Last night I slept with don pancho
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- Chapter 22: Domestic and other Goddesses
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“Sauce is the soul of a tamale” explained Chef Militza de Leon as she carefully spread a spoonful of pepian, a fragrant, sweet-spicy sauce featuring smoky chile de Coban, plump pepitoria seeds, tomato and cinnamon, atop the corn flour dough. I was one of a trio of culinary enthusiasts at Antigua Cooking School, located beneath the historic Arch of Santa Catalina in Antigua’s historic centre. Hosted by Militza de Leon, a culinary school graduate and niece of San Francisco-based owner Vilvma McCosmey, the lessons were set in a modern stainless steel kitchen in an outdoor courtyard. The other students were a middle-aged couple in Antigua celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary. My plan was to take a crash-course in formal cooking classes. I’d spent a lot of time in Guatemalan kitchens but between language barriers, distractions and beer-drinking, I was never completely sure what was going on. This school seemed ideal. Its focus was on traditional food, dishes an abuelita or Guatemalan grandmother would make, yet it was sophisticated and fully equipped with every accruement a modern kitchen should have. Unlike our family’s dark, cramped kitchens which I’d dubbed “las cuevas de Sanchez” - caves. Our menu was tamales and guicoyitos rellenos (a delicate stuffed squash). Under Militza’s direction, we filled tamales, chatted and enjoyed the sounds of the leaves rustling the leaves of the avocado tree. There was no need to grind the seeds by hand with a mortar and pestle, the fine-ground powder magically appeared, delivered by assistants who looked ready to audition for roles on the Food Network. No splattering, no kids running underfoot, no mountains of dishes to watch. Once the food was prepared, we carried out plates to the courtyard dining room to enjoy the fruits of our labour. We’d only taken a few bites of our steaming tamales when a series of loud explosions sounded. “Was that gunfire?” asked the woman to her husband. She’d been nervous about Guatemala to begin with and now her fork was shaking in her hand. “It sounds more like fireworks,” said chef. “You’ve got to love Central America. It’s an all-day party,” laughed the husband I watched as an ominous plume of black smoke rose over the red clay rooftop and filled the sky. The explosions were endless, with no break at all, out of control. Something wasn’t right. When I heard the sirens I knew it couldn’t be good news. One of the staff went to check it out. Fifteen minutes later he returned. A fireworks display at the market had caught fire and exploded, sending flames through the narrow stalls. Ambulances were on the scene. People were dead. I had been in the market just an hour earlier and it had looked so festive with the colourful fireworks displays, nacimientos and gifts ready to be wrapped. There was no escaping death in Guatemala. Back in Guatemala City, Thelma wasn’t too impressed with the photos of the food itself. “They used aluminum foil to wrap the tamales?” she said shaking her head. “They even cooked the chicken before they wrapped it in the masa,” lamented Lorena. Although Thelma had doubts about the merits of the classes themselves, I could see her doing some quick calculations on the profit margins of operating a cooking school for gringos. The seed of an idea had been planted.
The house was a messy ramshackle collection of lean-tos, each room occupied by a family of ten. But the property was large with thriving mango and avocado trees. The rooftop offered the same beautiful view of Pacaya volcano I had enjoyed for so many years at Thelma’s. “We could blast out the wall along the rear of your house and mine,” she said as we traced the concrete block walls with our hands and imagined a walkway from our future garden patio to the kitchen of her home-based bakery. “My dream is to build a school where young women from the community, like Mary, can learn a trade,” she said as we walked in an adjacent vacant lot, dodging the husks of avocado skins and dried palm fronds, to see the homes from the rear. “They desperately need more economic opportunities.” Thelma’s cake business was booming. She had begun by making cakes for cinceneras and birthdays to complement the business in her libreria, a stationary store where she also sold individual servings of creamy tres leches to the barrios’ school children. Her business had thrived and she now made wedding cake, multi-tiered creations festooned with fresh flowers. The elaborate structures required two vehicles to transport them and several people to assemble. She could barely able to keep up with demand. The more we talked the bigger our plans got. We imagined a commercial kitchen with several work stations, supplies and rooms on the second floor. Javier and Daniel trailed behind us while we walked. “She’s right. It could be done,” I thought. I had completed the Baking Arts culinary program at George Brown College and while my prowess at cake decorating was poor, my biscuits, bread and scones were tasty. The thriving ex-pat population in Antigua just 25 minutes away was a potential market for artisanal breads of spelt, whole wheat and sourdough. As I closed my eyes and pictured the view of Volcan Pacaya from our prospective new home’s rooftop and wood-fired bread oven, I felt longing swell up inside me, catch hold and springboard me into a new, imagined future. “Yes,” I thought, “This is definitely something I want.” Javier beamed as though he’d just won the happiness lottery and began making plans with Daniel to complete the paperwork. Our newly- imagined future began to take shape. Chapter 22: Domestic and other Goddesses
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