of Abarca’s theoretical framing—clearly all of these women are expressing concepts that can be mapped alongside theory, but they do not stand on their own, nor are they subsumed by the theoretical frameworks of feminism. Instead, the theory acts as scaffolding, and the eye tends to skim over Abarca’s many citations, instead lingering on the women and their anecdotes. That this space matters to them is a matter worthy enough of scholarship without the framing, and yet the only way this can be seen as a scholarly book is when the charlas can be upheld as evidentiary of something bigger than everyday experience. There is a tension inherent to this book that is as much about how we make meaning out of cooking as it is about what cooking means, but I’m not sure it’s a tension we want to get away with. (Separately, I’d love to know why “working class” does something specific here beyond just describing her interview subjects. And why “Mexican” is an influential category as well?) Maybe because Abarca is a literary scholar?

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

A contorted attempt at poetry of some sort. Long and unpleasant.

[Eva Toledo-Figueroa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Liked the stories of the women. The writing style was difficult to follow.

[Nisha · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was recommended to me by my adviser. Although I am enjoying it and find it really good reading, I can't help but be conflicted by the idea that women can make their "space" in the kitchen as a means of agency in a world where they have been largely dominated. I feel like that is like saying that a prisoner isn't confined because they make their jail cell their own "space" and some may even conduct business from it and make money. However, I would still recommend people read it. Again, I think it is very well written and fascinating, but I am not sure that I completely agree with her argument albeit a compelling one.

[Priscilla Previl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some sections are quite well written. My issue is the very steep inclination that the author has of men as oppressors. I feel that her perspective is quite tragically tainted because she sees it as a "them vs. us" sort of situation. But then at times she hits on brilliance and I am inclined to forgive.

[Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. It reminded me of the times spent in the kitchen with my mother. The way she cooks was like art form for me. As a child I always wanted to follow her and see what she was doing, mimicking the way she would stir a spoon, or the way she would measure with her hands.