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A conversation with Ray Garcia, Jonathan Gold, Evan Kleiman, Bricia Lopez, and
Carlos Salgado about the evolving role of Mexican cuisine in LA as culture, art, and
craft

Source: Food Icons on the Evolving Role of Mexican Cuisine in LA

Together, critic Jonathan Gold, food scholar Evan Kleiman, and chefs Ray Garcia,
Bricia Lopez, and Carlos Salgado have spent more than a lifetime preparing, eating,
and writing about Latin American cuisine. Before their recent panel discussion at
the Getty, offered in conjunction with Pacific Standard Time, they sat down with us
to reflect on the role of Mexican cuisine in the life of Los Angeles and how we might
expand our taste buds to go deeper.

SS: As a chef (or critic), do you

consider yourself an artist?

EK: Art to me often has an intellectual

component. I think of food preparation
as a craft–I don’t think of it as art.

RG: My personal approach to food is

more of a craftsman. I like having my
tools in hand, sort of creating and
building, and my approach is much
more trial and error. It’s part social

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 scientist, and part repair person or In the Getty Center auditorium for the
builder. I put food out, and wait for the recent “There Will Be Food“ panel.
reaction, and see what we can push,
what we can improve.

JG: I’m a writer. Some people can call writers artists, some people cannot. In terms
of food, there are people who approach cuisine from an art angle. Carlos Salgado is
astonishing that way. His food is rooted in Mexican flavors, but there’s this level of
abstraction in his food. Is it art as opposed to food? No, it’s food, but it’s being
approached in a different way.
CS: The highest point in my life is being with close family and friends, in the
backyard over a fire, cooking over the course of many hours, sitting under the sky,
and just filling this space with so much warmth. When I’m cooking there, I feel
much more like an artist than when I worked in the highest-concept restaurants.
They are like museums of food, accessible only with a certain level of literacy on the
part of the diner, with a certain level of cultural experience and background.

SS: This panel represents

Mexican American cuisine in LA.
What other kinds of Latin American
cuisine or particular dishes from
other regions do you like?

JG: El Salvadoreño cooking. It’s very

basic, but the ways they use corn and
greens and cheese. The fermentations
are lovely.

EK: I love Guatemalan tamales, maybe

Tamale with pepitas at Taco María in
Costa Mesa
more than Mexican tamales. The masa
is often mixed with potato, so it’s much
more tender. They’re wrapped in
banana leaves, so there’s a different
flavor. And the way they are filled is
different; often there’s olives or raisins
or prunes in them.

BL: I love Peruvian food. Everything from the ceviche to rice and beans, all of the
flavors. It has so much depth.

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 CS: Baja coastal cuisine. The freshness of it–you eat seafood in the morning because
it just came in. Very simply prepared, very intense, briny ocean flavors: big clams,
oysters, shrimp. Big, big flavors.

SS: If you could recommend one dish

or element in Mexican-American
cuisine that a total beginner must
try, what would it be?
EK: Tacos, because anything you eat
with your hands is less intimidating
than something that requires
silverware. It takes you back to the
permission of childhood, and that joy
of just eating that is super direct. There
is nothing in between you and the
food.

BL: I think mole is a really good one. A

lot of people think of it as a chocolate
sauce, and yes, it has chocolate, but it
also has like 18 other things. I always
recommend three things: mole, the
barbacoa, and the chiles rellenos at my Dishes at Broken Spanish, in
restaurant, just because I think they are Downtown LA.
universally delicious.

CS: I would say try more and different types of chilies, and the salsas that result
from them. The range of flavors, and balance of flavors, is really exciting, and is my
favorite part of Mexican food.

RG: Put aside your thoughts and limitations on what Mexican food can be, and how
much it can cost. Especially in LA, there is almost a cult-like following for cheap
Mexican food, for the greasy taco truck. There is something people find exciting
about that, but I think it’s good to stop and wonder why your taco costs a dollar.
There must be a lot behind it that allows you to eat a dollar taco. It probably
doesn’t include a living wage, a safe work environment, or the best quality
ingredients for you and your body. We could understand where our food is coming
from and be a bit more conscious in our choices.

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