Altrove/Elsewhere – Mamá’s sauce
By Daniel Leisawitz*
Matilda Koen-Sarano was born in Milan in 1939. Her parents were Sephardic Jews born in the city of Aydib (Turkey). Koen-Sarano grew up in Milan, speaking Italian outside the house, and Ladino with her family. She attended the Jewish Community school in Milan and studied languages and literature at the Università Bocconi in Milan. She went on to specialize Judeo-Spanish literature and folklore at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. She has become one of the leading writers and scholars of Ladino language and literature. She now lives in Israel.
The following story, “La salsa de la mamá,” is taken from her first collection of Ladino folktakes, Kuentos del folklore de la famiya djudeo-espanyola (Jeruslaem: Kana Press, 1986). This story was told to her by her uncle Arturo Sarano (b. 1918 at Rhodes).
“Mamá’s sauce”
Once upon a time there was a strapping young man, handsome and rich, who was a very picky eater. Every tasty dish, whether homemade or bought at market, was displeasing to him, and he drove his family to despair.
One evening he decided to go to a certain restaurant to see if he could find something good, since he felt a great desire to eat. He went in, sat down, and ordered a dish, which he tasted and promptly sent back to the kitchen. He then ordered another, which he tried and sent back, as well. He carried on this way with many more dishes, until he finally got up to leave, saying, “They don’t know how to cook here!”
One of the waiters who was serving in the dining room heard him. He approached the young man and said, “If you would like to eat some good cooking, wait till I’m done with my shift, and come with me. I’ll take you to my house. There you can eat my mother’s cooking, which is like no other that you’ve ever eaten in your life!”
The young man, who was always ready and willing to see if he could find something to eat that would satisfy him, happily accepted the offer. He waited for the waiter to finish his shift, and, before setting off with him asked, “Where do you live?”
The waiter responded, “Oh, close by. We’ll be there in a hop, skip and a jump.”
The two men started walking. They walked and walked for a whole hour, until the young man asked the waiter, “Do we still have far to go?”
“No,” responded the waiter, “we’re almost there.”
The two men continued walking, and after a couple more hours, they finally arrived at the waiter’s house. It had seemed an eternity that they were walking, and the young man, who was utterly exhausted, collapsed into a chair at the table.
The waiter went up to his mother, and said, “Mamá, can we have some of that sauce that only you know how to make?”
“Certainly,” said his mother. She went into the kitchen and brought out the sauce.
The young man attacked the plate of sauce and polished it off in no time at all. He called out to the waiter’s mother, and said to her, “Sinyora, I have never eaten anything as good as this! Do you have any more?”
The waiter burst out laughing, and said to the young man, “It’s true that mamá makes the best sauce in the world, but then again, I don’t think you ever sat down to eat as hungry as you were tonight!”
*Translation from Ladino to English by Daniel Leisawitz. Daniel Leisawitz is the Director of the Italian Studies Program at Muhlenberg College (Allentown, Pennsylvania, USA). The artwork is by Abraham Cresques a 14th-century Jewish Spanish cartographer.