Happy Pride, from One Potato! 🥔 🏳️🌈
A special guest post by Alison & Daniela - A Pride Weekend tribute to cooking and family traditions
Happy Pride, One Potato Family!
This is our second installment in our new guest series highlighting diverse families and voices in our community, and this Pride weekend we have beautiful food and family memories written by Alison and her wife Daniela. They both bring rich family cooking traditions (Alison is Cuban-American and Daniela is Mexican) to their home and their young son, passing along recipes from their abuelas and creating their own cooking and kitchen traditions with him as he grows.
We are looking forward to bringing you more voices from our community, and are committed to celebrating diversity and inclusion every day and every month - not just on explicit Heritage Months, but 24/7. Everybody needs to eat; we are a community of cookers and eaters, regardless of background, where someone comes from, and what day of the year it is. We celebrate ALL families, every day.
We would love to have you contribute your family stories as well and foster building this community - please send us a DM if you’re interested in sharing.
Wishing Alison & Daniela & their son, and all the LGBTQ+ families and allies, a Happy Pride!
Food Stories
by Alison A. G. & Daniela A. S.
Some of my most treasured childhood moments took place in kitchens all over Miami. I mostly remember standing in my childhood kitchen and watching my mom chop peppers––a job that I took over once I could wield a knife. Graduating to sous chef was more than an opportunity to help her; I would steal bites of our creations as hungrily as I did stories of her past.
I can easily recall the fragrant aroma of Abuela Bebé's famous arroz con pollo, a chicken and rice dish she lovingly prepared in seemingly industrial quantities for our lively family gatherings. Abuela Hortensia’s tomato-heavy salted cod, or bacalao, was always in heavy rotation during my visits; I was expected to enjoy at least three servings before she looked remotely satisfied, a way of showing her love and fortifying me for the week ahead.
When I left for college in upstate New York, I naively believed I could escape Cuban cuisine, tired of rice and beans. Yet, within weeks, I yearned for its familiar comfort. Upon returning home, I asked Abuela Hortensia for her coveted buñuelos recipe, only to find some waiting for me the next morning. A second attempt at acquiring a recipe had me following her around the kitchen as she made them again. Her secret? No measuring cups, just a special spoon and lots of confidence! I would never be able to recreate them, but hoped that one day I would find myself cooking with that same level of intuition.
Moving to Brooklyn and finding my queer community prompted me to start hosting potlucks, aiming to recreate the warmth of family meals and allowing me to continue honing my skills. During this time, I met Daniela, a charming, well-traveled woman from Mexico City. One of our earlier dates involved her joining my potluck; she brought a farm-animal-shaped waffle iron that instantly made everyone smile.
Eight years, and many meals later, our son was born. Daniela and I eagerly planned the diverse meals we wanted him to experience and learn to recreate: her mother’s pozole and Veracruz-style shrimp cocktail, my mother’s picadillo and slow-cooked oxtail stew. More than the dishes themselves, we looked forward to our shared moments in the kitchen, the passing down of our unique histories and traditions, and the dinner table conversations that would follow.
We began taking our son to farms and gardens. He's picked pumpkins, apples, and strawberries. He's eaten tomatoes off the vine. But before tackling polvorones and ropa vieja, our son’s culinary journey began with pizza, a quintessential New Yorker's choice. We watched as he spread sauce on the dough with delight and generously sprinkled some cheese, sneaking a handful or two into his mouth. Cooking together became our weekend ritual: mixing eggs for morning omelets and chopping watermelon. On lazy days, he’d blend smoothies with Daniela. When he turned two and we began feeling more ambitious, we got together with our friends and their toddler, and made tortillas from scratch.
In these everyday acts of food, I rediscover the joy of family, the taste of tradition, and the love that flavors every meal we share.
