Fifth Chinese Chorizo Festival Runs in Tucson Through November 22, Telling a Century of Chinese-Mexican Community Ties
The fifth Chinese Chorizo Festival is under way in Tucson, Pima County, Arizona, and runs through November 22, with restaurants across Tucson and Phoenix taking part, using one distinctive food to tell a century of friendship between Chinese immigrants and the Mexican community. The project was founded in 2022 by chef and multidisciplinary artist Feng-Feng Yeh, inspired by footage at the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center: early Chinese grocery owners, serving a largely Mexican clientele, created a Mexican-style sausage they called Chinese chorizo.
Project materials note that Tucson's neighborhoods were once home to 582 Chinese grocery stores, and Phoenix's redlined district had about 200 at its peak; the shops made their own versions from trimmings, red wine, Mexican spices and chiles. Alongside the festival, the installation Vivamos Siempre Como Hermanos (Let Us Always Live as Brothers) is on view through December in the original La Casa Cordova house on the Tucson Museum of Art's historic block, recreating a Chinese grocery of the era. During the festival, organizers donate Chinese chorizo to partner restaurants, which create special dishes so diners can taste this overlooked local history and build new community connections.
(Source: Smithsonian Festival)
Source: Smithsonian Festival
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：图森市历史街区的拉卡萨·科尔多瓦老屋，本届香肠节装置展览原址。（照片：w_lemay，CC BY-SA 2.0，经 Wikimedia Commons） / Photo: La Casa Cordova in Tucson's historic block, site of the festival's companion installation. (Photo: w_lemay, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons)
