4 Arroz Mexicano: A Testament to Family

“My mother-in-law, who I saw as a second mother, always told me never forget the most important ingredient: love. And I never forgot that” (Mendoza 2024).

My mother was born and raised in Indiana; her family goes back generations, so much so she cannot remember when her family migrated here. However, my father is a second-generation Mexican-American – his parents were immigrants from Mexico. Indiana is where these two met, so despite us frequently moving throughout my childhood, Indiana is my true home. It is where the concept of family was learned and built upon by my mother. I chose to interview my mother because her story is one of overcoming hardship and finding family outside of the one she grew up with.

Though my mother holds great love for her family, she always longed to be loved as she has loved. My mom chose to share the recipe for arroz mexicano with me because it was one of the first recipes she learned from my grandmother at only fifteen years old. It serves as a timestamp for the beginning of her love for my dad and the acceptance into his family. This created the foundation for her newfound belief system of food as a way to express love. She notes she cooks this dish almost every week, not only due to its ease, but its role as a sweet reminder of the woman that took her in as her own, and a reminder to bring that kind of love into her own family.

When discussing cooking in her parents’ home, she struggled to find happy memories-equating the time in the kitchen as a memorial of struggle. As “minimum wage workers eat minimum wage food” (Mendoza 2024), money was extremely hard to come by in her household due to her father being the sole provider. She recalled her mother stretching meals and relying on simple dishes that could be transformed into other dinners to provide for the family. In the same manner that Magoulick (2014) describes eating every part of the pig, my mother’s family stretched ingredients to feed a large family. This idea of making use of every last bit of, perhaps roast beef or some other versatile dish, was a tradition in her household due to economic hardship. Furthermore, she identified that family dishes were primarily from a can, making the claim it was due to her mother’s disdain for cooking, since she did not work. My mom recalled that she did not care what was put on the table, that they should be grateful they got anything at all. Though delighted to bring her family together through meals, she inherited this reliance on canned goods; she attributed it simply to the fatigue from working. Therefore, the recipe that follows uses canned tomato sauce instead of blended raw tomatoes. As many women do nowadays, she works full time and runs the household without much help – a legacy of women in the workforce due to the long lasting effects of industrialization (Madison & Sandweiss 2014).

When she moved in with my father at a young age, my mother was completely immersed in his Mexican American culture. My grandmother showed her a whole new side to cooking, where food was a way to love, and the kitchen was an opportunity to bond. Despite not exactly falling in love with the kitchen, my mother has always made a conscious effort to put thought and care into our meals, something she had only observed from my dad’s mother. Little things my grandmother did, such as requiring everyone to eat at the table, making her kids’ favorite dishes, and simply taking the time to pass down a recipe inspired my mom’s newfound dedication to making sure, through the simple service of crafting a meal, her kids would know nothing but love. For her, arroz mexicano is the embodiment of what family truly is.

Arroz Mexicano

Ingredients

1 ½ cup white rice

4 cups water

Small can of tomato sauce

2 ½ tablespoons of Knorr “caldo de tomate con sabor de pollo” (tomato bullion)

How to prepare

In a frying or saucepan, fry rice in pan until golden brown in oil. Once golden brown, add the water and seasoning and pour the tomato sauce as you count to 3. Stop pouring after 3. Bring to a boil and then turn the heat down and cover the pan, leaving a little opening for the rice to vent. Cook for 20-25 minutes. Stir occasionally. If rice is not soft and starts to stick to the pan, add a little bit of water and cook until rice is soft.

References

Madison, J. H., & Sandweiss, L. A. (2014). Hoosiers and the American Story. Indiana Historical Society.

Magoulick, M. (2014). Foodways of Southern Indiana in the Early 20th Century. Digest: A Journal of Foodways and Culture, 2(2).

Mendoza, Jessica. (2024). Interview by Nevaeh Mendoza. Bloomington, IN, November 8, 2024.