Fren Food is a collaborative zine that I created in 2014. Food has been important to me my whole life, and I was inspired to continue and expand upon my family’s documentation of recipes on cards, margins of cookbooks, and even bound collections of recipes compiled by generations of family members. I invite friends, family, and anyone interested to contribute a recipe, a story, a photo, a drawing, an experience, or even a dream about food to Fren Food- knowing that beyond a recipe lies feelings, stories, and memories to be shared.

Food has both brought my family together, and has given me a connection to my own history in times apart. I think about how food has sustained my family through generations. I acknowledge the privilege that I am here today because of it. I give thanks to my ancestors before me who journeyed across seas to harvest sugar cane and to those who crossed borders to work in fields.

I think about my grandpa Eddie’s hands twisted and curved from years of picking oranges and the memories of my dad and I driving through the orange groves of Lindsay CA stopping to pick up the ripe oranges that fell to the ground, but leaving the almost ripe ones on the tree and cruising the hilly, narrow roads, windows down and juice dribbling out of our smiling mouths. Flipping tortillas on the electric stove and dad burning his fingertips. Wishing I liked dads Menudo.

I think of my grama Carolyn and the valentine cookies every year, sprinkled with pink sugar. I think of the balanced breakfasts, lunches and dinners everyday. I dream of the smell of baking bread coming from the kitchen, and spitting cherry pits with my friend in the backyard. I think about grampa Bruce’s monster pancakes. Popcorn and tomato soup on Christmas Eve. Baked apples, Portuguese sweet bread and egg casserole on Christmas morning. Enchilada pie. Pikake salad. Always including me and letting me sneak bites. A literal spoonful of sugar to make the medicine go down.

Celebrations, journeys, experiences, memories, discovery, history, joy, conversations, remembering, connection, creativity.

Fren Food