Cristina Martinez is a Mexican chef and immigration activist in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. Martinez is a native of

Capulhuac Capulhuac is one of 125 municipalities, in the State of Mexico in Mexico. The municipal seat is Capulhuac de Mirafuentes. The municipality covers an area of 21.5 km². As of 2005, the municipality had a total population of 30,838. Notable p ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, and she is an

undocumented immigrant Illegal immigration is the migration of people into a country in violation of the immigration laws of that country or the continued residence without the legal right to live in that country. Illegal immigration tends to be financially upwa ...

who crossed the border from Juárez into the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. She found a job in Philadelphia as a pastry chef in an Italian restaurant, where she met and married Benjamin Miller, a U.S. citizen. Martinez was fired from the restaurant when they discovered her undocumented status, and she began cooking food for other Mexican workers in her apartment. As demand grew for Martinez's home-made

barbacoa Barbacoa () is a form of cooking meat that originated in the Caribbean with the Taíno people, who called it by the Arawak word ''barbaca'', from which the term "barbacoa" derives, and ultimately, the word ' barbecue". In contemporary Mexico, i ...

, she and Miller began selling tacos from a pushcart on weekends. In 2015, they opened a permanent restaurant, ''South Philly Barbacoa''. In 2016, ''

Bon Appétit ''Bon Appétit'' is a monthly American food and entertaining magazine, that typically contains recipes, entertaining ideas, restaurant recommendations, and wine reviews. Owned by Condé Nast, it is headquartered at the One World Trade Center i ...

'' magazine named it one of the top ten best new restaurants in America. Cristina and Miller are active in supporting undocumented immigrants in the restaurant industry, establishing an organization, the Popular Alliance for Undocumented Workers' Rights. In 2017,

Univision Univision () is an American Spanish-language free-to-air television network owned by TelevisaUnivision. It is the United States' largest provider of Spanish-language content. The network's programming is aimed at the Latino public and includes ...

produced a Spanish-language podcast about Martinez, called ''Mejor vete, Cristina'' ("You Better Leave, Cristina"), which won Mejor Cobertura Multimedia (Best Multimedia Coverage) at the 2018

Ortega y Gasset Awards The Ortega y Gasset Journalism Awards are named after the Spanish philosopher and journalist José Ortega y Gasset. The awards were created by the newspaper '' El País'' in 1984. Every year, these awards are given to those whose work has shown ...

. Martinez was also featured on an episode of the

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fil ...

series '' Chef's Table'' in 2018. In 2022, Martinez won a

James Beard Foundation Award The James Beard Foundation Awards are annual awards presented by the James Beard Foundation to recognize chefs, restaurateurs, authors and journalists in the United States. They are scheduled around James Beard's May 5 birthday. The media award ...

for Best Chef, Mid-Atlantic.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Martinez, Cristina Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Women chefs Mexican chefs Undocumented immigrants to the United States James Beard Foundation Award winners