Mine is a family of writers- myself, my children, my mother, and my sister. My sister, a self-confessed foodie, pens a blog called “Tomatoes on the Vine” and her latest entry was about a simple, yet tasty recipe for Empanadas.

Food is notorious for triggering memories. The smell of certain dishes takes us back to childhood. The smell of goodies baking in the oven or a pot of chicken soup on the stove- instantly transports us to a time and place where we felt safe and warm. I eat fried chicken and think of my father standing over the stove frying three or four pieces in a deep cast iron skillet, fried chicken that he later baked in the oven to crispy yet moist perfection. Nowadays I make a dish in the crock pot and remember the creative recipes my mother tried in the slow cooker. Much like me, she was an adventurer on safari through the cookbooks, forging her way through new and uncharted crock pot recipes, some of which were met with much success and others….not so much.

As I am reading my sister’s blog on Empanada’s I am taken back to Houston 1985. I was nineteen and living with my boyfriend in a very small studio apartment behind a large white house in the arts district of Montrose. During WWII housing popped up all over Houston to keep families and military personnel close to the port. Behind this large white house on a quiet brick lined street, was a large aviary and next to the aviary was a row of 4 studio apartments. The rent was cheap $275 a month including all utilities. Our apartment consisted of a small living room with a nook for the kitchen, a closet and a bathroom. The kitchen was a tiled corner with a one door refrigerator (the freezer was on the inside and always iced up) and the smallest oven/stovetop I had ever seen. There was a counter with a sink and two cabinets. It was cheap, it was cozy, and it was ours. There were stray cats outside and at times mice inside. The apartment was old and located next to hundreds of birds so of course there were mice and cats!

We were poor at the time, my boyfriend went to school and I worked at the mall. Groceries were often care packages sent by my mother and whatever I could conjure up. Empanadas were an easy staple to fix since my mother ALWAYS sent me a box of Jiffy Baking Mix. I worked with a woman who told me how to make them. She explained to me that I could fill them with virtually anything and so I did. I filled them with rice, potatoes, beef and chicken. With each attempt I grew more daring- varying the spices and creating breakfast empanadas and finally dessert empanadas- filled with canned fruit filling. It was an adventure, it was food, it was hot food, and at times when needed, portable food.

As I grew into adulthood money and groceries became more easily accessible and my desire to make little meat filled pies waned. I cooked mainstream dishes like the majority of society and eventually forgot my very humble beginnings in a tiny little kitchen on a tiny little stove until my sister wrote her blog. It was at that moment when I poured over her recipe and looked at her pictures that I remembered there was a time in my early adulthood that I was the Empanada Queen of Montrose.

-Lori Cumberledge