Fiction, poetry, book reviews, and literary wanderings. From medieval legends to Chicano speculative fiction, stories have a way of leading me into unexpected places.

Kitchen & Memory

Recipes, culinary history, baking adventures, and the stories food preserves. A continuation of the explorations that began with Doña Lupe's Kitchen.
Gardens, landscapes, art, France, and lifelong learning. An exploration of the places, ideas, and curiosities that keep my imagination growing.

Well, Here I am Again

Posted on by ginaruiz

It seems I have a habit of disappearing from my own website and then turning up again a few years later with an explanation. This time, I have a rather good excuse. Life has been busy. Very busy. Work, graduate school, books, writing, more books, and the occasional attempt to remember what having free time feels like. Oh, and after I finished grad school, I decided to get a graduate degree in LAW.

Somewhere in the middle of all that, my website fell by the wayside. I’ve spent some time recovering old posts, sorting through what survived, and deciding what I want this little corner of the internet to be. It turns out that rebuilding a website is also an exercise in remembering who you were when you wrote things years ago.

Work

I’m still at USC, working in Student Health. I work with a team I genuinely love, which is no small thing. After a long career working in different industries and with all kinds of people, I love being where I feel I belong. I am in exactly the right place. Work is more than work. It is fulfilling, and it is home.

My professional life has taken me through law offices, publishing, education, nonprofit organizations, and now healthcare. Each has been a different experience, and each has taught me something. One of the things I’ve come to appreciate is how much there still is to learn, even after decades in the workforce.

School

And then there’s graduate school.

After completing my M.A. in English at Arizona State University, I apparently decided that I hadn’t spent nearly enough of my life reading, researching, and writing papers. I’m now pursuing a Master of Studies in Law at USC Gould School of Law, along with a certificate in Healthcare Compliance.

It’s challenging, fascinating, and occasionally exhausting. There are days when I wonder what possessed me to take on another graduate degree while working full-time, but then I come across something in my coursework that sends me down another research rabbit hole, and I remember exactly why I did it.

I’ve also been thinking about what comes next academically, including doctoral study in Organizational Leadership and Change. Apparently, I have no intention of ever being finished with school. I suppose there are worse habits to have.

Home, Books, and Other Adventures

Meanwhile, things at home have been changing too. The grandkids have grown up and flown the coop, making homes and lives of their own. It seems like only yesterday they were little, and now they’re off having adventures, building their own households, and generally behaving like the adults they have somehow become. When exactly did that happen?

So I’ve been making changes around the house. My office and library are getting redecorated, the kitchen is getting some much-needed attention, and the spaces that once belonged to the grandkids are gradually being transformed into something new. It’s a strange thing, watching a home change as the people who once filled it begin making homes of their own.

My bookshelves have been changing too. Alongside the literature, poetry, and history books that have accompanied me for years, there are now quite a lot of law books. Apparently, getting another graduate degree also means finding room for an entirely new collection. I’m beginning to suspect that no matter how many bookshelves I acquire, there will never be enough.

And somewhere among the furniture, bookshelves, and household projects, I’m still writing. There are stories waiting to be finished, research questions that refuse to leave me alone, and a collection of websites that I’m slowly bringing back to life.

Writing, Websites, and Other Worlds

I’ve also been thinking about how to organize all the different kinds of writing I’ve done over the years. My interests have never fit neatly into one category. I write fiction, essays, book reviews, food writing, and academic papers, and I have a tendency to become fascinated by subjects that lead me into entirely unexpected places.

Rather than trying to squeeze everything into one website, I’ve decided to give some of these projects their own homes.

Doña Lupe’s Kitchen will continue to be the place for food, recipes, culinary memories, and the stories that come out of kitchens. AmoXcalli, my book-review blog, will have its own space again once I’ve finished cleaning it up. The Choloverse will be home to my speculative fiction, including the Arthurian Cholos and other stories that have been occupying my imagination.

I’m also developing Worlds & Margins, a new online publication for my fiction, essays, research, observations, and whatever else finds its way onto my desk and into my imagination. I’ve decided against making it an email newsletter. I rather like the idea of readers visiting when they want to, without another subscription landing in their inboxes.

And this website? I want ginaruiz.com to remain my personal home on the internet, a place for updates, reflections, and the occasional essay about something that has caught my attention.

So, Here We Are

I don’t know how often I’ll post. I’ve learned better than to make promises about regular updates when work, school, and life have their own ideas about my schedule.

But I’m here. I’m working, studying, reading, writing, rearranging bookshelves, and making plans for whatever comes next.

There’s still an awful lot I want to learn; I have characters nagging me to write about them that are competing with the things I think I want to write, and oh yes, moving bookshelves around and navigating space issues. When I first wrote Chanclas and Aliens, I never realized I would be building a whole universe of stories around my characters. I wrote it as a joke, and then the characters had more stories to tell. I ended up writing Arthurian Cholos on a Quest for the Grail (or maybe just tacos) and whaddya know? Those vatos want a sequel…if they’d only let me finish law school in peace.

So, hello again.

Azincourt/Agincourt

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

Written By Gina Ruiz

I couldn’t go to Crécy without also going to Agincourt. I have always read history of Agincourt and called it by that name until I went to the location in France. The French call it Azincourt and as it now belongs to the French and I was on their soil, it is what I will call it in this post about it. I didn’t plan it this way but we arrived in Azincourt on the anniversary of St. Crispin’s Day, the anniversary of the eve of the great battle of Azincourt. What Shakespeare buff or history buff has not been stirred by the resounding St. Crispin’s Day speech as shown above in the video. The last part always gets to me and I was whispering it from the tower there at Azincourt:

“This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember’d;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.”
— William Shakespeare from Henry V, spoken by King Henry

So, it was by chance or luck that brought me to Azincourt on the eve of this battle, October 24, 2022, remembering a speech that the real Henry V never uttered, on a rainy, windswept day and I was caught up in my memories of this rousing speech and repeating it in my head. We first found the village of Azincourt, then the Centre Azincourt 1415, where not only did they have the best exhibition of all things related to Azincourt, but a fabulous exhibit on the medieval feasting table, “A table au Moyen Âge” where I could observe dishes, pottery, the table, and other artifacts of feasting during the middle ages. The center does a really beautiful exposition and it was well worth the trip for that alone but I was here for Azincourt. Each exhibit has sound in both English and French, and you can follow maps, family trees, and stories. There is a cannonball from the battle, you can step under medieval armor to get a feel of its weight, and there is an absolutely mesmerizing immersive experience of the battle with narration. It is incredible. You feel you’re there in 1415 witnessing the battle. I spent probably far too much money in the gift shop buying medieval cookbooks in French, and souvenirs for my grandchildren (you know I had to get plastic maces and replica arrowheads, right?). I couldn’t figure out how to ship replica helmets, lances, and swords, but I’m going to go back one day and have that figured out before I get there. The exhibits were all so carefully thought out and laid out that it was wonderful to make that circuit through the center. There is also a medieval garden in the back, which smelled incredible in the rain, and a medieval oven, which they are working on for future exhibits. The staff is really knowledgeable and devoted to history. If you live in the Seven Valleys, you can get in for two euros. I paid eight, which was well worth it. If you can’t get to Azincourt, the center offers a virtual visit, which you should totally check out as it has the immersive battle experience I was so entranced by.

After leaving the center, we followed the circuit of signposts with various monuments to the battle or people that died there. I climbed the replica tower to see the fields where Henry V would have been camped and given his speech (perhaps more rousing than Shakespeare’s, maybe not). I was also overlooking the land where so many died, soaking those newly plowed fields in blood. It was both sad and exhilarating to be there, knowing I had ancestors that fought there on both sides. I found a monument to the fallen just to the side of the tower. As in Crécy, the tower had a map of the battle and the views were astounding. I slogged through muddy ground and thought about those soldiers so long ago who probably tramped in the same kind of mud. History says the fields were muddy from a week of rain and the French troops were slowed down because of it. Their slow progress through muddy fields made them prime targets for English arrows. The English had also sharpened stakes into the ground at an angle before themselves, which the French struggled to get through. It was a battle technique they hadn’t encountered before. The archers eventually abandoned their longbows and began fighting hand-to-hand. It ended up a slaughter with Henry V having nobles he captured killed. There was a pile of corpses by the time the third line of the French army got through the mud and they couldn’t or wouldn’t pass through the pile of bodies, and were massacred by the English. At the end of the battle, which is estimated to have lasted anywhere from a half hour to three hours, the precise number of casualties is unknown, it is estimated that English losses amounted to about 400 and French losses to about 6,000, many of whom were noblemen. The battle of Azincourt changed history. Henry V managed to subjugate Normandy in 1419. That victory was then followed by the Treaty of Troyes in 1420 in which Henry was betrothed to Catherine, daughter of Charles VI, and named Henry V as heir to the French crown.

At the end of my trip to Azincourt, I was treated to a double rainbow. Truly, it was a great day.

If you want to learn more about Azincourt I recommend reading the following books:

Jonathan Sumption’s epic histories of The Hundred Years’ War: Trial by Battle (Volume 1), Trial by Fire (Volume II), Divided Houses (Volume III), and Cursed Kings (Volume IV);
Anne Curry’s 1415 Agincourt: A New History;
Juliet Barker’s Agincourt: Henry V and the Battle That Made England;
Ian Mortimer’s 1415: Henry V’s Year of Glory;
Desmond Seward’s The Warrior King and the Invasion of France: Henry V, Agincourt, and the Campaign That Shaped Medieval England.
What are your favorite books about medieval history? Are you a fan of Shakespeare’s Henriad? Are you interested in The Hundred Years’ War? Let me know in the comments.

Crécy

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

Anyone that knows me will tell you I am hugely interested in The Hundred Years’ War. I have ancestors that fought in it if we’re to believe in genealogy. I am so enormously interested in it, that I seriously considered being a History major and studying it exclusively. However, English literature was always my first love, and won, though I do have a minor in History and am considering a second Master of Arts degree in History as well. Though medieval English and French history didn’t end up being my field of study, I do study it personally and am rather obsessed with the subject. My library here at home has loads of books on the wars and the major players. I have the brilliant Jonathan Sumption’s epic work on The Hundred Years War and read it often. Needless to say, my trip to France had to include a trip to Crécy Forest. It just had to. Though I didn’t have the time to stay there or visit as in-depth as I would have liked, I wanted to at least go visit the replica of the tower overlooking what had been the Battle of Crécywhich took place on August 26, 1346, in the first decade of The Hundred Years’ War.

Edward III crossed the Seine at Poissy and the Somme downstream from the village of Abbeville (where purportedly an ancestor of mine is buried). He then took up a defensive position at Crécy-en-Ponthieu. From there Edward posted men-at-arms in the center with cavalry to their right. The cavalry was under the command of Edward’s son The Black Prince (also Edward). To the cavalry’s left were men-at-arms under the command of the Earls of Arundel and Northhampton. Both flanks had English archers. While Philip VI’s army had hired Genovese crossbowmen, they were routed by the English archers and fell back behind the French cavalry. The French cavalry charged headlong into the English flanks but the archers moved forward and more detachments of cavalry were mowed down by arrow shots from both flanks. Those from the French army that did make it to the English lines were engaged in fierce fighting and many were killed. It is estimated some fifteen or sixteen French attacks continued through the night, which each successive attempt being mown down by the English archers with longbows. The battle shocked medieval Europe as the French cavalry had hitherto been considered one of the best fighting armies in the known world. By the end of the battle, Phillip VI’s brother, Charles II of Alencon, King John of Bohemia, and Louis II of Nevers, Count of Flanders were dead, along with an estimated 1,500 knights and esquires. Phillip VI escaped. Legend has it that he escaped through Crécy forest until he came to a manor or castle, where he asked for shelter. After that, he traveled through France with guides and a bodyguard until he came to Amiens.

The replica of the medieval tower lies off the side of the road just outside a small village. Surrounding it are metal blue and red artist renditions of knights and the shields or blazons of the battling royalty is painted on the ground. It’s an easy climb up to the top of the tower, with only three short flights of stairs. From it, you can see the expanse of fields all around and imagine you were Edward’s lookout, seeing the vast and powerful French cavalry coming your way. The view is incredible and pastoral, almost unbelievably peaceful and quiet with only the sounds of birds and the occasional swish of tires on the road. Still, it is easy to picture that battle, imagine the reach of the English archers with their famous longbows, and the panic of the cavalry below as they were mowed down by those archers.

After I left the tower (very reluctantly, I might add), we drove through the forest and a village near it. I got out of the car and walked in the somewhat muddy forest, which is ancient and still though you see the occasional family with a dog or random hiker. The overgrowth is thick and wild. You can hear birds and forest animals rustling but mostly, it is quiet and old. It feels old. When you’re walking in it, it’s easy to imagine medieval people and pilgrims traveling through it and being on alert for robbers and thieves. Or, imagine a king, escaping from a battle, or merchants with guardsman surrounding their carriages. The forest is timeless and deep with mushrooms growing, moss and lichen creeping up tree trunks, ivy wrapping itself around like a clingy lover, a squirrel’s feast of acorns, and piles underbrush underfoot. Coming from California where we are accustomed to wildfires, brush fires, dry grounds, and the clearing of brush to prevent such fires, this was an exotic, strange, and almost alien landscape. It transported me to all those old fairy tales of my youth, set in dark and empty forests. There is something special and magical about Crécy, you can feel its immensity, the stories it has to tell, the secrets it holds, and wonder what the trees have seen, what battles fed its trees with blood, and what history, still unknown lives in its depths. Because this is France and in the Somme, everywhere are memorials to the fallen from each village or industry. I found memorials for foresters who’d died in both world wars and other memorials in the village nearby. It added some solemnity to the already hushed environment of the forest.

In Crécy, I stumbled onto a French government initiative – that of turning old trees that fall into art. I found a forest fairy in the village, not far from a fascinating (but sadly closed) taxidermy shop, and another instance of this type of sculpture/art closer to the forest, called The Tree Tells a Story/l’Arbre Raconte. Of course, I had to sit with the storytelling tree and tell it a story of my own. I also ran into a herd of sheep who wanted to know what I was up to and were very vocal about it, a road named after the Templars, a modern water tower that looked medieval, and a mysterious tent in the forest made of twigs and branches. I am sure it belonged to the Forest Fairy. I took more photos from the tower and the view of the landscape, but sadly, that camera and its photos are still in France and I am currently fighting to get it back. What are your favorite stories about forests? Do you have an interest in medieval battles or history? I’d love to hear.

Lighting Candles Along the Way

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

I had two deeply beloved aunts that have loved and sustained me all my life, but sadly now have only one precious little auntie left. I lost my beloved Auntie Pita on September 25th, 2022, just before I traveled to Paris. Her loss was huge for the family, for my cousins and my uncle, and for my other aunt. It has been a hard and very sad time. I spent days grieving, feeling completely flabbergasted at the loss of such a pivotal and important person in my life. You see, my aunts were like mothers to me. My Auntie Pita was one of the softest, kindest, most gentle of ladies. Se gave me safety and comfort all throughout my childhood, and teenage years, as a young divorcee with four small kids to support years, and up to this, my sixtieth year. When I was growing up, she was a career woman, working for Pacific Bell. She was like the Mexican Mary Tyler Moore-stylish, elegant, strong, and yet, very feminine. She fostered my love of books and learning. I could never go to her home without being fed, given a book to read, and just loved without limit, without condition.

Losing her was a true gut punch and I am still just gutted by it, though France was somewhat healing for me, simply for the sensory distractions. My aunt Lupe Avila’s funeral was on October 13, 2022. I had already booked the trip to France, thinking that by then the funeral would have been held. I booked for the eleventh, and so missed her funeral. In my own way, I wanted to pay her the respect of a funeral, a wake, and a vigil. While I am not a Catholic, my aunt was, and out of love and respect for her, I was determined to include her in my trip, thought about going to nine churches to make it a kind of novena for her. I stopped at every church I found and lit candles, made donations in her name, and took photos of the glory that is French churches. Religious or not, the sheer beauty of a French church will take your breath away.

The first church I stopped in was on my first day in Paris in the rain. I stumbled onto the Church of St. Vincent de Paul and went in and lit a candle. I meant to go back and make a small donation and take photos of it, but France does things on its own time and many of my plans were changed because, well, PARIS. I will have to go back there someday, it was a gorgeous old church. I couldn’t go to Notre Dame because of the repairs taking place, but they had moved the chapel of the Virgen de Guadalupe (both my aunt and grandmother’ were named for this incarnation of Mary) to one of the churches with a bloody history – that of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois.

Read more: Lighting Candles Along the Way

The church Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois lies directly across the street from the east end of the Louvre and is close to both Notre Dame and Sainte-Chapelle, one of the reasons it is often overlooked is that tourists naturally want the better-known churches. Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois is beautiful though, in an ancient, and almost unassuming way, though the sculpture and stained glass are stunning. The building is in the Gothic style, with a vaulted nave and choir. The stained glass is gorgeous and somehow, survived the French Revolution. The church is the color of most of the ancient churches in Paris, a dirty yellowish-white that seems like history would feel if it were a color. You walk in and everything is hushed, it demands silence, reverence, and appreciation of its ageless beauty, but amidst all that beauty is blood, the French Religious Wars, which began in 1562.

Charles IX sought peace, permitting the Huguenots new rights of public prayer and betrothing his sister Margaret to Navarre’s Protestant King Henry III. The marriage was to have been to solidify the peace and stop the wars of religion. It would take place in Paris with all the nobles and very wealthy people-both Huegenot and Catholics attending. The wedding took place but the guests were still in Paris when an assassination attempt was made on Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, a Huguenot noble. Apparently, a Catholic sniper shot him from a window. Coligny lived but Catherine De Medici feared retribution. A list of the names of the important French Protestants was given to the King’s Swiss bodyguard. would be the signal for the Protestants’ murder. The Huguenots were staying at the Louvre Palace and it was arranged that the ringing of the bells in Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois would be the signal for their murder. As arranged, the bells in Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois rang, and the Huguenots were forced out of the palace and into the street where they were massacred. For days after, Catholic death squads systematically murdered Protestants. Contemporary estimates put the death toll at Contemporary estimates generally range from 10,000 to 30,000, but no one knows for certain how many died. However, Protestantism was pretty much dead in France.

The church where I went to visit the Virgen de Guadalupe, still rings the bells now in honor of the victims of the massacre. There is a sign outside the church indicating the reason for the bells. We arrived just as the bells were ringing and I have to say, it gave me chills standing there in the courtyard, probably on the very ground where so much blood was spilled, but I forced myself to go into the church. It is amazing how much you can forget when you step into the hushed environment of such an old and beautiful church. There is just so much art and beauty that all else fades away. I spent some time taking pictures, then found the chapel they’ve moved the Virgen de Guadalupe to and found her beside two Latin American saints-Rose of Lima and San Martin de Porres. Seeing the Virgen de Guadalupe there, the image that was so important to my grandmother when I was growing up brought me back to my purpose of remembering and paying respects to my aunt Lupita. It was the day of her funeral though, with the time difference, in L.A. it was the night before. That was strange too, knowing that I was living in my family’s future time of grief and mourning. The whole experience was surreal, especially as I, in my grief, in a foreign country, felt so lost in time and space.

I visited other churches-in Caumont and Paris, completing and overreaching my novena of visits. On one of my last days in Paris, I stumbled onto one of the oldest churches-one from the sixth century that had been raided and destroyed by Vikings, yet somehow still stands, a vibrant part of the community. This was the Eglise Saint-Laurent, which seems like this random, dirty building until you look closely, see the incredible sculptures, look past the scaffolding, ignore the shrieks of a proselytizer outside on the corner, and find the door leading in. Once inside, you are transported to another century and again are surrounded by art, sculpture, and that hushed ancient feeling of timelessness. I could still hear the shrieking man, (his lungs were an incredibly powerful thing) but I didn’t care because I was too entranced by the beauty. The church, for all its antiquity, was on the ball with Apple Pay and cardless, contactless tap pay for donations. Why am I even surprised? I tapped my phone to make donations and buy candles, then lit the final candles in the Chapelle de Sacre Coeur. I left quietly, only stopping to look once again at the painting of St. Denis holding his own head. Religious art is something else.

References:

Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Wars of Religion”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 25 Mar. 2016, https://www.britannica.com/event/Wars-of-Religion. Accessed 27 October 2022.

Editor, World History Encyclopedia, “French Wars of Religion.” World History Encyclopedia. 6 May 2022. https://www.worldhistory.org/French_Wars_of_Religion/

n raided and destroyed by Vikings. This was the Eglise Saint-Laurent, which seems like this random, dirty building until you look closely, see the incredible sculptures, look past the scaffolding, ignore the shrieks of a proselytizer outside on the corner, and find the door leading in. Once inside, you are transported to another century and again are surrounded by art, sculpture, and that hushed ancient feeling of timelessness. I could still hear the shrieking man, (his lungs were an incredibly powerful thing) but I didn’t care because I was too entranced by the beauty. The church, for all its antiquity, was on the ball with Apple Pay and cardless, contactless tap pay for donations. Why am I even surprised? I tapped my phone to make donations and buy candles, then lit the final candles in the Chapelle de Sacre Coeur. I left quietly, only stopping to look once again at the painting of St. Denis holding his own head. Religious art is something else.

Turkish Food in Paris

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

When I used to think of France, particularly of Paris, I thought of French food: butter, cheese, cream, roast chicken, etcetera. However, Paris is multicultural, always has been, and the food reflects that. My culinary tour of Paris was unexpected, wonderful, and diverse. I sampled so many cuisines on one block in one arrondissement (the 10th), and it would take me weeks to finish sampling all that block had to offer, that my mind was blown. I want to go back and make an actual practice of just covering the restaurants, brasseries, and cafes in each arrondissement in Paris then hit the rest of France. It would be a life’s work, but what a glorious career that would be. I’m working on it.

Anyway, I’m rambling as I usually do when I am overwhelmed by great food memories, the tastes, and scents that niggle at my memory like Proust’s linden tea and madeleine combo, but for my first night in the city, after much wandering in and out of the famous Paris passages, checking out various places in the passages, taking photos of memorial walls and graffiti, and wondering where to get dinner, we ended up at a Turkish restaurant called Marmara on the Rue des Petites Écuries, not far from the Gare du Nord and just off the Rue de Faubourg St. Denis. Basically, it’s an eleven-minute walk from Gare du Nord, which is a quick walk in Paris.

Marmara is a charming little place with azure walls, which were calming and lovely after a wild day of trains and hotel check-outs and ins, not to mention dragging luggage from the train station to the hotel. The server set the trend for which was to be my tour of Parisienne mustaches. His was very black, very large, dominated his face, and it was almost animated. He wouldn’t pose for a photo but his mustache provided a lot to the ambiance. I had chicken with olives while my colleague had kofta and chips. I tasted her kofta and it was gorgeous, but for me, the star of the night was the chicken with olives. The chicken was spiced but not overly so and just melted in my mouth. The olives added just the right acidic note and, combined with the frites, and salad, just perfection. The food is budget-friendly, plentiful, and delicious. Do stop there if you’re near the Gare du Nord and want a hearty meal, great service, servers with character and huge mustaches, and delicious, well-prepared food. The gallery below will give you an idea of a passage, the restaurant, our mustached waiter, the memorial wall, graffiti, a little taste of Paris at night, and the chicken with olives.

Petrichor Parisienne

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

I arrived in Paris late at night on Wednesday the 12th of October, 2022. I was exhausted and wandering around Charles de Gaulle like a zombie. Charles de Gaulle makes LAX look easy to manage. I had been on the flight from LAX to Dublin for ten hours, had a four-hour layover in Dublin, then a little over an hour into Paris, with about an hour spent just trying to find my way out of it and into baggage. CDG is a maze. You follow signs saying “BAGGAGE” but then suddenly, at the end of what seems the tenth but is probably only the third escalator down, the baggage signs stop and there is just a train. WHAT TO DO? Which train? It is unclear. I was wandering around and these young Irish people said, “WTF where do we go?” I looked at them, they looked at me, we shrugged, and decided to get on the first train and get lost together. Thankfully, that train eventually led to baggage claim, where I easily found my suitcase-a little worse for the wear, and headed to find my ride to the hotel. She was looking for me and I was looking for her and finally, we met somewhere outside where we were continuously besieged by taxi drivers. We loaded my luggage onto a cart and headed in the direction of the hotel shuttle, which was not as easy as the hotel made it out, and finally, I just said fuck it, we’re taking a cab. Forty euros later and a very comfortable SUV cab ride, we were at the hotel, and checked in. We spent the night in a very generic (but clean with great customer service) airport hotel, shared Sprinkles cupcakes, which I got from a cupcake ATM at LAX, and crashed out completely happy and entirely exhausted.

The next morning, (my first morning in France!) after an amazing breakfast buffet at our hotel (hint, LOTS OF CHEESE AND BUTTER), my then colleague and I set off on the airport train to Gare Du Nord. Out of the station, we found a very rainy Paris. Umbrellas were out and open, raincoats and boots were one, puddles were forming and the streets took on a sheen of wet asphalt and the glitter that is being in Paris. Rain isn’t daunting when you are charmed by a city, by travel, and by a long-awaited visit with a friend. Into the next hotel on my itinerary, we went, just across the street from the station, and were shuttled into an ancient and tiny elevator to the eighth floor, found my room, and struggled with the lock a bit before Eleanor realized it was a double lock, and into the most glorious room in Paris. It wasn’t fancy. It wasn’t even nice by American standards, but it was VERY Parisienne with odd angles and a vintage shower that looked like it originated in the 1920s. Me being me, I flung open the windows and just gaped. On one side I had a view of the Gare du Nord with all its bustle and busyness on the other, I had the view of the Sacre Coeur and the French flag. Even Eleanor, who lives here, was stunned at my view. We spent some time photographing it from different angles, and laughing when we bumped into each other in the tight, quirky little room then Eleanor had to go to a meeting and left me to my own devices. I had thought to rest as I’d had little sleep and could have used it, but I was in the city of my dreams – PARIS.

I unpacked, grabbed my handbag and a raincoat, and set out to walk the streets of Paris. I walked with a colleague to the Gare du Nord, and she pointed me in the right direction, and as soon as she was gone, I ended up forgetting and just rambling the streets of Paris. I was happily lost in the city of my dreams. The rain had stopped and all that remained was the sheen of it, the occasional puddle, and the petrichor of all the rainy Parisienne afternoons. My boots squelched on wet and yellow leaves and I just rambled, or went on a flannerie, as they call it here. I practiced my poor French in stores, managed to get euros, met a man who was the road manager and percussionist for The Four Tops, bought pastries in a patisserie, got blisters, and got lost. I eventually found my way when I stopped to ask a woman, “Ou est la Gare du Nord?” and she said, “droit, droit, droit” (right, right, right). Following her instructions, I turned right at one intersection, right on another, and right one more time right onto the street of my hotel, where I got into the wacky elevator and to my room. I ended up with nasty blisters after three hours walking, two tartes framboise, a brush, and comb (I’d forgotten to pack mine), lots of bonhomie from the locals, lots of random photos of doors, door knobs, cobblestones, and people, and the obligatory selfie stick for the better shots I’d hoped to get later when I went sightseeing.

Les Routiers

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

In my travels through France, I ate at a lot of different places: bistros, table d’hotes, brasseries, cafes, restaurants, and yes, even a taco stand in Paris. One of the standouts, though, was a restaurant of a type I had heard of and had come to write about – Les Routiers. Routiers are what we here in the States would call a roadside diner. However, this is France, and a routier is anything but the typical American truck stop diner.

Some of the elements are there. These routiers are on roadsides in rural France where the truck and van drivers carrying crops into the city have their routes. The routiers are usually non-descript buildings with huge parking lots that are filled with cars, vans, trucks, trailers, and even tractors. French families on road trips are budget-savvy and know about les routiers. There is even a guide, much like the Michelin Guide, but this is specifically for the routiers. The guides exist mainly so that truckers know of places on their routes where they can rest, fill up with petrol, have a great meal on a budget, and maybe a drink or two. The most important and up-to-date guide is called Relais Routiers (basically, the French trucker network). Sometimes truckers are asleep in their vehicles in the parking lot, just as with American truck stops. It is the food that sets les routiers apart from their American counterpart. Fun fact: the truck drivers are also known as routiers. The routiers in these rural locations also serve as a form of community. They can be a watering hole, an informal town hall, the place where farmers can buy lottery tickets and cigarettes, or have a glass of beer or wine. The routier acts as a kind of social club for the rural communities they serve.

A routier will typically serve regional, hyper-local, and seasonal fare. There is usually one menu, written on a wall, and you can pick and choose from what is offered. When it runs out, you are out of luck. There are often several courses because this is France and a routier is considered a restaurant. Here in America, we use the word “restaurant” interchangeably to mean anything from a McDonald’s to a three-star Michelin dining experience, but in France, it has a specific meaning. The proprietors of these rural dining spots know their clientele expect good, hearty, well-cooked food on a budget. These are French truckers, after all, and are more than willing to drive out of their way if the Relais Routiers tells them a particular place has a great menu, service, and price.

I visited La Cabane Bambou, a routier in Brailly-Cornehotte on my way to Crécy. The routier is located at the crossroads between Hesdin-Abbeville and Crécy-Auxi le Château, so it was a perfect place to stop and get lunch before heading out on a day trip through the Crécy forest. The parking lot was full of trailers, some family cars, and plenty of white trucks and vans. I walked into a comfortable place with a bar in the front that served quite a few French and Belgian beers, wine, cigarettes, and lottery tickets. The menu was handwritten on a piece of paper entitled Menu a 17 E that hung on the wall. The menu was divided by courses with four or five selections on each course. La Cabane Bambou offered four courses at 17 euros a person. Yep, you heard that right, 17 euros for a four-course meal, including coffee and water. Wine, beer, or soft drinks were extra. The menu did offer cook-to-order specials, and those added a few euros to the bill, but still, it was very reasonable.

My lunch companion and I selected a table and gave our orders to the waitress, who quickly brought us coffee and water. My companion started with samon fumee avec asperges (smoked salmon and white asparagus) while I had bruschetta de chevre (a baguette slice topped with tomato, goat cheese, and ham). For entrees, I chose the carbonnade Flammande, a traditional Flemish beef stew made with beef, caramelized onions, beef broth, and dark local ale, and my companion chose the bavette a poivre (Pork flank in peppercorn sauce). There was a cheese course after that with a selection of local cheeses and fresh bread and butter, and for dessert, I had the tarte aux pommes and my companion had the moelleux au chocolat (chocolate cake).
Everything was delicious and fresh. The bruschetta, goat cheese, and tomato were enough to make a meal for me. The cheese was oozy, melty goodness, and paired perfectly with the thin slice of French ham and the acidity of the juicy red tomato. Frankly, I was surprised that there was a tomato so flavorful and juicy in rural Northern France in October. Tomatoes thrive on sunshine, and being from California, I tend to be a little biased. While not as rich a red as a California tomato, the slice that topped my bruschetta was surprising in its depth of flavor. Combined with the cheese, ham, and crusty baguette, it was heaven in a bite.

While that appetizer was great, the star of my meal was the carbonnade flamande, which I had heard about but never tasted. The dish originated in Belgium, a near neighbor to Northern France. The recipe, it is told, was invented by workers in the coal mines, who marinated their leftover meat in beer and then grilled it over coal. The name carbonade refers to that grilling over coal. The recipe has been around since at least the eighteenth century. I was excited to try it as I grew up eating one of the recipes of the Mexican silver miners – enchiladas mineras, tacos, and burritos, foods invented by or for miners. There is a wealth of food we have that was created to nourish the hard-working people who worked in often dangerous conditions in mines. I was eager to try the Belgian/Northern French version of miner’s food.

When my plate was brought to the table, the dish emanated the rich aroma of slow-cooked beef. Also on the plate were the ubiquitous pommes frites and a salad made with local greens. The beef was braised to perfection, succulent, and infused with the essence of caramelized onions and herbs. The ale lent a deep, malty undertone to the dish, balancing the sweetness of the onions and enhancing the savory notes of the beef. The tender meat had absorbed the ale-infused sauce, making each bite a delectable experience. The crispy pommes frites made from hyper-local potatoes (literally, the potato field is just across the road) were a perfect accompaniment to the carbonnade flamande. I found myself dipping them into the leftover sauce from the beef, just to soak up the last delicious bit of it. The portion sizes at La Cabane Bambou are hearty, and I barely had room for the dessert, but I sure didn’t want to miss the tarte aux pommes.
The tarte was just as wonderful as I had hoped and well worth stuffing myself for. The local apples, just in season, were the highlight. I tasted the piquancy and fruitiness of the apple, the butter in the pastry, and the faintly smoky taste of the light char on the roasted apples. It was, in a word, glorious and a perfect ending to my first meal in a routier. It won’t be my last. I have plans to go back to France and schedule a road trip around every routier just to write about all the glorious local and seasonal food in the countryside.

Checking In

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

I’ve been horribly remiss in updating this blog. Illness in the family, a heavy study schedule, research for a story I am working on, and a full-time job have me busy and distracted. I am currently in a Master of Arts program at ASU and it’s far more intense than I thought it would be but I love it. I have been reading tons, studying a lot, and sometimes pulling out my hair (thanks Old English and Classical Rhetoric). I will probably come up for air sometime in February of 2023. As to what I am working on well..dryads, squirrels, and my old homies are working their way into what I think will be a novel. There are gardens, lots of botany and horticulture, climate change, and immigration. There are also tree monsters…

Maybe a monster…maybe Cipactli

Neurogastronomy, Food, & Memory

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

I am reading about neurogastronomy in the book Neurogastronomy: How the Brain Creates Flavor and Why by Gordon Shepherd. Neurogastronomy is a science I did not know existed until I began working on a capstone paper on food writing in literature. Of particular interest to me was the chapter on the famous madeleine passage in Swann’s Way. Shepherd’s easy-to-understand, yet scientific breakdown of what Proust was experiencing as he wrote about the memory of Combray really made me understand that evocative literary moment in a different way. This is fascinating as the chapter breaks down sections of Proust’s writings on how the tea and madeleine experience triggered a childhood memory. According to Shepherd, “The narrator’s mouthful of crumb-laden tea thus activates a range of receptors tuned to the different volatile components, leading to impulse discharges that carry the information to the brain” (Shepherd, 2013, p. 176). Shepherd goes on to state:

It is this flavor image that was recognized by Proust’s brain, at first only indistinctly, as being part of a more complex memory that initially seemed beyond recall. The flavor image of the tea-soaked madeleine is thus metonymic for the complex multisensory image of the town of Combray.

Shepherd’s analysis of the neurological process identifying this complex memory disputes the idea of instant, involuntary recall and states that “our cognitive mechanisms have a gestalt quality in which we perceive and recall things as integrated wholes” (Shepherd, 2013, p. 180).

While it is impossible to have the same olfactory experience when reading literature, it appears that reading about food can still create a type of visual food memory, rather than one based on taste or smell. The reader creates those flavor “images” based on their own memories, desires, and experiences when they read about food.

In another book on food and how we relate to it, The Omnivorous Mind: Our Evolving Relationship with Food, “Food memories are important not just because they concern sustenance but also because they have extensive connections to other memories of people, places, and things” (Allen, 2012, p. 152). I believe that the connections we make to food memories in literature, even without the sense of smell of a meal, are important and use a similar process, which is why food in literature can be so haunting.

Starting Over

Posted on by Gina Ruiz

I decided to move my existing blog over to Squarespace and forgot to back it up. Guess I will be starting over, which is fine. I wanted a clean slate and this gives me the opportunity to re-write posts I wasn’t happy with, better define what this blog is about and categorize things a little better. Bear with me, please. It will all turn out okay in the end. Meanwhile, *Doña Lupe’s Kitchen* will still reside with the old host. Some new content will be posted there, such as cookbook reviews and the occasional food post, though not much else as my focus has shifted to academic work pertaining to food writing in literature. I am also working on a novel.

UPDATE 7/19/2023 – Well, I moved the whole thing back and decided to rebuild it since I am working on my digital portfolio for my M.A. program at ASU. Whoops!