from Mexico
| BY JOSEPH SORRENTINO, writing from Mexico | The smell of apples drifts out
of Sidra San Francisco’s front door, enticing passersby to enter. If they do, they’ll discover a small store where Gabriel Hernandez Garcia makes sidra (hard cider), the fourth generation in his family to do so. Garcia makes his sidra in Huejotzingo, Puebla, the same city where his great-grandfather became the first person in Mexico to learn how to make it almost one hundred years ago. Sidra has a very long history. There’s evidence that Celts in Britain were making it as long ago as 3,000 BC. Romans discovered sidra when Julius Caesar made his first attempt to conquer Britain in 55 BC. Caesar and his army apparently liked it so much that they brought it back with them to the continent and made the first written record of the drink. Sidra, and sidra-making techniques, quickly spread throughout the Roman Empire and Europe. In 1927, it started taking root in Mexico. It was during that year that Gabriel Guerrero Miruela, Garcia’s great-grandfather, learned how to make sidra from a French chef who lived in Huejotzingo. “My great-grandfather taught his sons,” says Garcia, “and my grandmother taught me. When I was young, my grandmother transmitted this love of sidra to me.” He worked by her side for four years to fully learn the process.
It’s Sidra
SEASON
“My great-grandfather taught his sons, and my grandmother taught me. When I was young, my grandmother transmitted this love of sidra to me.” – GABRIEL HERNANDEZ GARCIA, Sidra San Francisco SEPT/OCT 2021
| el restaurante
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