Traces of vegetarianism can be sourced back to ancient civilizations, but in the past two decades the number of people practicing a fully or partially plant-based diet has really been taking off. This growth has been spurred, in part, by concerns over the environment, personal health, and the increased availability of meat alternatives.
But a new book by chef Adán Medrano says a plant-based diet has deep roots in South Texas and northern Mexico cuisine, and he’s put some of the recipes and stories behind them into a new book, “The Texas Mexican Plant-Based Cookbook.”
Medrano joined the Standard to dish on the details. Listen to the interview above or read the transcript below.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: You say you want readers to take away from this book that “plant- based” and “traditional” can mean one of the same when it comes to Texas-Mexican food. Could you say more about that? You don’t think people understand how “plant-based” and “traditional” go together?
Adán Medrano: I think that there’s confusion because some of the questions that I have been receiving are how “are you going to adapt to the plant-based Mexican food?” “Where are you going to find the ingredients?”
And so the clarification is plant-based traditions are native to Texas, to southern Texas. If you look back 10,000 years, the earth ovens that we used, that our ancestors used, were mainly used for plants – not for barbacoa that we use today.
And so I say that plant-based is traditional because plant-based cooking will take it’s place alongside our other tradition of meat-based cooking. Both are traditional, both are over 10,000 years old. I want to just complete the picture of Texas-Mexican food.
Now, we’ve been talking about some of the regions of southern Texas and northern Mexico, but say more about the past cultures that you’re drawing from here.
That’s a great question, thank you. That’s really at the heart of it.
What has happened with my book and with the new chefs that are coming up, the younger ones, is we have moved the North Star of cuisine – that is, a reference point from the Aztecs and the Mayas to the people who lived here 10,000 years ago… Our own ancestors in San Antonio, South Texas, Austin, Northeastern Mexico. This is our true North Star, and we have it above us now.
So, the Coahuiltecan people around San Antonio the Karankawa of Corpus Christi, all of these native communities that had given us the flavors that we have today, that’s what we’re celebrating.
Yeah, and you also, I know, want to make an important distinction that the stories and the recipes that you’re sharing in this book, that’s not what you would consider Tex-Mex. Could you say more about the distinction?
Yes, that’s an important distinction. Ever since the New York Times came up with the article on my work and called it “Don’t Call It Tex-Mex,” I’ve been asked about that.
You can call “Tex-Mex” all of those restaurants that are Anglo-owned and that out at the top of their sign, they say “Tex-Mex,” “choose Tex-Mex” … The food I’m talking about is native to Texas and that is what Tex-Mex tries to imitate.
So our food does not have high fat in frying. We do not have all of that cheese. And we don’t choose chiles, for example, only because of their heat. We choose them for flavor, aroma, and texture.
I have nothing against Tex-Mex food, please. I love it, but they’re just too different. Ours is much older, and ours is what Tex-Mex copied.
Let’s get more into the types of dishes in the book. Can you touch on some of the key or common ingredients when it comes to cooking plant-based meals the way they were eaten back in the day?
Yes, I would like for our readers… I invite you, the readers, to look at the book not as recipes from the past, but recipes from today. They have a past which is our tradition, but they are not of the past. They are of today.
For example, in the book we have chia and pecan pudding. Pecans are native to Texas. We have been eating them for over 10,000 years. There’s also a mushroom tacos. And our ancestors here in Texas and in northeastern Mexico, of course, we ate mushrooms. So this is ancient, but it’s also new.
And then the last one I want to mention is avocado popsicle. I love the avocado popsicles. Kids love it too. And I mention that because it has avocado, tomatillos, maple syrup. And I mentioned that because all of these recipes are traditional, but many of them have contemporary twists.
You know, we live in today, we do not live in the past.
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