Food tells of tradition and history at Tucson’s Mission Garden

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Thanksgiving is history and tradition reflected in food. There is a reflection of Tucson’s different cultures in the shadow of “A” Mountain, growing in Mission Garden.

At Mission Garden, memories grow on trees. Dena Cowan opens a sweet lime, a fruit that dates back to citrus Spanish settlers brought to Arizona hundreds of years ago..

She says, “Northern Sonora, Southern Arizona it just takes them back to their childhood.”

As curator at Mission Garden she guards the history of this spot that has been farmed and feeding the region for more than four thousand years.

The Tohono O’odham found frequent river floods watered and enriched this land and made it an ideal place to farm fruits and vegetables like squash that have deep roots in O’odham, and later Mexican, tradition.

Spanish settlers adopted foods that had been feeding the tribes for generations.

Cowan says, “You know all of these things are that we are all over the world right now. Are originally American crops, peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, squash, zucchini, all the squashes, corn, that's an American crop. So yes, there was definitely a sharing.”

The Europeans brought wheat, pomegranates, figs, and a fruit called quince.

“Typically you would cook them. I like to put them in the microwave for a minute or two. They get soft, and sweeter and juicer and you don’t have to add sugar like the jams and that’s my favorite way to eat them.”

A wagon at the garden is a reminder of Chinese families who grew crops and delivered them to Tucson homes, but also set aside land for themselves to grow the foods they grew up with.

“The long beans, the winter melon, the bitter melon, the bok choy, all these things.”

Together they all form the recipe for a city of many cultures blended into the Tucson of today.