Category: food traditions

At Indian Pueblo Kitchen, a Story Told in Feast Day Stew and Frybread

What is indigenous food, exactly? Monique Fragua is an expert on that question, a topic that delights her both personally and professionally. Born and raised in northern New Mexico’s Jemez Pueblo—where the rest of her extended family still lives—Fragua is the chief operating officer of commercial operations at Albuquerque’s Indian Pueblo Cultural Center (IPCC). That…


Pasties, Porketta, and Potica: Culinary Gems of the Iron Range

In northeastern Minnesota, dotting a landscape called the Iron Range, there are cities with names such as Hibbing, Virginia, Chisholm, Nashwauk, and Eveleth, and in these cities are bakeries, delis, bars, restaurants, and church fundraisers that sell delicious things beginning with the letter “p.” Delicious things that have been part of the region’s identity since…


The Gift of a Meal

On a chilly Monday afternoon, I paced the hallways of my home with my colicky, three-week-old baby. I checked the clock again: 4:06 p.m. I was sure the battery was dead. How could it only have been one minute since I last checked? I was deep in the turbulent waters of brand new motherhood. My…