Dinner and a book is supported by the Rex and Alice.

A. Martin Foundation of Elkhart, celebrating the spirit of Alice Martin and her love of good food and good friends.

From 19th century cigar factories to present day detention centers from Cuba to Mexico of Women and Salt by Gabriela Garcia is a portrait of the betrayals, personal and political self-inflicted or done by others that have shaped the lives of these women, the legacy of the memories they carry, the choices they make, and their tenacity is a story of America's most tangled, honest roots.

Let's welcome my guest, Suzanne VonGunten, to find out more.

This is a broad topic.

It's a.

Very.

Yes.

Actually, the book itself starts in Cuba in the late 1800s.

And it takes us, you all, to the United States, Miami to present day.

And we also visit Mexico for a while.

And yes, it is multigenerational women.

So we're finding that know, as in so many books, women are they're the target of nasty behavior here.

They lose their place in society.

They're unhappy, they're ill treated, and they want to come to America.

That's part of the reason they want to come.

So this family starting back in the cane, in the tobacco fields, which I found most interesting.

Yes.

Antonio.

And who is it?

Who was the woman who forgot her name already?

It was.

Was it Dolores?

Nope.

The one before.

Oh, two.

Two names?

Yeah.

Maria.

There's so many women in Maria and they work hard.

She is.

Why?

She's wrapping.

Cigars.

Cigars?

And there is a man that comes in and reads to the people wrapping cigars.

Don't you find that interesting?

That was fascinating that they read to the men and women that were wrapping cigars and they read, you know, very literary books.

Victor Hugo Books.

Yes.

So that was very interesting.

Well, Antonio came in and did that, and he was so he was a rather nice man, wasn't he?

Yes, he actually married Maria.

Mm hmm.

And he is speaking for liberty.

He wants the Spanish out of Cuba, out of Havana, wherever they're everywhere.

And so he speaks up in the field and he's shot.

Right.

But he had married the woman, and now she is left on her own.

And so this starts the cycle of this family.

We move further in through history that at the time of the revolution, when Batista is in power and then the other come in, the communists and the same family, it nothing really changes, does it, through this time period?

No, except that Dolores comes to the United States.

She's trying to escape, I think both Cuba and some family situation.

Yes, some issues.

And they've all had some family issues.

So we were started on that.

But let's talk about what we're going to make of what you're doing.

Well, I'm going to make a plantain dish.

And I wanted to show people the differences in the plantains that we have here.

This is a plantain that some people would use in a stew, and it's very unripe.

And then you can see as you look across that the plantains darken up, they get yellow, and when they get black, they're sweeter.

And you can make sweet plantains, which is what I'm going to do today.

And if you go to the market, you can find these plantains, have chili and lime.

These are sweet ones.

If you go to a Hispanic market.

I believe you can find any kind.

Including cheese.

Oh, even cheese, yes.

But not probably vinegar and salt.

You never know, though.

No, I think so.

I think vinegar and salt the other day.

And the other thing I'm going to do is I will be cutting a number of papaya and they would serve that kind of as a dessert at the end of the meal.

They like fruit.

There is a lot of fresh fruit in South America.

And so you're going to start on your plantain.

Yes, I am making black beans and rice and I have seen this serve so many different ways.

I'm making sort of a stew out of this.

But today, some of the young people like to make it as a big, bowl dish where you put the rice in the middle, then you put some chicken around it.

Then you add this wonderful sauce, then you can add sliced radishes, chopped spring onions, and it is just like a bowl, you know, the dinner in a bowl.

And I like those bowls.

I like that concept.

So I've been cooking beans.

I did not cook them there.

They were not raw.

When I started, I would have had to cook them through the night and I didn't want to get up and look at beans at two in the morning.

I just said no.

So I bought the canned beans.

I do have a son, the will and grandson that only want them fresh and they cook them at night.

So the beans are cooking.

And then I have been cooking some onion here and we're going to add some chopped green pepper.

And I already have the rice made because rice is one of those things.

If you if you start cooking it, don't pay attention.

You start talking about a book.

It goes up in smoke.

So the onions are starting here.

They're they're weeping.

They're just right.

I'm going to add some green pepper.

And and that these are the basics here.

I've added garlic.

So you have onions, green pepper, garlic.

That is sort of like the base of Cuban food.

And I'd say, try it.

It's it's fun.

It really is.

And then I will decorated at the end.

So tell us what you're doing with these right.

Plantains.

Well, I. I find that you can't feel a plantain exactly like you do a banana, so you kind of have to slip it down one side and then the other.

And with the riper ones, then they they'll peel back.

And then you take the plantains and you cut them at about a half an inch, depending on on what you like.

And I'm cutting a little bit at a diagonal.

So that gives it a little more space for frying.

And then I will fry them in about a half an inch of oil.

Hmm.

I hear my green pepper sizzling.

I'm adding some bay leaf, some cumin some oregano, and some slap your mama hot pepper.

And we're going to let that mix.

This is important, this mixture of herbs first for Cuban food and I like it hot.

I mean, I don't mean temperature wise, I mean spicy.

We like it.

Spicy.

Yes.

You know, and what was interesting in the book was Dolores, you know, after the communists took over, she found it hard to find cumin and she loved cumin.

And so I found that really interesting in the book that she had difficulty finding cumin.

Well, and, you know, cooling is is used in so many countries, in African countries.

And it's the flavor that is so good.

I'm going to add a little free range chicken broth, not too much salt.

And then we are going to add after that, we're going to these are getting nice and soft.

Oh, I can hear them sort of sizzling.

Yeah.

Cooking fast aren't they.

Yeah, they really are.

Ooh, I think I better turn it down a little bit here.

So I am now going to add the black beans.

We want that to cook for a while, mixed in with the onions, garlic and all the wonderful spices, green pepper.

And I want to be very careful when I add these beans because they are very hot now.

You see, you could keep these separate and serve them on a buffet table where people make their own mixture.

It's a it's a nice dish.

So we have this all mixed together.

It's getting nice and thick.

All right.

And we're talking about how we follow these women through the ages.

And why are the men this?

There are two men in this story, but there's ancillary they're not the focus.

Why do you think she does that?

Well, I heard an interview by the author, Gabriela Garcia, and she grew up in a family of mostly women.

Her mother was from Cuba and her father was from Mexico, but she said it was her grandma and her aunt's and her sisters.

They were the important people in her life.

So I think when she went to write a book, she was going to write a book about about women.

About women.

And I think that having all the voices of women only, I think was was good.

You heard about the men, but they were they were.

They were on the sideline, weren't.

They?

Right.

And most of them were violent.

Violent.

They hurt the women.

And so we don't want to focus on that.

And I feel sorry for the women.

They have to live this well.

They had fathers that molested them.

I mean, it it is a hard life.

And I just want to say before we go, we take a little break here.

I have the rice cooked normally.

I don't mix them together.

But this is the recipe, a Cuban recipe.

So when we come back, I'm going to put the rice in and we're going to let this all meld in season and it tastes so good.

So you're working on your second?

Yes, I'm going to do another one.

Yes, I'm, you know, plantains.

They just eat so many plantains in the Central American South American countries.

They use it a lot like a starch.

As I said earlier.

Yes.

They put it in stews like we would use a tomato.

I mean, like we use a potato and it's.

Yeah, it's just a staple.

Well, and that thought, let's take a little break here.

We going to show you some pictures of Havana, the street scenes and the markets.

And then we'll come back and finish this cooking, this wonderful plantain.

And then you're going to start on your papaya.

Oh, we've got everything here.

So take a little break.

We'll be right back.

And we have our little shop here, our little restaurant where cooking up a storm.

You have your second plantain.

Look at the color.

Yes.

In that pretty uniform.

You know, I noticed one earlier that was quite dark and I tasted one and it was delicious.

So unless you just really burn it, yeah, there's still quite good that's, you know, and how dark they are.

Yeah.

You know, you can also, if you want, you could sprinkle cinnamon on them, you could sprinkle coconut a little bit of coconut and.

Becomes a dessert.

Dessert, almost a dessert.

Well, you know, we were talking about Victor Hugo and he's very well, he's red in South America and particularly in Cuba.

Why do you think that is?

Well, I think because he wrote Les Miserables.

I'm not sure that's pronounced right in in French, but and that was during the revolution.

And so when they were reading that book in the Cigar Factory, you know, it really made the workers, I think, feel powerful.

And then the book Le Mis is throughout the throughout the whole book, you it comes back.

Yes.

Because we won't say how it goes, but in the very end, it shows up again.

It shows up.

And in this was a very important moment.

There was a man that came to visit and Dolores couldn't find her book and it was Jeannette that had borrowed it, the the book by Victor Hugo.

And she automatically accused this older man and it really shows a certain amount of racism that is there.

And Jeannette sort of paid attention to that.

And, of course, she returned the book.

But they like him.

He he was sensitive to revolution in whatever country.

Now I have my sauce ready and I add a little sugar.

I don't want it to be so tart and spicy that it turns this off.

But now I'm going to add the rice.

Now, remember that you don't have to add it.

You can mount it up in a dish.

But the recipe I have has us putting it in.

I have about three cups of cooked rice and we can always add some more chicken stock and then we'll put it in a serving bowl and top it with some chopped cilantro, some lime, and voila, I'm also going to add some chicken.

So this is I think this could serve easily ten, 12 people, maybe even.

More so.

And I'm getting my papaya ready here.

I'm feeling it.

Oh, that's pretty, isn't it.

Yeah.

Isn't it pretty nice.

Really.

It's beautiful.

It's like an art piece.

It is.

I don't know that if Americans eat a lot of papaya because I bought this at the Mexican store.

And I don't think when I go to my local grocery store that I see very I have that I see papaya very often.

It's kind of an unusual taste.

I know when I was in Costa Rica and I lived there for about three months when I was in college, my mother, Costa Rican mother, kept saying, eat this.

It's really good for your stomach, makes your makes your digestion good.

And so she was always pushing papaya.

You know, every country has its things.

It's good for digestion.

In France, it was a little bit of liquor, wouldn't you know, the little chartreuse, if you're if your tummy is upset, I'm adding a little more free range chicken broth.

And because this is the soup, this is really dry.

I mean, it's really coming together.

And I don't want to.

Get to talk a little bit more about that racism.

It was really interesting when Jeanette went to Cuba to see her cousin and grandma, and then her grandma showed such kind of racist opinions.

You know, you kind of think, well, this is a communist country.

You know, everybody must be equal.

There must there must not be a problem.

But, you know, I think that every country has its problems.

And it has its stereotypes.

Right.

And they have to have somebody to blame.

And I'm reading a book now, a French book, an English book, and it has some of the same things in it.

And it was accepted.

People were accepting of it.

And, you know, and today it's in secret, but it's still it still exists.

I think I'm going to as a chicken at the end, it's already cooked.

I have some drumsticks and some slices.

And in my mind I have two ways of serving this and that smell good, doesn't it?

At least I think it smells good.

And look at this.

Gosh, those seeds are so pretty.

And you can't use them for decoration, can you?

I don't think so, no.

But, you know, like big caviar.

One of the things we didn't talk about was one of the problems that one of the main character has is addiction.

You know, she's living in Miami in the United States.

And her mother, Carmen, is has emigrated from Cuba and wants to be the perfect kind of woman, you know?

Yes.

She wants her makeup to look right.

She wants shoes, then she wants clothing.

Her husband is a doctor her, but he also molests his daughter.

And also Carmen has a secret from her home country.

One of the reasons that she came, I won't tell her because that would spoil the book for a lot of people.

But, you know, all of these women have secrets.

And, you know, I think lots of people have secrets.

It's not just this book, but lots of secrets and they don't tell their children.

And so sometimes they're hiding things and their children, I think, actually know.

That they know something.

Yes.

Yes.

Maybe the mother doesn't come out and say it directly.

There was this thought that in my immigrant family that a woman who has a daughter and if she loses her husband, it's dangerous her to marry another man.

I mean, they had all these ideas and they were some of them were true, just like this, doctor.

And these themes are throughout history and certainly in this book.

Oh, I love this room.

So I really I really like this book.

At first it was confusing because very confusing.

It goes it goes back and forth between characters, but also time, time periods.

Yes.

But the author said in her interview that, you know, it's kind of like life.

Life is never completely linear when you tell your story.

I guess you could say it's not a linear story.

You tell little bits here and you try to put together what does actually happen.

And you have to really focus.

I mean, you're here, you're in the 1860s, then you go way to present day Miami, then you're back.

And in the same scene in in the in the tobacco fields or in the factory.

And you really have to pay attention, but it's worth it, because these are rich stories.

They're stories of tribulation.

And and, you know, some of the wounds are self-inflicted, but many of the wounds are are inflicted by a husband and one of the young girls sees her mother murder the father, the one who has been beating her up consistently every night.

She had broken teeth and broken ribs and she couldn't get away from this.

So she just devised a plan to get him drunk and take him out in the yard and pour gasoline on him.

Well, she killed him first.

With the machete.

I forgot the machine and then took him out.

And that's when her daughter saw her burning.

Her dad on the on the sofa out in the backyard.

So this is not for the faint of heart, but it's true history and it's things that have gone on.

I don't care what country you're talking about now.

We just have a few minutes to wrap up our cooking.

You are in perfect time here.

Look at that beautiful bowl.

You could make more plantains if you wanted to.

We'll put that in a serving dish, add that to our table, and this is ready.

I'm going to dish it up.

We're not going to plate the food, but we're going to put it in serving bowls.

I'm going to add chicken in the little decor of sliced spring onions and cilantro.

So cilantro is wonderful.

A lot of people don't like it.

They think it has a musty.

But once you get used to it, yes, I put it in salad, too.

I like it.

I like the flavor.

You.

Me, too.

You know, the other thing that we wanted to talk about was how the author wanted to make sure that people understand that the immigrant story is not always the same for every family, every woman writes it.

It varies.

And to make generalizations about this immigrant or people coming to this country, it's just not true.

Well, the author said there is no one immigrant story correct.

Everybody has a story to tell.

Some of them have very happy experiences.

Some of the books written today are really to show the pain and the suffering of these people.

And it doesn't diminish its it's it's there.

So and I like the food I've been to about six countries in South America and this black beans and rice ooh it comes up all the time.

It's everywhere.

And I love it.

So you're going to finish chopping.

I'm going to add some things.

We're going to set our table.

We are ready to invite you to a Cuban meal.

All right.

We'll be waiting for you today.

Our book is Gabrielle Garcia's Of Women and Salt.

And my friend here, Sueann VonGunten.

She's going to say why it's called why it's called of salt women and salt.

Well, I heard the author talk a little bit about it and she said, well, salt is just such a common thing.

Like in the Bible, it says, we're the salt of the earth.

And a couple of times in the book, there was things about sweat, and so salt was present.

All right.

That's that's a very good, very good explanation.

And this is the first novel, the first book by Gabriela Garcia.

And I wish her well.

And let's talk about this food that we have been slaving over.

Yes, well, we have plantains here.

They're the ripe plantain.

They call them Maduro.

Maduro, which means mature.

And you can also buy plantains at any of the Latin grocery stores in your hometown.

And we also have just fresh papaya.

This is a wonderful papaya.

It's very ripe and very delicious.

And if I would have had time, I could have sliced the pineapple, put some in there with the papaya or served it alone.

They they love pineapple.

So and I made a black beans and rice dish with some chicken.

And that took all my time.

Right?

I kept working on that.

And so I like this book.

I really did.

I did get all tangled up, moving through time, back and forward.

But the thread was the story of this family.

And Jeanette starts with the woman in the tobacco factory and we end up with Jeanette today.

What did you take away from the book?

Well, I think it took away that the strength of women and how strong the women are in this book, but they also have tragic flaws.

It's kind of like all of us.

And so there's sadness in this book.

Very much so.

You know, it's not a happy, happy book.

There is a bit of a happy ending, I would say.

But, yes, it's it's not a Hollywood ending.

So we we're glad you joined us today.

Remember, good food, good friends, good books make for a very, very fulfilling life.

And I want to thank you for coming and suggesting the book.

Thank you.

All right.

You're welcome.

You're welcome.

And thank you for watching.

We'll see you next time.

This WNIT local production has been made possible in part by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Dinner and A Book is supported by the Rex and the Alice A. Martin Foundation of Elkhart celebrating the spirit of Alice.

Martin and her love of good food and good friends.