I’ve always loved my culture from the different ways we pronounce words to the folklorico and our random parties where someone played the Venezuelan ukelele. One night, I told my mom, “Can we make Hajacas?” Hajacas are like tamales full of flavor in every part of its being. The masa is made with oil cooked with seasonings and the filling is a bowl of diversity: pork, chicken, beef and turkey. I know what you’re thinking–this sounds delicious! And it is–but it’s not about the food that makes it special.
My mom went to the store, bought the banana leaves, and here came the adventure. Every day after my Mom’s shift, my mom, my dad and I all went to the kitchen to prepare the hajacas. The kitchen was alive and we were forced to conversate, be in each other’s way and help each other out all at the same time. Lighting the leaves to the fire and watching it change colors ignited my curiosity too. Why we never did this. Making food together as a family, and why it took me saying I wanted to make it happen? When my family finally finished the masa, cutting the carrots, bell peppers, and turkey into bite sized pieces, then cutting the banana leaves into the perfect size so that we could assemble the hajacas came
Step 1: Oil inside the pan
Step 2: Look up at the TV, usually the Laker game
Step 3: Grab a handful of masa and roll it into a ball
Step 4: Flatten it into a circle in the banana leaf
Step 5: Fill with your choice of meat
Step 6; Decorate
Step 7: Carefully wrap together and hand it to mom
Every time I hand the hajaca to my mom she would inspect it and make sure that it was tight enough so water wouldn’t ruin it. There was always something to fix! Every night we fought over what channel we would watch until I just picked one. My favorite part of the whole experience was laughing over whose hajaca came out the ugliest–always my dad’s, who claimed he was great at cooking, even though I almost never saw him in the kitchen
Then came the day when all the hajacas were put in the pot of whom my mom bought pupusas and tamales from. Each year we would end up with over 100 hajacas that we would end up eating over the year. If nobody wanted to cook, have Hajacas! If I wanted to feel at home, Hajacas! If I wanted to taste culture–Hajacas! And when they finally run out I can almost taste them when I watch a Laker game. Staying up at 3 a.m and laughing. I can especially taste them on the night I eat cheese and olives, because the part I hated became the part I loved the most and miss. The warm olives in the center of the hajaca my mom made for me.