Remembering Pancakes Past: Colombian Food Nostalgia on the Barre-Montpelier Road
Claudia, left, and Jhuly Alvarez at their restuarant, Arandas. Photo by John Lazenby.
It’s amazing, isn’t it, how smell and taste become memory generators? For me, popcorn and the movies, vinegar and Easter eggs, burned pretzels and walking in Manhattan in winter, sawdust and my father in his shop, Aqua Velva and my first date… from the first whiff I am immediately taken back in time. (On the flip side, the cloying sweetness of Southern Comfort evokes an unfortunate experience in youth.)
A new restaurant on the Barre-Montpelier road offered me a chance to taste and smell an item that was my daily treat 50 years ago when I was an exchange student in Bogota, Colombia: the humble arepa. It’s a cornmeal pancake, crisp on the outside, fluffy on the inside, often served with a filling but delicious all on its own, or with butter. For the first time since I tearfully left Bogota and my adopted family, I saw arepas on the menu, and right here in central Vermont!