Mariana Velásquez - Colombiana: A Rediscovery of Recipes and Rituals from the Soul of Colombia

COLOMBIANA . Copyright 2021 by Mariana Velsquez. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollllins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

Photography by Gentl & Hyers

Illustrated by Paulina Carrizosa

Digital Edition JUNE 2021 ISBN: 978-0-06-301944-7

Version 05132021

Print ISBN: 978-0-06-301943-0

A Diego

Mi corazn de melocotn

This manuscript was submitted to HarperCollins on April 7, 2020, during the first COVID-19 lockdown, from our home in South Williamsburg in Brooklyn, New York. More than ever, cooking has become a source of comfort and care. Learning to cope with uncertainty suddenly gave me the courage to write from a more personal place. Seclusion even inspired my husband, Diego, to cook by following recipes for the first time! A newly found appreciation for the essential beauty and gifts of everyday life illuminates these pages.

The vision of going on a ten-day road trip from Bogot to Cartagena to photograph the places, food, and people transformed into shooting the book entirely in Brooklyn due to the pandemic. Creative challenges can bring unexpected results.

It is my wish that these recipes give you as much comfort and joy as they gave us. Hopefully in brighter times.

Mariana

My story starts on New Years Eve in 1999, when I was working at my first cooking job in America. I was eighteen years old, and my mother, back in Bogot, wanted me to be anything but a cookdespite the fact that she herself had devoted a life and career to the art of the table, curating and selling fine china and crystal. As I stood in a kitchen on the California coast, the new millennium was mere minutes away. The Post Ranch Inn, which sits atop Big Surs breathtaking cliffs, is home to the award-winning restaurant Sierra Mar, where a party of sixty swayed outside, poised to ring in the New Year. I was in the kitchen, part of a thirteen-member crew cooking up a storm. More precisely, we were preparing a decadent, twelve-course dinner to be served in the exquisite dining room overlooking the Pacific Ocean, with linen tablecloths, gigantic freshly cut pink and white dahlias, and handmade dining ware. That night, still sweaty and watching the guests from afar, I toasted the year 2000 with a loving crew fresh from the kitchens red-hot, tired line.

After Id been peeling carrots, systematically, tirelessly, for days on end, the restaurants then executive chef, Craig Von Foerster, a stocky, bald man with a tender smile, asked me to make the mise en place for the caviar with eggs and potatoes. I opted to cook the eggs and potatoes at the same time in one pot, just like my grandmother had always done at home. Chef Craig walked by the sixteen-burner gas stove and stopped abruptly upon glancing at my work. Who did this?! he yelled. It turns out that youre not supposed to cook eggs and potatoes in the same pot in a professional kitchen.

I identified myself, expecting dragon-fire to rain upon me. But then Chef turned around and spoke to me, almost in a murmur, Never stop doing it this way. This is how you become a unique cook.

Even now, after being in New York City for more than half my life, the recipes and foods I grew up with continue to be at the core of my identity as a cook. My unapologetic Colombianity comes through in my accent, my organic approach to plating food, and the ruffles of my dresses. It shows when I make coconut fish sancocho for friends in the West Village on any given winter night, or shape up arepas on Thanksgiving morning for everyone before the true preparation for the feast begins. It is no coincidence that Diego, my Bogotnian husband, shares playlists that start with smooth tones but slowly make our guests dance a little in their seatssometimes a lot.

My experience in restaurant kitchens was grounding to say the least. Working under chefs like Colombias Harry Sasson and Prunes Gabrielle Hamilton in New York, among others, I learned discipline and hard work. Then, driven to explore my fixations with history and art beyond the kitchen line, I transitioned to the world of food magazines at publications like Saveur and Eating Well. There I learned the method and the minutiae that go into making a recipe trustworthy. I was constantly testing, developing, and researching every step. I remember taking the subway to Jackson Heights to buy a whole kid goat from a halal butcher, twice, to test and retest a biryani for a Pakistani story. That very dish was photographed by Brooke Slezak, who told me I had a hand for food styling. Food styling? I replied. I had no idea that was something you could do for a living. And so it happened. Beauty, photography, storytelling, culture, and food. I realized I could preserve, forever into an image, a moment as ephemeral as a meal.

Since then, Ive had the good fortune to work on many authors cookbooks. Ive had the honor of preparing and styling the food they had envisioned, written about, and tested. Now, after twenty years, I feel Ive come full circle. Im ready to write, style, and art direct my own vision.

Being both a Colombian cook and a food stylist in New York has inevitably shaped my cuisine. I constantly weave a fabric influenced by both cultures: their colors, exuberance, maximalism, history, mysticism, and politics. Everything comes together to create a food flavor and style all my own.

Yet, at my core, I am and will always be a Colombiana. No matter how much I enjoy tossing up a frgola sarda with pistachios and Pecorino Romano, or how regularly I braise lamb with olives and preserved lemons for the tagine I learned while working in Marrakesh, my country always remains my muse, my center, my compass.

And so here, finally, I offer you my sincere take on the Colombiana way of being. Creating and relishing intense yet balanced flavors, with my country as my muse, embracing the beauty and bounty of nature, celebrating with friends and family, and honoring the traditions that define a home.

To understand the food of my country, you must travel it by car, exploring every region and tasting your way through the mountains, valleys, fog forests, and markets. You could start by saying that our cuisine is a hearty mix of Indigenous, African, and European cultures. But truly defining the cuisine of Colombia in one phrase would be impossible, mainly because Colombia is one of the most biodiverse countries on earth by area, second only to Brazil. Imagine the range of dishes that can come from an almost countless variety of fruits, vegetables, tubers, and meats, all found within an area roughly twice the size of Texas. All climates, all year long. Its as challenging to define as it is delicious in its complexity.