An interview with Lily Ramirez-Foran

I am working on a series of newsletters about Mexican-authored cookbooks, and I am delighted to introduce my first interviewee. Lily Ramirez-Foran is the owner of Dublin’s Picado Mexican store and cookery school, a frequent guest on Weekend AM Virgin Media Television, writer of the popular blog, ‘A Mexican Cook’, and soon-to-be author of ‘Taco’ published by Blasta Books. Lily has been living and cooking in Ireland for two decades, and her recipes have been featured in the Irish Times. A norteña by birth (she was born in Monterrey), Lily comes from a long line of tortilla bakers by trade; her father had a tortilleria in the small town of Mante in Tamaulipas. She is a weaver of words and la maga de la cocina, bringing together her homeland and adopted home in the most delicious of ways (this is a woman who adds Irish black pudding to her tacos). I am delighted to be able to celebrate her talents here.

Can you tell me about your journey to published author? I know it was hard for you to get a book deal despite having a high profile in Ireland, including TV appearances and a clear command of your specialist area. 

About 10 years ago, Irish publishing houses went through a period of commissioning quite a few cookbooks from food bloggers; the commercial success of Donal Skehan paved the way for other food bloggers to get deals, but although my blog was quite popular, most Irish publishing houses were completely inexperienced handling non-Irish writers. World cuisine titles were thin on the ground, and those who are there are titles written by Irish authors and not by international writers. There is an inherent lack of awareness when it comes to cultural diversity in publishing. In fairness, diversity in Ireland is quite a new phenomenon, and it takes a long time to shift organisational culture, and that reflects on the attitudes of commission editors and sales departments across the industry.

I was taken on as a client by a well-known and highly successful literary agent. She loved my writing style and was very enthusiastic about finding a book deal for me. I wrote a proposal, did the market research, collated pictures and marketing figures. It was a professional and very solid proposal, away it went, and to our surprise, we got rejection after rejection. 

That’s when I realised that added to that cultural inexperience in publishing houses, publishing is a business, and although commission editors were excited, sales departments were hesitant, as they saw Mexican food as too niche and my social media reach not large enough. No amount of marketing research seemed to convince the accountants that betting on Mexican food was a good thing.

The meetings always went the same way, read your proposal, love your style, how many followers do you have on your social media channels? After two deals fell threw for the same reasons. I decided to move my focus to the business side of my venture and concentrate on that. I was disappointed and deflated, and I stopped writing for a while as it felt like no matter how good I was and how dedicated I was to my craft, if I did not have 100K followers on Instagram, I wasn’t going to get a deal. Those times where talent would get you something was gone, and all the publishing houses cared about was social media following.

After a while, I returned to writing. I am often asked to write recipes for Irish media, I’ve been working on television for a few years now, and I’ve built up a great brand from scratch. My classes and supper clubs before the pandemic had 6-month waiting lists, but Irish publishing houses still believe that Mexican food is a niche, so the lack of diversity in bookshelves is a direct consequence of the short-minded attitudes of publishing houses.

This problem didn’t go unnoticed to one of Ireland’s most prolific cookbook editors, Kristin Jensen, who also happens to be an author of two books herself and a great friend of mine. During the pandemic, she had time to look around and see how many cookbooks she had edited in her 20-year career and how repetitive they were. Same voices over and over again.

The lack of diversity in her bookshelves shocked her, and she decided to do something about it. She texted me in early January to set up a video call. She told me her plan to shake up how cookbooks were being published and asked me to be her brand new publishing house’s, Nine Bean Rows, first author. I was both honoured and amazed. I had lost so much confidence in the process of trying to get published that it took me a couple of weeks to understand that I was finally getting a book deal with the bonus of being able to work with a friend I respect and admire, who has a ton of experience both writing and editing Cookbooks!

I handed over my manuscript at the end of June, and the process has been so amazing and the presales so good. I’ve been asked to do a second book, this time what we call a ‘big’ book, 100 recipes, photos, the lot. I laugh out loud when I think it’s all famine or feast. My Blasta book TACOS is coming out in Spring 2022, and I am so excited to share it with the world!

You are following in the footsteps of other brilliant food writers who are female and have Mexican heritage. (I’m so excited about your book!) How does it feel to represent your cuisine and country in print?

In a chat with the Mexican Ambassador to Ireland, Miguel Malfavon, a couple of years ago, he said to me we were all ambassadors of our country. That stayed with me. I’m honoured to share Mexico’s food, history and culture with people in Ireland. I’ve always taken this task seriously. From day one, the weight of that responsibility felt heavy on me. It has made me better. It has pushed me beyond just sharing my mother’s recipes and my grandmother’s tips. I do a lot of research; I test my recipes dozens of times. I read other authors. I have a passion for history and how cultural, social and political events affect and shaped a dish. My bookshelves are filled with the many voices before me that have shaped how I cook and teach. From the descriptions of the rich tables of Moctezuma to the incredible XVII century recipes of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz to the books of Diana Kennedy, Martha Chapa and the modern take on Mexican food from chefs like Enrique Olvera and Guillermo Gonzales, to the playful dishes of Martha Ortiz, they all sit on my shoulder and whisper their wisdom as I work. Being Mexican and cooking Mexican is a huge responsibility, and I feel incredibly privileged to be able to do so.

Can you tell us about your book- its design and feel?

The book is called TACOS, and it is the first of the BLASTA books series (‘blasta’ is tasty in Irish). They are a series of small books designed to bring more diverse voices to the table. Small books, big voices. The books will be A5 in format, with roughly 75 pages each, around 25 to 30 recipes depending on the author, edited by Kristin Jensen, beautifully illustrated by Dublin artist Nicky Hooper and designed by Jane Matthews. The all-female team behind the Blasta series has some serious kudos in the industry, and it has been an absolute dream to work with them. I’ve learnt so much in the process! The books will be hard covered, colourful and just beautiful.

Have you enjoyed focusing on one aspect (tacos) of Mexican food culture?

Due to the size and the periodical nature of the Blasta books series, we had to use a theme for the book. Mexican food as a whole is so vast; it would be impossible to condense it. We felt tacos was a great way to introduce people to Mexican food. Everybody loves tacos; they’re versatile, delicious, convivial and just plain joyful! Writing a book on such a convivial topic during a pandemic, where we spent most of our time confined and with little social interaction, was a way to spread hope.

I’m a very individual writer. I use my speaking voice and tone to write, so expect the book to be cheeky, funny and personal. I explain in the introduction how fitting it was to write about tacos for me, how the recipes in the book have little rhyme or reason. They are just recipes that mean something to me; they tell a story of growth, loss and grief. While I was writing the book, I lost my dad to cancer. I also nearly lost my mother and a beloved sister to Covid while stuck in Dublin, unable to travel. The recipes end up a homage to love and family. They tell a very condensed life story through my plates—the journey from Mexico through Ireland with bits of life in between.

You are a proud norteña. What makes your home region of Mexico so distinct? I feel that quite a lot of Mexican food coverage focuses on the southern half of the country.

The way I see it, Mexico is 47 times the size of Ireland; let that sink in…. food is so incredibly regionalised. Even in Mexico, we don’t know as much about the culinary traditions from each other’s regions. It is a vast cuisine, and only a small amount of that vastness translates between regions and even a smaller amount of that is known outside the country. Oaxaca is all the rage now, but until you taste a ‘hen zacahuil’ from the Huasteca Tamaulipeca, you haven’t truly tasted the best of Mexican food yet.

When I think about the food of Monterrey, I always think of cabrito ( it means goat, which I included in the book), but what about the more hardcore dishes, like fritada or cuajitos (soups made with blood and offal from sheep and pigs)? The extreme heat of this semi-arid land, with harsh winters and prolonged droughts, leaves little choice for farming. With high mountains where oranges and apples grow, we have a history of dishes that waste nothing, A true nose to tail approach to food, pushed by the harness of the elements and the necessity to survive. These dishes are full of flavour and inventiveness, but little is known about them abroad. As Mexican food becomes more mainstream around the world, there are great opportunities to shine a light on regions yet unexplored, and that is quite exciting.

How has living in Ireland influenced your cooking?

When I was living in Mexico, going out for a meal meant international food: Japanese, Lebanese, American, Italian, Chinese, French, anything but Mexican, that was just everyday food for me. When I moved to Ireland, the first three months were great: I loved everything and omg how many varieties of potatoes does one small country can have?! It was awesome! After that, homesickness kicked in, and I started to yearn for the familiar, a warmed corn tortilla cradling a sizzling piece of meat and crowned by a spicy salsa; the simplicity of a plate of freshly cooked black beans with cilantro and fresh onion… a plate of Mexican rice… I started to miss all those everyday foods like crazy. I soon realised that if I didn’t do something about it, I would be homesick forever, so I started cooking Mexican with what I could get, which 21 years ago was little or nothing. 

I used my monthly call home to get recipes from my mam (before calling cards, Skype, WhatsApp and video calls, ringing home was a once a month affair that lasted no more than half an hour, it was all I was able to afford). I found substitutions and spent a lot of time eating food that wasn’t great but learning and adapting. 

By 2011, I was fed up and looked at starting an online shop selling Mexican ingredients. The philosophy behind Picado Mexican has always been the same: I buy whatever the hell I want to cook and eat and hope everybody else follows! – not a great business strategy, but it has served us well. People come to our cooking classes and get a lesson on Mexican food cooking sprinkled with plenty of culture and history. I am never happier than when I have a group of people eager to discover the subtleties and nuances of Mexico through its wonderful food.

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Lily’s book will be available to pre-order and buy direct from the Blasta Books website in the coming months and I will alert you all when that time comes. At the moment their website lists the book as sold out but this will not be the case. It is due for publication in Spring 2022; please contact Blasta Books for more information.

Blasta Books new website is now live! Order Lily’s book here.

Find Lily on Twitter and Picado Mexican on Insta.

Another interview with Lily (£)

Lily in the Irish Times.

Lily’s sweet corn cake via Weekend AM.

Image of Lily © Copyright Lily Ramirez-Foran.

Book images courtesy of Blasta Books.