Life, food, events, and community in Albuquerque, NM

Holy Posole, Batman! The Mayor Saves the Day!

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Read the headlines on CNN, The Drudge Report, MSNBC ... and it will send you running for the hills with your shotgun and a suitcase of money. But with all the financial panic, high seas piracy, and new cabinet appointments, I was pleased to see that we in Albuquerque still know REAL news when we read it. Yesterday's Albuquerque Journal headline is what local Journalism is all about:

"Thursday, November 20, 2008

Mayor Reverses Ban on Posole

By Olivier Uyttebrouck
Journal Staff Writer
Praise the Lord and pass the posole.
Parishioners at St. Francis Xavier Church won't have to eat the canned stuff after all when they honor Our Lady of Guadalupe on Dec. 14, city officials assured them Wednesday.
Mayor Martin Chávez told church leaders that parishioners can take their homemade posole, menudo, tamales and bizcochitos to church as they have for 84 years.
Chávez also ordered up a steaming bowl of revisions to city law — changes that will allow churches and other groups to serve homemade dishes without violating city food-handling laws..."

The story goes on to tell of local restaurants which also volunteered to rescue this 84-year-old tradition. This is proof of the power of the press. Just one day before, an article ran in the paper telling citizens of the plight of this church: canned posole? Seriously? That's worse than store-bough tortillas.

It didn't take long for the mayor to spring into action and provide relief. Thanks to the quick actions of our mayor, these parishioners will have real chunks of pork in their posole and some fresh crumble to their bizcochitos.

My son wonders where the mayor goes to church. Could it be he, too, was reading his paper in the morning when he spied the terrible news, looked up from his cup of coffee and moaned, "Canned posole? Seriously? I am NOT eating canned posole!" Who knows, but whatever the real story, we like our version. And we're with him all the way - canned posole is not fit for a celebration.

It's good to see that quick action can lead to policy changes overnight in city hall... now about those red light cameras...

(For other posts, you can visit my blog at http://writingthroughrosecoloredglasses.blogspot.com)

Tags: albuquerque, chavez, city, hall, journal, martin, mayor, posole

13 Comments

Comment by sophie on November 21, 2008 at 8:59am: Hey Lisa! Love the post. Is there any chance you could make that photo a little less tall? Ideal dimensions are 500px wide, something under 200px tall.

Comment by Lisa on November 21, 2008 at 9:02am: I have no clue - the technical DNA in my brain got lost somewhere along the way, but I'll try.

Comment by dolores on November 21, 2008 at 9:04am: I love this post too, tall photo and all. So good to see at least there are some people who know how to get their priorities straight

Comment by Lisa on November 21, 2008 at 9:25am: I DID it! I fiddled with the HTML to get it to the right height. Does this mean I can add HTML to my list of skills now? ha! ha!

Comment by Miriam on November 21, 2008 at 11:04am: I was not even aware that posole came in cans! Luckily I no longer need to know.

Comment by Tricross on November 21, 2008 at 11:19am: I can't even imagine how horrible posole from a can would be. I remember eating canned tamales from Old El Paso during desperate times as a starving college student. I dry-heaved for days.

Comment by KelVick on November 22, 2008 at 6:14am: Great post Lisa! My church serves dinner every Wednesday night and recently served Posole. It was the most bland stuff I've ever had. Obviously my group can't do four part hominy---I'll have to try out St. Francis.

Comment by magoo on November 22, 2008 at 7:43am: mmm......canned tamales..............gotta get some......

Comment by Lisa on November 22, 2008 at 8:51am: Canned tamales? That is just nasty.

This was posted originally on my blog, and somehow I forgot just how unique our food is. I've received a ton of emails all asking the same question: what is posole? Maybe we should send them some cans to get them started...

Comment by Khan on November 22, 2008 at 9:35am: Well, canned posole is called "hominy" and is a Southern food. It's not posole, actually, but rather pre-ground grits!

To the meat of the story, though--I get health codes, I really do. And as a waiter I was a stickler, and luckily worked, mainly, in a place that always passed with flying colors, which made me feel proud. But telling a church that it can't serve food, because people who don't belong to the congregation are there? It's a technical, but not nuanced or smart, application of the law.

Wow, did Marty Chavez do something that made sense? That's so unlike him...

Holy Posole, Batman! The Mayor Saves the Day!

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