Houston’s Diverse Food Culture

By Isabel Herrick

Cummings Elementary School sits alongside South Kirkwood Boulevard in the Alief School District of Houston. On any given day, you might see a sign out front with messages for the kids and parents. My favorite phrase was “Thank you Tortilleria San Luis.” This phrase points to the strong Mexican and Central American influence on Houston and its food culture. But the languages spoken in this area of Houston are not limited to English and Spanish. If you look at the Cummings Elementary School webpage, you will see translations for a number of other languages, including Chinese, Vietnamese, Arabic, Burmese, Urdu, and Yoruba.

In fact, the International District of Houston is only a few minutes’ drive from Cummings Elementary. Perhaps you might have driven through this area before without realizing it. One obvious indicator is the abundance of street names printed in Mandarin Chinese instead of English. And if you are looking for a bite to eat, you will find food from regions all over the world.

The presence of such an ethnically diverse population brings with it a diverse food culture: a culture with different cooking traditions, histories, and agricultural practices. My experience working as Brighter Bites intern with the enthusiastic and eager Cummings Elementary students for several weeks was amazing and enriching. In a city of over 2 million residents, our collective gastronomical history is vastly diverse; food has always been a way to embrace our different backgrounds and, at the same time, it can be a powerful tool to bring people together.

After talking to some of the elementary school teachers during lunchtime, I learned that, for most of the kids, their favorite aspect of the Brighter Bites experience is bringing a recipe card home each Tuesday to share with their family. For the students, the ability to share this new healthful information is empowering.

It can sometimes take a leap of faith to try a food that is unfamiliar and or prepared by a stranger. A huge shout out goes to the Cummings elementary school students for being super brave and for their overwhelming willingness to try the Brighter Bites samples. Some of the favorites were the Pumpkin Spice and Everything Nice Smoothie and the Popping Pomegranate Salsa.

Isabel Herrick is pursuing a degree in environmental studies. She completed a Brighter Bites internship in Houston, TX in the fall of 2017.