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How this indigenous chef promotes the future of gastronomy

2021-08-12T02:16:52.255Z


Claudia Albertina Ruiz Sánchez, of Tzotzil origin in Mexico, talks about the path that led her to be highlighted by The World's 50 Best Restaurants, which annually designates the best restaurants in the world.


MEXICO CITY.- Part of the future of gastronomy lies with an indigenous woman who defied discrimination by opening her own restaurant, which has become a site of experimentation, of preservation of ancestral methods of preparation and training for future generations.

She is the Mexican Claudia Albertina Ruiz Sántiz, a 33-year-old chef of Tzotzil origin.

The World's 50 Best Restaurants, which annually designates the best restaurants in the world, named her along with

50

other

young people from 34 countries

who she trusts will define the global culinary course with their innovations and work towards a fair, sustainable and sustainable supply of ingredients. that promotes social welfare.

Ruiz Sántiz tells in an interview with Noticias Telemundo that the inaugural list of "culinary pioneers" seems like a "beautiful" way to show

how "the richness of the kitchen goes beyond taste."

He comments that gastronomy actually "encompasses many things" more than ingredients that are cooked: he mentions the culture of preparation techniques, the myths around how to cook and what to cook, respect for the environment to do so or the traditions of a place .

[“Helping those who still don't have a voice”: chef José Andrés's new 'American dream']

In her case, tradition dictated that she should leave her studies in adolescence

to dedicate herself to being at home

.

Instead, she determined to go to college and have her own kitchen, which she achieved by opening the Kokono 'restaurant in 2016. The restaurant focuses on preserving the traditional flavors of the indigenous cuisine of Chiapas, a southeastern Mexican state.

Chef Claudia Albertina Ruiz Sántiz in a video call interview carried out in June 2021. Telemundo News

He adds about the 50 Best appointment that "the most pleasant thing is that it

counteracts all those very constant voices

that have tried to tell me along the way: 'you can't, you're a woman, you're indigenous, you're not worth it,'" says the chef.

"With this everything has been worth it," he highlights.

In fact, it mentions that people from San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, a tourist town with an indigenous majority in the Mexican southeast, began to arrive at the Kokono 'restaurant after the appointment.

“Before they didn't visit us much, we had more people from outside.

Now we have that additional commitment of proving to the locals where the recognition came from, ”he says.

Along these lines, Ruiz Sántiz makes sure to give credit to the team that surrounds her and

to the people who have given her opportunities.

[He lost his hand due to a strange accident but did not stop cooking]

“This achievement is not only mine, it belongs to a collective.

Just as there have been people who have set foot on us, there are those who have supported us and contributed the grain of corn, ”he says.

One of them was Enrique Pujol, a prominent Mexican chef who

recruited her after reading Ruiz Sántiz's university thesis

, which consisted of a traditional cookbook from the highlands of Chiapas that she wrote in both Spanish and Tzotzil.

The chef worked for several years in the kitchens of Pujol and Máximo Bistrot, restaurants in Mexico City that have repeatedly been included in the annual list of the 50 best in the world.

In addition to Ruiz Sántiz, the

list of the future of gastronomy includes Latin Americans such

as the Chilean Diego Prado (who is looking for a sustainable way to generate alternatives for egg white), the Bolivian Marsia Taha (with a program for the preservation of products from Andean biodiversity) and the Peruvian Manuel Choqque (who collects almost disappeared varieties of the potato and promotes the maintenance of the cultivation by making wine with them).

"There are many young people who need space and since they get it they do extraordinary things," says Ruiz Sántiz.

A dish from the Kokono 'restaurant in San Cristóbal de las Casas, a majority indigenous town in the southeastern state of Chiapas, Mexico Courtesy Kokono'

That is why the chef's recognition also comes from how she has dedicated herself to spreading job opportunities and scholarships along with her love for traditional Chiapas gastronomy.

[A river vital to their existence was taken from them and now this indigenous Mexican people is vanishing]

In his kitchen he receives young students of indigenous origin to

give them training opportunities

.

And it does so by allowing them to work according to the hours available to them given their classes, without feeling that they must go out of their way to do both.

He says he drew on his own experience having to knock on many doors until one opened for him, and trying to balance the demands in many kitchens with the demands at school.

"There you can see and reflect the effort we have been making and the journey we have made for several years now," says the chef.

For now, she says that the appointment granted in April will continue to motivate her to improve herself together with her team to continue

promoting her community and her state.

“I want Chiapas to be thought of the same as, for example, in Oaxaca: that it be a place where remarkable, important, rich gastronomy attracts as well as being a tourist site in general,” he mentions.

He says they will continue to fight together to achieve it even if the pandemic, with the continuous waves of infections from variants and the slow pace of vaccination in Mexico, can complicate that goal.

[Pan de muerto without masa or mole with garlic: this is how Paco Méndez has reinvented Mexican cuisine]

Source: telemundo

All news articles on 2021-08-12

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