Dolores Huerta at the table

In Mexican-American working-class families in California, meals aren't divided into appetizer-main-dessert but revolve around *masa* (nixtamalized corn dough) and the *olla de frijoles* that simmers permanently on the stove. Warm tortillas are filled, a big pot is shared, and everyone helps themselves: it's a cuisine of sharing, thrifty, easy to carry on the boycott routes, and fuels the picket lines.

Corn soaked in lime water (nixtamal) becomes masa, the heart of the entire Chicana table: tortillas, tamales, atole. With chile (dried or fresh), it forms the gustatory backbone of the cuisine that Dolores Huerta shared with the families of farmworkers.