About the Author

Sarah Portnoy is an Assistant Professor of Teaching in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Southern California. She has been researching, teaching and publishing about Latino cuisine, culinary culture, and food policy for the past several years. She published a chapter in Global Latin America co-authored with food historian Jeffrey Pilcher, an entry on authenticity in food in The Encyclopedia of Food Issues, and an entry on Latino Cuisine in the Oxford Bibliographies in Latino Studies. You can visit her website at sarahjportnoy.com.

Reviews

From the wonderful food diversity of Mexican Los Angeles; to the bitter street food battles over the tamale wagons and the loncheros; and into the food swamps of low income Latino neighborhoods where fast food and food marts (better known as liquor stores) prevail, Sarah Portnoy effectively takes us into the world of the Latino food environment. She allows us to experience the tastes of Oaxacan and Yucatan specialties. She documents the struggles to create an alternative food justice approach in the gardens and urban farms of South LA and Boyle Heights. She has us get to know the Alta California cuisine created by young Mexican-American chefs. And she helps us understand that food justice and food sovereignty have their own deep roots in the Latino connection to food – and to social justice.
*Robert Gottlieb, author of Global Cities: Urban Environments in Los Angeles, Hong Kong, and China*

A knowledgeable and humane portrait of the rich culinary cultures as well as the ongoing struggles for food justice and dietary health in Latino Los Angeles.
*Jeffrey M. Pilcher, author of Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food*

Portnoy gives us a beautifully written and nuanced account of food, health, and culture in Latina/o Los Angeles. She captures the wealth of Mexicana/o and Latina/o food knowledge and traditions as well as the creative ways communities are challenging the inequality that leads to food deserts in working-class communities.
*Enrique C. Ochoa, author of Feeding Mexico and co-editor of Latino Los Angeles*