Grilling at the Grijalva’s
Back in the 1980s, I grew up in a very small desert community consisting of less than 40 families about an hour and half east of El Paso, Texas. We lived at the base of the Guadalupe Mountains, which is the tallest point in the state. My father was stationed there and worked at a compressor station for the El Paso Natural Gas Company. It was a quiet kind of life.
Each week, my parents, my older brother, younger brother, and I would have Sunday Dinner. Every once in a while, we would have company join us. I particularly loved when family from El Paso would make the hour and a half trek for a visit because that meant time with my cousins. Over the years, our interests changed from playing with Barbie dolls to taking rides one-by-one on the back of my older brother’s dirt bike through the trails surrounding our community. We also spent a lot of time listening and dancing to old tunes on the boombox while watching the adults play Huachas, a game similar to cornhole, in which large washers are tossed at an aluminum can dug into the ground.
On Sundays, my dad would provide the protein for the meal by grilling outside. He would usually prep the meat on Saturday for grilling the following day. His grilled chicken was by far my favorite. My parents would make their special BBQ sauce to slather over the chicken. I remember biting into juicy goodness that tasted of mesquite smoke and a bit of char. It was just so scrumptious!
My mom would make homemade flour tortillas, and to this day, I still don’t know anyone who can make them better. She mixed the dough by hand, which included lard, making them extra yummy. I always had the responsibility of masterfully tucking the dough with my fingers until each dough ball was perfectly sized. Then, wielding her wooden rolling pin, my mom strategically rolled out each ball into perfectly circular tortillas. She cooked each tortilla on a piping hot comal, a round cast-iron griddle. After cooking the tortillas, she always made a ‘baby’ tortilla that all of us would take a bite from pre-dinner. Spread with butter, it was so soft and melted in your mouth.
As my dad and brothers sat at the dinner table, my mom and I would serve the plates. Like most Mexican families, we always prayed before eating. Back then, our prayers consisted of what was happening in our personal lives. Now when we have Sunday Dinner together, we find ourselves praying more about current events in our world that we find troubling.
During dinner, my parents always made sure that we, the kids, participated in whatever we were discussing, whether it was about school, our friends, our extracurricular activities, music, movies, etc. I remember as teenagers, my older brother and I would just want to eat and not talk so much, but my parents always had a way of pulling us into the conversation. When stories were told, it was usually about how my parents were when they were our age -- what a troublemaker my dad was and how my mom was both feminine and a jock. The story that was most repeated was how my parents met in high school. My dad was attracted to her first, but she just thought he was a vago (a thug). One day at school, they were both turning a corner in opposite directions. They bumped into each other causing my mom to drop her books, and my dad picked them up for her. The rest is history. Each time, this story was met with a mixture of smiles, rolling eyes, and future longing for a similar type of love.
And after filling our bellies, we each had a role in clearing the plates from the dinner table and cleaning up the kitchen. My mom would always supervise while putting away the leftover food, my brothers cleared and cleaned the table, and I washed the dishes. We all worked together until everything was put away -- well, all except my dad, who would kick back, enjoying a beer after grilling all day.
It was a great time in our lives. We were a young family, and my parents did an excellent job of bringing us up to understand that family relations are what’s most important. It was just the five of us; no spouses or kids. Looking back on it all, life was just a little simpler back then. I miss that.
Now, when all of our schedules happen to align by the grace of God, and we manage to gather for Sunday Dinner, it’s the same, but different. There are so many more of us, as we all have our own little families now. It’s loud and a bit chaotic, but at some point during the dinner, I always witness my parents’ pride in what they have created -- a family that shares with each other, over homemade food that was prepared with so much love.
By Veronica Grijalva Magalski
A native Texan, Veronica graduated with a degree in Bilingual Education from the University of Texas at El Paso in 2001. Her first nine years in teaching took place in El Paso and Austin, Texas. Then after wanting to experience the international teaching world, she found herself in both Dalian, China, and Monterrey, Mexico. She finally returned to El Paso where she left the teaching profession after fifteen years of being in the classroom, teaching primarily middle school students. Now she is a crafter, and spends her time volunteering for various charitable causes.