Op-ed: Through Acts of Solidarity, We Can Support Immigrants in the Food Chain and Beyond
July 22, 2025 | Source: Civil Eats | by Alba Velasquez
As a kid, I used to cringe when my mom would pull the car over on the side of the freeway. She’d spot something growing wild in the hills around Los Angeles and jump out of the car, searching for flor de izote, a white flower that’s part of everyday cooking in El Salvador, our home country. When she found some, my mom would take it home and cook it with huevos estrellados con tomate (fried eggs with tomatoes) or stir it into a cheese filling for pupusa.
As I grew older, I came to realize that this was my mother’s ingenious way of connecting to home, even as we were putting down roots in a new land. In this way, we built a life here, away from a dangerous civil war in our home country.
I grew up cooking alongside my family, and I saw firsthand how assimilation was wrecking our health. Not only were we lacking access to our customary nutritious foods, but everyone was working hard, too, up to 16 hours a day, which left little time for meals beyond fast food.
I went away from home for college, and one day, I got a terrible call: My dad had suffered a heart attack. I knew that stress and poor eating habits had finally taken a toll. I decided then to work to change the broken food system that had failed my family.