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The Punjabi Mexican American community, the majority of which is localized to Yuba City, California, is a distinctive ethnicity holding its roots in a migration pattern that occurred almost a century ago. The first meeting of these cultures occurred in the Imperial and Central Valleys in 1907, near the largest irrigation system in the Western Hemisphere.
For decades in the early 20th century, Punjabi farming families sent their sons out of Punjab to earn money. [1] [2] Intending to return to the Punjab Province, only a handful of men brought their wives and families. In the United States, however, due to changed immigration laws it was not possible for the families of Punjabi workers to join them. Beyond this, poor wages and working conditions convinced the Punjabi workers to pool their resources, lease land and grow their own crops, thereby establishing themselves in the newly budding farming economy of northern California. [3]
Almost one million Mexican immigrants began entering America in the 1910s, shortly after the Mexican Revolution, with a large percentage arriving in families. A small number of these families picked cotton in fields farmed by Punjabi men. The Punjabi men are thought to have chosen women of Mexican ancestry for many reasons. Mexican women were considered brown, as were the Punjabi men; interracial marriage bans in California prevented Punjabis from marrying Black or White women but allowed them to marry Mexican women. Mexican women, much like the women of Punjab, covered their heads and bodies to protect themselves from the blazing sun while working in the fields. [3] Mexicans and Punjabis shared a rural way of life, with similar types of food and family values, and thus maintained a similar material and social culture. Mexicans and Indians shared an initially lower class status in American society. [1]
Punjabi men married Mexican women laborers and there were eventually almost four hundred of these biethnic couples clustered in California’s agricultural valleys. [1] Although the majority of these intermarriages happened in northern-central California in the Central Valley, in areas such as Yuba City, Stockton, or Sacramento, Punjabi-Mexican marriages occurred as far away as New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, or El Paso, Texas. [4] [5] Husbands and wives spoke to each other in rudimentary English or Spanish. The men tended to be older, in their late thirties or forties, and the women in their early twenties. Punjabi men learned Spanish to communicate with Mexican agricultural laborers and to speak to their wives. Some Punjabi men adopted Spanish names or nicknames: Miguel for Maghar, Andrés for Inder, and Mondo for Mohammed. [1]
The aspects of Punjabi culture fathers transmitted to their wives and children included that of food and funerary practices. Cooking in the home drew from both Mexican and Punjabi cuisines and the men taught their wives to cook chicken curry, roti, and various vegetable curries. For example, the Rasul family in Yuba City ran the El Ranchero restaurant, the only Mexican restaurant in California (before closing in 1993) that featured chicken curry and roti. [6] Another important retention of Punjabi culture was the disposition of the body upon death. The Hindus and Sikhs insisted upon cremation, then uncommon in North America, and Muslims carried out orthodox burial ceremonies for each other (though the plots in which they are buried in rural California have since been misnamed "Hindu plots"). The wives were buried in the Mexican Catholic section of local cemeteries, as were the children. [1]
Indian cuisine consists of a variety of regional and traditional cuisines native to the Indian subcontinent. Given the diversity in soil, climate, culture, ethnic groups, and occupations, these cuisines vary substantially and use locally available spices, herbs, vegetables, and fruits.
Roti is a round flatbread native to the Indian subcontinent. It is commonly consumed in many South Asian, Southeast Asian, Caribbean, and Southeast African countries.
Pakistani cuisine can be characterized as a blend of regional cooking styles and flavours from across South, Central and Western Asia. Pakistani cuisine is influenced by Persian and Arab cuisine. The cuisine of Pakistan also maintains certain Mughal influences within its recipes and cooking techniques. The country's various cuisines vary across the country. Pakistan's ethnic and cultural diversity, diverse climates, geographical environments, and availability of different produce options reason for the uniqueness of Pakistani cuisine.
Punjabi cuisine is a culinary style originating in the Punjab, a region in the northern part of South Asia, which is now divided in an Indian part to the east and a Pakistani part to the west. This cuisine has a rich tradition of many distinct and local ways of cooking.
The Punjabis, are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group associated with the Punjab region, comprising areas of eastern Pakistan and northwestern India. They generally speak Standard Punjabi or various Punjabi dialects on both sides.
Butter chicken, traditionally known as murgh makhani, is an Indian dish originating in Delhi. It is a type of curry made from chicken with a spiced tomato and butter (makhan) sauce. Its sauce is known for its rich texture. It is similar to chicken tikka masala, which uses a tomato paste.
Indo-Trinidadians and Tobagonians or Indian-Trinidadians and Tobagonians are people of Indian origin who are nationals of Trinidad and Tobago, whose ancestors came from India and the wider subcontinent beginning in 1845 during the period of colonization.
A dhaba is a roadside restaurant in the Indian subcontinent, primarily across Pakistan and India. They are on highways, generally serve local cuisine, and also serve as truck stops. They are most commonly found next to petrol stations, and most are open 24 hours a day.
Indo-Guyanese or Indian-Guyanese, are Guyanese nationals of Indian origin who trace their ancestry to India and the wider subcontinent. They are the descendants of indentured servants and settlers who migrated from India beginning in 1838, and continuing during the British Raj.
South Asian cuisine, includes the traditional cuisines from the modern-day South Asian republics of Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, also sometimes including the kingdom of Bhutan and the emirate of Afghanistan. Also sometimes known as Desi cuisine, it has been influenced by and also has influenced other Asian cuisines beyond the Indian subcontinent.
Punjabi culture grew out of the settlements along the five rivers which served as an important route to the Near East as early as the ancient Indus Valley civilization, dating back to 3000 BCE. Agriculture has been the major economic feature of the Punjab and has therefore formed the foundation of Punjabi culture, with one's social status being determined by landownership. The Punjab emerged as an important agricultural region, especially following the Green Revolution during the mid-1960's to the mid-1970's, has been described as the "breadbasket of both India and Pakistan". Besides being known for agriculture and trade, the Punjab is also a region that over the centuries has experienced many foreign invasions and consequently has a long-standing history of warfare, as the Punjab is situated on the principal route of invasions through the northwestern frontier of the Indian subcontinent, which promoted to adopt a lifestyle that entailed engaging in warfare to protect the land. Warrior culture typically elevates the value of the community's honour (izzat), which is highly esteemed by Punjabis.
American Sikhs form the country's sixth-largest religious group. While the U.S. Census does not ask about religion, 70,697 Americans declared Sikh as their ethnicity in the 2020 census. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated the adult Sikh American population at 78,000 in 2008. The Pew Research Center estimated the Sikh American adult population to be 140,000 and the total population at 200,000 in 2012 while the World Religion Database at Boston University estimated the American Sikh population to be at 280,000 in 2012. Sikh organizations like the Sikh Coalition and American Sikh Congressional Caucus estimate the Sikh American population to be as high as 1,000,000, but do not provide any sources for these figures; 500,000 nevertheless remains the most cited Sikh American population size. With 1% of Asian Americans being Sikh, and 90.7% of Sikh Americans being Asian American, the American Sikh population can be estimated at around 200,000-300,000 in 2021. The largest Sikh populations in the U.S. are found in California (52%), New York (11%), and Washington (6%).
Dal makhani is a dish originating in Punjab region. A relatively modern variation of traditional lentil dishes, it is made with urad dal and other pulses, and includes butter and cream.
Indo-Belizeans, also known as East Indian Belizeans, are citizens of Belize of Indian ancestry. The community made up 3.9% of the population of Belize in 2010. They are part of the wider Indo-Caribbean community, which itself is a part of the global Indian diaspora.
Awadhi cuisine is a cuisine native to the Awadh region in Northern India. The cooking patterns of Lucknow are similar to those of Central Asia, the Middle East, and Northern India and western India with the cuisine comprising both vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes. The Awadh region has been influenced by Mughal cooking techniques, and the cuisine of Lucknow bears similarities to those of Central Asia, Kashmir, Punjab and Hyderabad. The city is also known for its Nawabi foods.
The Punjabi diaspora refers to the descendants of ethnic Punjabis who emigrated out of the Punjab region in the northern part of the South Asia to the rest of the world. Punjabis are one of the largest ethnic groups in both the Pakistani and Indian diasporas. The Punjabi diaspora numbers around the world has been given between 2.5 and 10 million, mainly concentrated in Britain, Canada, United States, Western Europe, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Australia and New Zealand.
Punjabi Americans, are Americans whose ancestry originates wholly or partly from the Punjab region of India and Pakistan. There are over 300,000 Punjabi Americans, many of whom were Sikhs from British Punjab who first settled in California's Central Valley to do agricultural work.
A tandoor is a large urn-shaped oven, usually made of clay. Since antiquity, tandoors have been used to bake unleavened flatbreads, such as roti and naan, as well as to roast meat. The tandoor is predominantly used in Western Asian, Central Asian, South Asian, and Horn of African cuisines.
Punjabi tandoori cooking was born out of the clay oven known as the tandoor. According to Macveigh [2008] the Punjab tandoor originated in the local region. It is a clay oven and is traditionally used to cook Punjabi cuisine, from the Punjab region in Pakistan and northwestern India. It is traditional to have tandoors in courtyards of homes in the Punjab to make roti, naan and tandoori chicken. In rural Punjab, it is also traditional to have communal tandoors.
British Punjabis are citizens or residents of the United Kingdom whose heritage originates wholly or partly in the Punjab, a region in the Indian subcontinent, which is divided between India and Pakistan. Numbering 700,000 in 2006, Punjabis represent the largest ethnicity among British Asians. They are a major sub-group of the British-Indian and British Pakistani communities.
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