Honestly, most of what we think we know about "Mexican food" is just a collection of colonial layers piled on top of a much healthier, much older reality. You’ve probably seen the Decolonize Your Diet book—officially titled Decolonize Your Diet: Plant-Based Recipes from Mesoamerica—on a friend's shelf or popping up in your social feed. It isn’t just a cookbook. It’s a manifesto.
Luz Calvo and Catriona Rueda Esquibel didn't just wake up and decide to write some recipes; they were responding to a literal life-or-death crisis. When Luz was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2006, the search for healing led back to the "Old Ways." It led back to the food ancestors ate before the Spanish arrived and flipped the script on the Americas' ecology.
The Problem With the Modern "Latino Diet"
We’re told that traditional Mexican food is heavy. We’re told it’s all about the cheese, the lard, and the heavy flour tortillas. That’s a lie. Or at least, it’s a very recent version of the truth.
The Decolonize Your Diet book argues that the current health crisis in Chicano and Latino communities—diabetes, heart disease, certain cancers—isn't because of "traditional" food. It’s because of the displacement of it. When the Spanish landed, they brought cows, pigs, goats, and sheep. They brought wheat and dairy. These weren't just new ingredients; they were tools of colonization that physically altered the landscape and the gut biomes of indigenous peoples.
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Before that? It was the "Three Sisters." Corn, beans, and squash.
These three crops are a biological miracle. They grow together in a symbiotic relationship where the corn provides a ladder for the beans, the beans fix nitrogen in the soil, and the squash leaves shade the ground to prevent weeds and retain moisture. When you eat them together, they provide a complete protein profile. It’s perfect. It's literally perfect.
Reclaiming the Ancestral Kitchen
The Decolonize Your Diet book isn't interested in some hipster version of veganism. You won't find a lot of fake processed meats or weird chemicals here. Instead, you find ingredients like quelites (wild greens), nopales (cactus paddles), and huitlacoche (corn smut—which is way more delicious than the name implies).
Think about the tortilla. Not the gummy, preservative-laden white flour discs from the supermarket. Calvo and Esquibel push for the return to nixtamalization. This is an ancient process where corn is soaked in an alkaline solution, usually lime water. It’s not just for texture. It actually unlocks niacin (Vitamin B3) and makes the protein in corn available to the human body. Without this indigenous technology, people relying on corn diets historically suffered from pellagra. The ancestors knew what they were doing long before a lab confirmed it.
You might be wondering if this is just "Indigenous Paleo." Sorta. But it’s more political than that.
Why This Matters in 2026
Health is political. Access to fresh, ancestral food is a privilege that many in urban food deserts don't have. This book tackles that head-on. It’s not just about what’s on your plate; it’s about who controls the land and who decides what "healthy" looks like.
- Corn over Wheat: Wheat was the crop of the colonizer. Corn is the soul of Mesoamerica.
- Plants over Meat: While some indigenous groups hunted, the bulk of the diet was plant-based. Meat was a seasoning or a special occasion, not the center of every meal.
- Wild over Cultivated: The book encourages foraging for greens like purslane and dandelions. These "weeds" are actually nutrient powerhouses.
There’s a common misconception that "eating healthy" means eating "white." You think of kale salads and quinoa bowls sold at a 400% markup in gentrified neighborhoods. But for the authors of the Decolonize Your Diet book, health is about de-linking from that Western, corporate food system. It’s about realizing that "superfoods" like chia seeds, cacao, and spirulina were staples of the Aztec and Mayan diets long before they were trendy in California.
The Flavor Profile of Resistance
If you’re worried the food is bland because there’s no cheese or lard, you haven't tasted a real salsa made in a molcajete. The heat of the chiles, the earthiness of toasted pumpkin seeds (pepitas), and the brightness of fresh lime provide more flavor than a mound of melted Monterey Jack ever could.
The recipes in the book, like the Red Pozole with Mushrooms or the Hibiscus Flower Tacos, aren't just substitutes. They are revelations. They rely on the umami of mushrooms and the acidity of fermented foods. It’s a complex, layered way of cooking that requires us to slow down.
How to Actually Start Decolonizing Your Plate
You don't have to throw out your entire pantry tonight. That’s not sustainable. Honestly, just start with the basics.
- Find a real corn source. Look for organic, non-GMO masa harina or find a local tortilleria that actually nixtamalizes their corn.
- Embrace the bean. Most people think beans are a side dish. Make them the star. Experiment with heirloom varieties like Ayocote or Tepary beans.
- Kill the "diet" mindset. This isn't a weight-loss book, even though people often lose weight on it. It’s a relationship-with-earth book.
- Learn the history. Read the intros in the Decolonize Your Diet book. Understanding the "Columbian Exchange" changes how you look at a cow or a stalk of wheat.
The reality is that our gut health is often a reflection of our history. For many people of color, the "standard American diet" is a biological mismatch. Reclaiming these ancestral foods isn't just a culinary choice; it’s an act of resistance against a system that profits from us being sick.
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It’s about more than just nutrients. It’s about memory. When you smell corn toasting or grind chiles for a mole, you’re tapping into a lineage that spans thousands of years. That’s something a processed protein shake can never give you.
Actionable Steps for Your Kitchen
- Audit your fats. Swap out the processed vegetable oils for small amounts of avocado oil or, if you aren't strictly vegan, sustainably sourced fats. But honestly, try cooking with vegetable broths and herbal infusions first.
- Grow something. Even if it’s just a pot of cilantro or a single pepper plant on a windowsill. Connecting to the growth cycle is the first step in decolonization.
- Support indigenous farmers. Seek out brands and markets that prioritize native seeds and fair wages for the people who actually know the land.
- Cook for others. Food is communal. The "individual meal prep" culture is very Western. Ancestral eating is about the mesa, the table where everyone gathers.
The Decolonize Your Diet book asks us to remember who we were before we were told what to consume. It’s a long journey back, but it starts with a single corn tortilla and the courage to eat differently than the world expects you to.
Next Steps for Implementation
To move beyond just reading and start practicing, begin by replacing one meal a day with a "Three Sisters" centered dish. Track how your energy levels feel when you prioritize nixtamalized corn over refined flour. Finally, seek out a local Mexican market (mercado) specifically to find ingredients like pápalo or nopalitos that are often absent from mainstream grocery chains.