‘To Make! Mix It All Together!’

By 826 Valencia

Illustration by Elizabeth McConaughy-Oliver.

This year, students at Everett Middle School in San Francisco wrote odes to their favorite foods and interviewed someone special to them about a dish that they love. 826 Valencia published their writing in Kitchen Magic: Odes and Recipes from our Culture. The students celebrated their book release with a pupusa-making class at La Cocina Marketplace, a food hall that supports immigrant, women entrepreneurs as they formalize their food businesses. 

Because there’s endless Kitchen Magic to share in the world, the student writing selections below are a continuation of last month’s.

Elizabeth Nagy’s Strawberry Kale Salad

Elizabeth Nagy was born in Sacramento. Since her mom was from Russia, she had grown up with Russian food that didn't quite fit Elizabeth’s taste. So at six years old Elizabeth learned recipes such as scrambled eggs with salsa. “I would pull up a chair because I was too short to reach and since I didn’t know seasoning, my parents told me to add salsa to add flavor.”

Elizabeth grew tired of the bland taste of Russian foods she had grown up with and cooked. She would cook with her mother. When her mother had made kale salad, she couldn’t eat it because of the cheese. Since Elizabeth was vegan, which her family would tease her about, Elizabeth had decided to change the recipe of the kale salad a bit. Even though she had only started to learn serious cooking, her childhood had shaped her hobby of cooking at a young age and to experiment to escape from the bland food she had to eat. 

Ingredients 

• Vegan cheese (but any cheese you would like)

• Six cups of kale

• One pint of strawberries

• Two avocados

• Four walnut halves

• Half an onion

• Any additional veggies

Salad dressing 

• One quarter cup of olive oil

• Vinegar three tablespoons

• Four teaspoons of honey

• Salt and pepper

Recommended Equipment: A bowl 

To make! Mix it all together! 

First, for the salad dressing, add vinegar and olive oil and stir.

Massage the kale with salad dressing, slice the onion, and most importantly, slice the strawberries in half as well as the walnuts and any other veggie you like. Then mix. Then add salt and pepper to taste. Now all you need to do is mix and add the honey on top and any cheese you like. Then, there you go: a Strawberry Kale Salad!

Ivett Tiscareno

Enchiladas Verdes

The grass green sauce covering the tortilla

Crema melting on top like an ice cream on a hot day accompanied with shredded lettuce

The queso fresco gives it an even creamer taste. 

The first bite into you is amazingly savory and spicy. The tortilla, the salsa, el queso y la crema combined with the shredded chicken all in one bite.  

When I cut a piece off with my shiny fork, I see the chicken spilling over making my whole enchilada fall apart. The chile is making my nose run as if it's a waterfall. 

The way the soft tortilla melts in my mouth makes me feel complete.

Rosa Jaramillo Rodriguez 

Ode to Fried Rice 

Dear fried rice 

Looking at you from that clear case 

Making it hard for me to control myself

All the wonderful colors the peas, eggs, carrots 

And the tan color of the rice 

Your smell calling my name 

Putting a smile on my face 

Biting into you like winning the lottery but in my mouth 

Hearing internal fireworks going off in my mind

Your taste a mix of sweet and spicy when I add hot sauce 

Oh fried rice, you give a tight hug to my heart 

Loving me dearly.

Jhoana Sanchez

Ode to Pupusas

My wonderful pupusas you bring so much light and flavor to my life.

When I see you, I feel my stomach grumble like thunder.

I can’t wait to lay you on my plate, grab my fork, and eat you up.

Seeing you come out of the kitchen all steamy and lightly burnt makes you so appetizing.

I grab a spoonful of salsa roja and cover you in it like a blanket 

Can’t wait to feel the flavor of the mild tomato sauce on you 

And to give you more color I add the curtido 

Now you’re covered in the greenness of the cabbage and the orangeness  of the carrots and the extra flavor of the vinegar 

Oooh the flavor of its bitterness, crunch and little mild taste 

Your hot cheese melts as I take a bite and feel your stringy goodness.

then I feel the soft taste of your beans.

Finally I taste both the flavors of the cheese and beans plus the curtido and salsa roja making fireworks in my mouth.

I feel all sorts of flavors and textures coming from you 

The bitterness, the little mild touch, the chewy cheese, the soft brown beans, 

 A collision of flavors in my mouth.