editor’s note: Our friends Billy and Kaki Burruss sent this dispatch from their annual trip to Oaxaca. For a little taste of Mexican shopping, venture beyond the tourist shops and head south of the Zocolo into the heart of commercial Oaxaca. In just a few blocks you”ll find the excitement and busy bustle of the Mexican shopper. Unlike our department store shopping, here the shops are squeezed together, each offering a different product. You´ll find shoe shops, fragrance shops (where […]
Visual historian Sarah Borealis talks about culinary tradition, eating in Oaxacan markets, and her new documentary “The Path of Stone Soup,” which explores the culinary heritage of Oaxaca’s Chinantla region. As Borealis explains,Chinantla’s specialty is a freshwater seafood soup “cooked to perfection using red hot stones.” I was interested to learn that the dish is traditionally prepared by men. The 24-minute documentary is the work of an international team that includes Borealis, director Arturo Juarez Aguilar, and César Gachupin de […]
“I know there’s a market in Oaxaca that has a ton of food stalls,” I said disconsolately. We’d traversed the cavernous Mercado Juarez in search of fondas, and we were still hungry. “I remember it being right downtown too…” I said, eying a couple of nearby booths. Was it possible that I had missed an aisle? “Let’s just go find a taqueria,” Rich said hastily, no doubt anticipating another interminable death march as I scoured the market for food. Unfortunately, […]