PupusaFest is back for a second year!
By hola | Published | No Comments
At its first PupusaFest last June, the Shrine of the Sacred Heart sold nearly 10,000 pupusas in a single “Day of the Pupusa,” but it still wasn’t enough to satisfy the hungry crowd that church officials estimate at about 1,500 people.
Determined to serve even more this year, Alba Funes, Maria Martinez and dozens of fellow parishioners started planning back in January, recruiting more people to help prepare the food and run the second annual Pupusafest taking place on Sunday, June 26.
Nearby residents have long flocked to Sacred Heart on weekends to dine on pupusas, a traditional Salvadoran dish made from masa, or corn flour. They are typically filled with pork or chicken, or beans and cheese and topped with curtido, a fermented cabbage slaw containing red chili pepper, vinegar and carrots.
Photos courtesy of Sacred Heart
The dish is favorite at Sacred Heart, the Roman Catholic church near 16th Street NW in Columbia Heights, where nearly 75 percent of parishioners hail from Central American countries where the pupusa has been on the menu for millennia. Given the popularity of the church’s weekend pupusa sales, it made sense to turn the parish’s annual Feast of the Sacred Heart into a pupusa festival in 2015.
“It was just a way to extend some of our cultural richness and celebration into the surrounding community of Mt. Pleasant and Columbia Heights,” says church member Charles Kovatch.
The pupusa-making will commence at 5 a.m. on the morning of the festival with the first pupusas ready by 8 a.m. at the tents set up outside the church. You can buy three Pupusas for $5.
Sacred Heart plans to use money raised to support its dinner program, hypothermia shelter, alcoholism program, and other church ministries. A portion will go to benefit Sacred Heart’s mission in El Salvador. There will also be a health fair held in the church basement, providing free blood pressure screenings and insurance information.
“Last year was only our first year, but it feels like we’ve been doing this forever,” says Funes, a native of San Miguel, El Salvador, who emigrated to the United States in the 1980s.
In her 25 years as a Sacred Heart parishioner, Funes has volunteered her time in many areas of the church, often in activities involving food. She was recruited to help with the PupusaFest last year by Sacred Heart Pastor, Father Moises Villalta, and stuck around for a second year.
“I’m not able to give an explanation on how I learned to make pupusas. It just comes naturally,” says Funes when asked how she learned to make pupusas. She cannot pinpoint a specific time when anyone taught her or shared their recipes. She says she, like many people, learned by watching.
“We don’t follow recipes. It’s not like two cups of this, and two cups of that. We just know already,” adds Maria Martinez. “A lot of people can make pupusas, but not many know how to make it. We Salvadorans know what is a good pupusa when we taste it.”
Funes says her fellow parishioners really like the pupusa de chicharron that she plans to prepare for the festival. It contains pork, cheese, tomato, chile verde, onion, garlic and seasonings. Funes also plans to sell zucchini pupusas, mushroom pupusas and chicken pupusas.
The festival isn’t only a way to celebrate the cuisine of El Salvador, Martinez says, but an avenue for the church to welcome the entire community.
PupusaFest
Sun., June 26, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Shrine of the Sacred Heart
3211 Sacred Heart Way, Washington, DC 20011
(near 16th Street NW and Park Road)
Price: 3 pupusas for $5, cash only
—Tatiana Delgado-Prather
Recent Stories
