Gustavo Arellano, the Original “Mexican” Columnist, Answers Questions About Mexican Food in the U.S.
Updated April 18, 2012 — I had a chance this month to chat with Gustavo Arellano, the original “¡Ask a Mexican!” columnist and now OC Weekly editor, about Mexican food in the U.S., the subject of his new book Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America. Arellano is one of the featured speakers at the Go West Book Fest at the Autry on April 29. Naturally, we chatted over a truly fantastic meal at Taqueria Zamora in Santa Ana: Arellano had the tacos dorados and I had the chilaquiles with red salsa and a fried egg on top.
With this book, Arellano aims to fulfill two goals: to guide you through a geographic, historic and ultimately cultural journey of Mexican food across the United States; and to do away with the notion of “authentic-ness” as a criterion by which to judge the quality of Mexican food.
Gustavo Arellano, in his element at Taqueria Zamora (Photo by Tessie Borden)
“The whole idea of the book is that, what people feel is Mexican food is, for them, Mexican food,” he said. “It’s their interpretation of it.”
Arellano referred to an interview he had done earlier with KPCC’s Larry Mantle, in which Mantle mentioned Naugles, the fast-food Mexican drive-through chain restaurant that was a part of his youth and of life in Riverside, but that Arellano knew nothing about until he began research for Taco USA. The anecdote is one way of saying that all Mexican food — like all politics — is local and is a product of relentless creative mixing of ingredients and cultures. This not only is true in the bowels of that melting pot called the United States, it’s also true in Mexico, the ostensible home of authentic Mexican cuisine. But Arellano has little use for labels like “authentic.”
Arellano started his book tour at Plaza Olvera’s La Plaza de Cultura y Artes museum, “for karmic purposes,” then moves on to San Francisco and San Diego. But soon, he’s hitting the entire Southwest: Tucson, AZ; El Paso, TX; Albuquerque, NM; Santa Fe, NM; Flagstaff, AZ; Phoenix, AZ. And almost every place he’s visiting has its unique style of Mexican food.
“When I’m doing interviews and doing my pláticas, I’m going to focus on their contributions,” he said. “Especially when it comes to these regional foods, they want to be validated, because for too long they’ve been put by the wayside, derided as not being authentic.”
Arellano notes how skirmishes over authenticity in Mexican food also occur in Mexico, a deeply regional place with many styles of cuisine, all of which, of course, come under the heading of Mexican food — including the relatively recent trend at restaurants like Fonda Don Chon or Patricia Quintana’s Izote in Mexico City, which serve their chefs’ interpretations of pre-Hispanic or pre-Columbian food. In other words, what indigenous gourmands of Meso-America might have eaten before 1492.
“Food is changing so rapidly,” Arellano said. “What’s in today changes so rapidly, because of trends, because of economics, because of whatever. So to have this trend of bringing back this pre-Hispanic food is wonderful because we’re lucky it’s still around. We’re lucky that we even know what it is. That said, there’s no such thing as authenticity. The authenticity game is foolish. Food is the ultimate immigrant. Food travels, mingles, intermixes with other things to create new things. So to insist that somehow this particular platter is not authentic because it doesn’t come from here, here and here, it’s silly. If we want to play the authenticity game, then yea, the only real authentic food is this pre-Hispanic food that existed. But that is not Mexican food.”
Mexico by definition involves the mixing of at least Spanish and Indian traditions, Arellano said. And there are others, too, that also are important to what we think of as typically Mexican: German, Czech, and Austrian immigrants made the beers that are such a big marketing success in the U.S., and the spit-roasted tacos known as al pastor are not that far away from their Lebanese origins.
“I used to be one of those zealots of ‘Taco Bell is not authentic Mexican food’,” Arellano said. “But the person who really turned me over to the dark side was the dean of Tex-Mex cookbook writing, Rob Walsh. He’s won numerous James Beard awards, and he’s always been this very fierce advocate for Tex-Mex food.”
Arellano said it was Walsh who wrote that what is now considered Tex-Mex was, until 1972, just called Mexican food.
Arellano gets enthusiastic about his subject (Photo by Tessie Borden)
“Then, all of a sudden, you have these people like (the celebrated English author and expert on Mexican food) Diana Kennedy coming in and saying, ‘These traditions that mexicanos have been cooking (with) in Texas for over a hundred years, that’s not really Mexican,’” Arellano said. “Who on Earth is a British woman to be telling Mexicans in Texas who have suffered all sorts of discrimination at the time of segregation, that what they’re eating is not truly Mexican? That was the great revelation for me.”
It comes down to what Arellano considers the philosophy of “all tacos are created equal, but some tacos are more equal than others.” In other words, he says, the Taco Bell taco is as authentically Mexican as mole poblano from Mexico’s heartland or a Mission-style burrito from San Francisco.
“Does that mean that all Mexican food is equally good? No, no, no. Not at all,” he says, following up with what for some might be fightin’ words: “I’m not a fan of Taco Bell. They do not make good food. Del Taco? They make better food.”
In the book, Arellano charts the long-time popularity, back to the 19th century, of San Francisco’s tamale men, as well as the rise, in the 1980s, of the Southwestern food trend and of fajitas and, later, the burrito.
“The only constant in all these trends is Americans want the next best thing,” he said. “Americans want the next great Mexican dish.”
And even though he rails at Kennedy and famed Chicago chef and restauranteur Rick Bayless (whose cuisine is featured at the chi-chi West Hollywood eatery Red O) for staking out positions as arbiters of “authentic” Mexican food, Arellano actually praises the enterprise of Americans like (Taco Bell founder) Glenn Bell and, surprisingly, Wild West Show entrepreneur “Buffalo” Bill Cody, whom he credits with establishing the first Mexican food restaurant outside the U.S. Southwest. In 1886, as part of the New York stop of his Wild West Show, Cody set up a pop-up food stand in what was then Madison Square Garden that served tamales, chiles rellenos and chile con carne.
“Cody never explained what Mexican food had to do with the submission of the West, and the ‘Mexican ranchers’ who populated his show alongside Native Americans and cowboys were more accurately vaqueros, the Tejano riders from which the American English ‘buckaroo’ derives and from whose womb cowboys emerged,” Arellano writes. “But Cody’s Mexican restaurant — staffed by Mexicans, with mescal and chocolate shipped in from Mexico to end the meal — became a New York sensation, with lines of Gothamites waiting to taste curiosities, ‘inflamed and excited by the hot chile peppers and the other condiments which burn like caustic,’ according to an observer.”
For the Los Angeles Times’ take on Arellano and his book, click here.
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Check out what others are saying...[...] Gustavo Arellano The final product that people eat is the food that gets labeled as a particular type of food; the producer has nothing to do with it. Americans have made Mexican food for over a century, and Mexicans have been making all sorts of ethnic cuisine in Southern California for decades. But we don’t call a bagel a Mexican food item, not even a jalapeño bagel. At what point does a food cross over? I’d say after it becomes ubiquitous in a culture from where it started off as a foreigner. Anne Edkins SoCal is obviously a great place to find excellent Mexican food. But is there some other city or region in the US where there’s a surprisingly large Mexican population serving great food? Gustavo Arellano Anne: Many places. Tucson and their Sonoran hot dogs. El Paso and their awesome rolled tacos buried under a blizzard of yellow cheese. San Antonio’s puffy tacos; Denver’s Mexican hamburgers. Wichita makes its own type of Mexican food, influenced by the beef trade and a bunch of sour cream! The Autry What’s the ideal Mexican meal to eat when you’re on a diet? Gustavo Arellano If you’re on a diet, you want to eat as many nopalitos (chopped-up cactus) as possible. It’s incredibly healthy, low in calories, and you can mix it up many ways: as a salad, as tacos, as a substitute for meat, even as candy. It’s a severely underrated ingredient that more Americans should embrace. The Autry What is your favorite commercial hot sauce? Gustavo Arellano Tapatío, of course, is a standard at every Mexican household, but I’m a huge fan of Gringo Bandito hot sauce. It seems unlikely, given that the guy who makes it is Dexter Holland, punk legend for the Offspring, but the gaba knows his hot sauce: as great as Tapatío, but with seeds! Hilarie Kelly You had me at birria … Love the book. Will buy another to send my daughter in Australia. Gustavo Arellano Hilarie: Too kind! Birria is a magnificent meal—I still say only us Mexis, Indians, Pakistanis, and Caribbeans know the glories of the meat. Gracias for buying the book! Gustavo Arellano makes a point (Photo by Tessie Borden) Anne Edkins What’s the ideal Mexican meal to eat when you’re NOT on a diet? i.e., the most decadent food? Gustavo Arellano The most decadent meal is particular to my home region of Jerez, Zacatecas: asado de boda jerezano. Read about it here: … Damn link! Will post when I can. Canyon Cruz Have you noticed corn tortillas changing over the years? Are they using genetically altered corn these days? Gustavo Arellano Canyon Cruz: Corn tortillas are becoming worse and worse, and it’s all the fault of Gruma, the people behind Maseca, Guerrero, and Mission tortilla brands. They’re driving out traditional tortillerías in favor of their cardboard monstrosities. OUT, DAMN DEVIL, OUT! The Autry What’s the most unlikely ingredient or concoction you found during your research for this book? Gustavo Arellano The strangest meal by far is the Mexican hamburger of Denver: a chicharrón-and-bean burrito with a hamburger patty in the middle, then “smothered” (what us Southern Californians would call wet) with chile specific to Denver: orange, more like a gravy, and hot as hell. Yodotdog Chavez Menudo or Posole??? White or red? Corn or flower tortillas? Can tell a lot from your choices. Gustavo Arellano Yo: Pozole, red, corn tortillas (unless they’re from Tucson or El Paso). Tracy Gutierrez Gustavo………what is with the Mexicans love for rábanos??? My parents, being from Jerez and Puebla love them, while us kids just can’t get into them. My mom has admitted that she didn’t like them until she married my dad………….is it also a regional thing? Gustavo Arellano Tracy: Rábanos (radishes) are meant mostly as a palate cleanser, due to their crisp, moist taste. You see them in most taquerías, so I’d say it’s more of a Central Mexico tradition than anything. Gustavo Arellano And here’s the asado de boda link! Gustavo’s Mom-and-Aunt’s Recipe for Asado de Boda Jerezano Named One of 2010′s Top 10 Favorite Recipe The Autry Do you plan on creating a series of books on food? What is your next adventure? Gustavo Arellano Not sure about another food book — I have other projects in mind. Want to do a history of the Orange County Register, or a biography of someone INSANE… The Autry You mentioned Maseca, what do you think of the fact that college professors are now researching the history of tortillas? Gustavo Arellano I’m glad people are researching food history; for far too long, that genre was neglected, if not outright dismissed. Too many of our food histories have disappeared because of our neglect. Anahi Garcia love your book, it was a great help for my research paper in my latino pop culture “authentic mexican food” ..what is your believe on authentic salsas? what makes a salsa a great salsa? Gustavo Arellano Anahi: Gracias for buying my book! As I wrote, there is no such thing as “authentic” anything. Who determines what is authentic? I love salsa de chile de árbol, but someone from the Yucatán would prefer habanero salsa, and someone from Oaxaca would prefer a mole salsa. What makes a good salsa for me is the right mix of flavors, heat, its thicknes (I like them a bit thicker than watery), and its overall umami. The Autry What’s your must-eat Mexican restaurant in L.A.? In the U.S.? Gustavo Arellano Buy my book to find out haha! For sure in LA, Guelaguetza, Rivera, Lucy’s Drive-In for their chile relleno burrito, Cielito Lindo for the taquitos … again, buy my book for more! The Autry Can you talk about why salsas are runny in Mexico and chunky here? Gustavo Arellano The difference in chunkiness is regional. Chunky salsa is a part of Sonoran cooking and the borderlands. I’d probably attribute it to the abundance of vegetables, but it’s all regional. One of my aunts makes a great chunky salsa filled with chili peppers and tomatoes–and we’re from Zacatecas! The Autry There’s a lot of talk about chocolate being a major ingredient in mole, but mole is more about the chile. Do you have to keep explaining that? Gustavo Arellano Not necessarily true. If you see the recipe for the asado de boda jerezano (a type of mole), we use a massive chocolate bar. Mole negro uses chocolate paste. Again, it’s all regional traditions–no one tradition is right. The Autry If you were to die tomorrow, what would be your last meal? Gustavo Arellano Asado de boda jerezano!!! Gustavo Arellano And horchata estilo Oaxaca, y preparada. The Autry What can we look forward to on Sunday at the Autry during your talk at the Go West Book Fest? Gustavo Arellano I’ll give a lecture about my book, take questions from the audience, and tell everyone how Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show was instrumental in popularizing Mexican food. GO GO GO and BUY BUY BUY! The Autry What? No demo on how to cook asado de boda jerezano? Gustavo Arellano HA! Can’t cook, remember? And you’re only supposed to do for a wedding–hence, the boda part! Joe De La Riva Tacos de tripas, imho Gustavo Arellano Joe: Tacos de tripa at Alebrijes Grill! The Autry Any final words of Mexican culinary wisdom? Gustavo Arellano Gracias to the Autry for having me, and for ustedes readers for the great questions; if you have any more, message me on Facebook. In the meanwhile, buy my book! The Autry Thanks for joining us! This was a very enlightening conversation. We’ll see you on Sunday! Canyon Cruz Thanks Gustavo The Autry Can’t get enough of Gustavo? Here’s an interview we did with him earlier this month for our Trading Posts blog: Gustavo Arellano, the Original “Mexican” Columnist, Answers Questions About Mexican Food in the… [...]