[Music]
[Applause]
if you are not from the border perhaps
you think that there is a distinct
division between Mexico and the United
States but as I have lived in that
region where Spanish and English
overlapped I can tell you that that is
not the case
I’m from the Rio Grande Valley I was
born and raised on a working cattle
ranch on the US side of the border and I
married my husband who was born and
raised on a working cattle ranch on the
Mexican side of the border in the state
of thumb my Lepus and we now live on a
working cattle ranch on the US side of
although we were raised on opposite
sides of the Rio Grande we often speak
about participating and the shared
experiences of our binational community
I often muse that a fly could have
landed on his lunch table in Reynosa and
very easily have made it to the dinner
table at my grandparents house in
Edinburg Texas we often speak of our
shared experiences of watching the same
television shows or listening to the
same radio jingles we both agreed that
we really liked the Pink Panther cartoon
because a Pink Panther never said
anything and it was easily understood in
any language as a food writer I have
spent my career telling the story of Tex
Mex telling the story of our border food
but when I first began I started reading
all of the great food writers that we
are familiar with here in the Union
United States
I read MFK Fisher and James Beard Julia
Child’s and Fannie Farmer but our
binational cuisine didn’t quite fit
their mold
so then I started reading about all of
the great food riders from the Mexican
side of the border such as Josefina
Velazquez early on saw Juan Ynez de la
Cruz Bernardino de saga on and of course
there’s always a Louisville libro de
but our by national cuisine didn’t quite
fit their mold either so I decided in
that moment I was going to become the
authority on tex-mex but I needed to
find a resource that would enable me to
tell the story better and I found one
mother nature was the best teacher I
ever had regarding cuisine nature taught
me about our region in ways that people
from elsewhere could not by learning
about our native plants and animals I
could see what the Aboriginal tribes
would have eaten before the
conquistadores the colonialists and the
settlers arrived by learning about our
weather I could see what types of crops
were appropriate for our region it turns
out where dryland crop area and we do
much better with sorghum and with cotton
and obviously beef cattle our natural
environment plays host to airborne yeast
and fungi and bacteria and that in turn
had an effect on the way that we store
food and what we would find in our
pantry and what we find in our pantry
our ingredients and ingredients turn
into recipes and recipes turn into
cuisine so these are the types of things
nature taught me for instance how many
really great Tex Mex traditional Tex Mex
salads have we enjoyed not very many
we’re meat and cheese people in the days
before we had electricity to pump water
and irrigate our crops we relied solely
on rainwater and it takes less rain to
raise a cow than it does a salad crop so
these are the types of things that I
learned my brother
an amazing painter and one day I stopped
by his studio to see what he was working
on and I saw this painting this painting
right here and I was absolutely floored
I was stunned I was inspired
it’s a masterwork I could not figure out
what it was I liked about this painting
so much I stared at it for hours
studying it trying to figure out what my
connection to this painting was and I I
finally had to ask my brother I said
what inspired you to paint this and he
answered me in a very little brotherly
way I don’t know well I didn’t know
either but I had to figure out what my
connection was to this amazing painting
of turkey vultures flying in a circle in
a deep blue South Texas sky I know what
you’re thinking turkey vultures are
nasty nuisances nobody likes them they
nourish themselves on the decaying flesh
and rotting bones of others there is not
a single piece of protein that is immune
to the interest of a hungry vulture
everybody hates them heck even other
birds attack them nobody likes them
turkey vultures are members of the
Cathar today family which is also known
as New World vultures and they are
native to almost every part of the
American continent now did you know that
a vulture can smell a dead mouse under a
pile of leaves over a mile away they
have amazing sensory abilities that help
them survive they do not waste energy
they are caloric cheapskates at night we
see them roosting in the trees and they
lower their body temperature so they do
not waste energy keeping themselves warm
and in the morning we see the
on top of rooftops and telephone poles
with their wings spread open wide like
solar panels so they can collect up
every drop of that warm morning Sun and
as they fly they don’t even flap their
wings because that wastes energy they
simply soar along on air currents and
mountain updrafts John James Audubon
noticed something very particular about
vultures he said they had amazing
memories he said that if we dared to
shoot at a vulture not only would they
remember you but they would remember the
horse you rode in on humans arrived on
the American continent 13,000 years ago
by crossing the Bering Strait the frozen
Bering Strait now that theory is debated
by archeologists and anthropologist but
there is no debate and no question who
is watching us when we got here and
that’s right my friends it was the
vultures they have been watching us and
they remember us since time immemorial
they know us well the people of South
and Central America figured out the
symbolism of the vulture long before I
did on the Aztec calendar we have the
image of books got Watley the vulture
who symbolizes wisdom on the coats of
arms of bolivia chile colombia and
ecuador we have a new world vulture we
have a new world vulture on the flags of
Ecuador and Bolivia in North America
among the Native American tribes there
are many legends of the vultures
Cherokees call them peace Eagles as
vultures do not kill sharing our land
with vultures is a very large but quiet
part of our shared experience here on
the American continent seeing a vulture
links me to everyone on this continent
from the southernmost point of Argentina
all the way past the border of Canada
now here’s some personal trivia the
symbol of our nation the bald eagle I’ve
only seen it once in my life I was in
Cincinnati but every day when I’m at the
ranch when I look up in the sky I see a
vulture their presence is part of my
everyday life in South Texas we don’t
have a single word to describe what it’s
like to live in a community that spans
both sides of the Rio Grande but we do
have the shared experience of human
culture just as a fence stretches across
an open pasture our human culture
traverses our continent the way that I
write about food follows the flight path
of a vulture ignoring and overlooking
politics the highly cognizant of
resources there is no political boundary
that is an obstacle for a bird there is
no wall that could be built high enough
that could keep out a vulture the
vulture would simply soar over it every
aspect of our human culture cuisine
music art literature and dance rises
above all that has been constructed
artificially human culture can and does
exist in a plane well above politics I
see this phenomenon
every day in my binational community
through food through language through
friendship through family relationships
and through a deep abiding sense of
community symbolized by my brother’s
painting the spirit of our human culture
transcends the borders of our American
continent and no matter what happens in
my by ‘national community I am reminded
of our shared experiences every time I
look to the sky thank you [Applause]
[Applause]
if you are not from the border perhaps
you think that there is a distinct
division between Mexico and the United
States but as I have lived in that
region where Spanish and English
overlapped I can tell you that that is
not the case
I’m from the Rio Grande Valley I was
born and raised on a working cattle
ranch on the US side of the border and I
married my husband who was born and
raised on a working cattle ranch on the
Mexican side of the border in the state
of thumb my Lepus and we now live on a
working cattle ranch on the US side of
although we were raised on opposite
sides of the Rio Grande we often speak
about participating and the shared
experiences of our binational community
I often muse that a fly could have
landed on his lunch table in Reynosa and
very easily have made it to the dinner
table at my grandparents house in
Edinburg Texas we often speak of our
shared experiences of watching the same
television shows or listening to the
same radio jingles we both agreed that
we really liked the Pink Panther cartoon
because a Pink Panther never said
anything and it was easily understood in
any language as a food writer I have
spent my career telling the story of Tex
Mex telling the story of our border food
but when I first began I started reading
all of the great food writers that we
are familiar with here in the Union
United States
I read MFK Fisher and James Beard Julia
Child’s and Fannie Farmer but our
binational cuisine didn’t quite fit
their mold
so then I started reading about all of
the great food riders from the Mexican
side of the border such as Josefina
Velazquez early on saw Juan Ynez de la
Cruz Bernardino de saga on and of course
there’s always a Louisville libro de
but our by national cuisine didn’t quite
fit their mold either so I decided in
that moment I was going to become the
authority on tex-mex but I needed to
find a resource that would enable me to
tell the story better and I found one
mother nature was the best teacher I
ever had regarding cuisine nature taught
me about our region in ways that people
from elsewhere could not by learning
about our native plants and animals I
could see what the Aboriginal tribes
would have eaten before the
conquistadores the colonialists and the
settlers arrived by learning about our
weather I could see what types of crops
were appropriate for our region it turns
out where dryland crop area and we do
much better with sorghum and with cotton
and obviously beef cattle our natural
environment plays host to airborne yeast
and fungi and bacteria and that in turn
had an effect on the way that we store
food and what we would find in our
pantry and what we find in our pantry
our ingredients and ingredients turn
into recipes and recipes turn into
cuisine so these are the types of things
nature taught me for instance how many
really great Tex Mex traditional Tex Mex
salads have we enjoyed not very many
we’re meat and cheese people in the days
before we had electricity to pump water
and irrigate our crops we relied solely
on rainwater and it takes less rain to
raise a cow than it does a salad crop so
these are the types of things that I
learned my brother
an amazing painter and one day I stopped
by his studio to see what he was working
on and I saw this painting this painting
right here and I was absolutely floored
I was stunned I was inspired
it’s a masterwork I could not figure out
what it was I liked about this painting
so much I stared at it for hours
studying it trying to figure out what my
connection to this painting was and I I
finally had to ask my brother I said
what inspired you to paint this and he
answered me in a very little brotherly
way I don’t know well I didn’t know
either but I had to figure out what my
connection was to this amazing painting
of turkey vultures flying in a circle in
a deep blue South Texas sky I know what
you’re thinking turkey vultures are
nasty nuisances nobody likes them they
nourish themselves on the decaying flesh
and rotting bones of others there is not
a single piece of protein that is immune
to the interest of a hungry vulture
everybody hates them heck even other
birds attack them nobody likes them
turkey vultures are members of the
Cathar today family which is also known
as New World vultures and they are
native to almost every part of the
American continent now did you know that
a vulture can smell a dead mouse under a
pile of leaves over a mile away they
have amazing sensory abilities that help
them survive they do not waste energy
they are caloric cheapskates at night we
see them roosting in the trees and they
lower their body temperature so they do
not waste energy keeping themselves warm
and in the morning we see the
on top of rooftops and telephone poles
with their wings spread open wide like
solar panels so they can collect up
every drop of that warm morning Sun and
as they fly they don’t even flap their
wings because that wastes energy they
simply soar along on air currents and
mountain updrafts John James Audubon
noticed something very particular about
vultures he said they had amazing
memories he said that if we dared to
shoot at a vulture not only would they
remember you but they would remember the
horse you rode in on humans arrived on
the American continent 13,000 years ago
by crossing the Bering Strait the frozen
Bering Strait now that theory is debated
by archeologists and anthropologist but
there is no debate and no question who
is watching us when we got here and
that’s right my friends it was the
vultures they have been watching us and
they remember us since time immemorial
they know us well the people of South
and Central America figured out the
symbolism of the vulture long before I
did on the Aztec calendar we have the
image of books got Watley the vulture
who symbolizes wisdom on the coats of
arms of bolivia chile colombia and
ecuador we have a new world vulture we
have a new world vulture on the flags of
Ecuador and Bolivia in North America
among the Native American tribes there
are many legends of the vultures
Cherokees call them peace Eagles as
vultures do not kill sharing our land
with vultures is a very large but quiet
part of our shared experience here on
the American continent seeing a vulture
links me to everyone on this continent
from the southernmost point of Argentina
all the way past the border of Canada
now here’s some personal trivia the
symbol of our nation the bald eagle I’ve
only seen it once in my life I was in
Cincinnati but every day when I’m at the
ranch when I look up in the sky I see a
vulture their presence is part of my
everyday life in South Texas we don’t
have a single word to describe what it’s
like to live in a community that spans
both sides of the Rio Grande but we do
have the shared experience of human
culture just as a fence stretches across
an open pasture our human culture
traverses our continent the way that I
write about food follows the flight path
of a vulture ignoring and overlooking
politics the highly cognizant of
resources there is no political boundary
that is an obstacle for a bird there is
no wall that could be built high enough
that could keep out a vulture the
vulture would simply soar over it every
aspect of our human culture cuisine
music art literature and dance rises
above all that has been constructed
artificially human culture can and does
exist in a plane well above politics I
see this phenomenon
every day in my binational community
through food through language through
friendship through family relationships
and through a deep abiding sense of
community symbolized by my brother’s
painting the spirit of our human culture
transcends the borders of our American
continent and no matter what happens in
my by ‘national community I am reminded
of our shared experiences every time I
look to the sky thank you [Applause]
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