When I arrive at the home of Antonina Hernandez de Paz in Duluth on a recent Sunday, I expect to be led into the kitchen. Instead, the family is cooking outdoors, on a comal over an open fire, and grinding salsa in their mother’s molcajete.
This is the way their mom, the late Rosa Hernandez Lopez, would have done it back home in her native Oaxaca, and it is their intent to keep those traditions alive as long as they can.
Hernandez Lopez died last year, just shy of her 71st birthday, from complications following a case of COVID-19 — but not before teaching her daughters to make the authentic Oaxacan cooking they serve at La Mixteca Tamale House in Suwanee.
Though Señora Rosa spoke in her local Mixtec dialect and never learned Spanish or English, she was a masterful cook. La Mixteca, owned and operated by her daughters Antonina, Patricia and Stacey, was the culmination of her passion.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
As her daughter-in-law Silvia Hernandez crushes fiery chile de arbol, garlic and roasted tomatillos in the oversize mortar and pestle, Antonina mixes masa harina and water. These two ingredients form the batter for picaditas, the griddled masa cakes their mother made as a special treat, often on Sundays when she was able to be with her nine children.
“That’s how my mom used to wake us up in the morning,” says Stacey, remembering the throat-tingling sensation of toasting chiles.
“We miss that,” Antonina says.
Like many families who’ve lost loved ones, the siblings assign special significance to preserving their mother’s heirloom recipes. It’s a way of keeping her memories alive. At the same time, other families with elderly loved ones held them close during the pandemic, cooking at home and rarely venturing outside a closed circle.
Such was the case with chef Archna Becker (Bhojanic, Tandoori Pizza & Wing Co.), whose family parlayed their home cooking skills into a catering and restaurant business in the mid-’90s.
When I spoke to Becker at the end of the year, she told me her parents, both in their 70s, were hunkered down at their Decatur home with her 90-year-old nanima (grandmother). That conversation inspired this story.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
Often, the elders are the keepers of the recipes. Indeed, the cuisine at La Mixteca and Bhojanic owes a great deal to the matriarchs: Hernandez Lopez; Becker’s mother, Purnima Malhotra, and her nanima, Nirmala Arneja.
I arrive at the home of Becker’s parents on a Thursday just past noon. Before I can get through the front door, Becker pulls up. She’s running late because she had to fetch measuring spoons and cups so we can make recipe notes. In the Malhotra home, there are no such utensils.
How much garlic and ginger? Purnima Malhotra winces nearly every time her daughter asks her to measure something.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
Becker’s father, Surender Malhotra, is preparing an appetizer of paneer pakoras. He spreads a spice paste onto slices of paneer and tops them with a second slice — as if he’s assembling tiny sandwiches. The cheese will be dipped in spicy batter and twice fried for extra crispiness.
While he does this, Mrs. Malhotra puts together tahiri, a rice and potato dish that her husband aptly describes as a vegetable biryani. During the pandemic, the family had plenty of basmati rice and potatoes, so tahiri became a staple.
Finally, it’s Nanima’s turn.
She whisks together milk and ghee for kheer, a milky sweet similar to rice pudding and flavored with saffron. Only instead of rice, she uses thin strands of toasted Indian vermicelli. When it comes time to add the saffron, she measures it out the way she’s always done, in the palm of her hand. She crushes a pinch of bright orange-red threads with her fingers and throws it in the pot.
Wisps of saffron are one thing. Other matters — such as love, the meaning of home and family, and memories of loved ones living and dead — cannot be measured.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
RECIPES
Learn how to make Oaxacan picaditas and Indian paneer pakoras, rice pilaf and vermicelli pudding.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
Rosa Hernandez Lopez’s Picaditas de Queso Fresco
Picaditas are griddled masa cakes from Oaxaca that get their name from the pinched borders. For the family of the late Rosa Hernandez Lopez, these were a special weekend treat, topped with cheese and fresh salsa made in a molcajete. We’ve adapted the salsa recipe for a food processor.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
Mr. Malhotra’s Paneer Pakoras
The Malhotra family’s spicy paneer pakoras (cheese fritters) make for a delicious snack or appetizer. Dip them in green chile sauce or the hot and sweet sauce considered the ketchup of India. Note: You can find the condiments, as well as pomegranate powder, at Indian grocery stores.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
Mrs. Malhotra’s Tahiri
This was a pandemic staple in the home of Surender and Purnima Malhotra. A dollop of yogurt or raita tempers the heat.
Credit: Wendell Brock
Credit: Wendell Brock
Nanima’s Vermicelli Kheer
This comforting sweet is similar to rice pudding but calls for Indian vermicelli instead. It is a favorite of chef Archna Malhotra Becker’s family and always made by her grandmother, Nirmala Arneja.
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