Oaxaca on the Night the Dead Come to Dinner

Seven moles, one cemetery, and an altar with my grandfather's favourite cigarettes.

Oaxaca is the food capital of Mexico, and on the first of November it is also the capital of the dead. Families build altars heaped with marigolds, bread and the favourite things of whoever they're expecting home. The city smells of copal smoke, chocolate and chile. I came hungry in every sense.

The morning was the Mercado 20 de Noviembre, where the meat hall is a corridor of smoke: you buy raw tasajo at one stall, hand it to a grill at another, and eat it with tortillas and a heap of charred spring onions. Then pan de muerto at Panadería Hueso Dulce, a sweet egg bread decorated with little dough bones.

Lunch was the serious business: seven moles at Fonda Siete Ollas in Jalatlaco, from the bright amarillo to a negro with more ingredients than I have relatives. The cook's grandmother sat in the corner supervising. I believe she ran the place.

At dusk I walked to the Templo de Santo Domingo, glowing gold, and down the Andador Macedonio Alcalá, where a comparsa of masks and brass swept me up for an hour. At midnight I went to the Panteón General, where families sat at candlelit graves with guitars and picnics. Someone handed me a mezcal. I raised it to my grandfather. He would have approved of the moles.

Lived November 01, 2025.