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Revealed over 3,500 years ago, Zoroastrianism was one of the first monotheistic religions known to mankind. In spite of it being so old, it is a living religion for just under 200,000 Parsis (Indo-Iranian) who have now settled and practice their faith around the world.

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By day — and a lot of times by night — I’m a television producer. It’s a career I adore. It’s given me stories and adventures and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. But it is a relatively “in person” kind of job.

And then March of 2020 came Covid and work slowed. Thankfully for me it didn’t stop, but we all found different ways to fill our stay-at-home time.

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We asked her how she does it all.

In her native Panama, Yadira studied electronics at an all-boys technical high school and dreamed of becoming an astronaut. She earned a degree in Electrical Engineering with a minor in Computer Science and Robotics on a full scholarship in the United States. Yadira credits her father for encouraging her to pursue her dream, and her mother, who was always giving and volunteering, for teaching her to be humble, to remember her blessings, and  to “give back.” After an apprenticeship program at NASA she became a Technical Analyst and Designer of banking systems, traveling the world. She worked in Asia, Central and South America, and Europe for more than two decades. Everywhere she lived, she sought out people in the countryside, sampling the authentic food and culture in the outskirts of the cities. In 2012, Chef Yadira founded Esencias Panameñas in Washington, DC—one of only a handful of Panamanian food businesses in the United States. Esencias Panameñas serves authentic Panamanian cuisine and is the only Panamanian catering company in the USA to offer its food nationwide.

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The following is excerpted from the essay The Kingdom of Rice, in the acclaimed cookbook, Between Heaven and Harlem by JJ Johnson and Alexander Smalls.

If we traveled the world from Africa to Asia and all the points of the diaspora, we could eat only rice and we would not starve. On the contrary, we would feast. We could start on New Year’s Day in Charleston, South Carolina, where certainly we would eat hoppin’ John, the traditional holiday meal of black-eyed peas and rice, seasoned with a bit of smoked pork. The dish is considered a symbol of good fortune for the year ahead. As culinary historian Jessica B. Harris explains in her wonderful essay “Prosperity begins with a Pea,” although some historians connect hoppin’ John to the way it sustained the hungry during the Civil War, “For African Americans, the connection between beans and fortune is surely complex. Perhaps, because black-eyed peas can be germinated, having some extra on hand at the New Year guaranteed sustenance provided by a new crop of the fast-growing vines. The black-eyed pea and rice combination also forms a complete protein, offering all the amino acids. During slavery, one ensured of such nourishment was lucky indeed.”

From the book Between Harlem and Heaven by JJ Johnson and Alexander Smalls. Copyright © 2018 by JJ Johnson and Alexander Smalls. Reprinted with permission from Flatiron Books. All rights reserved. 

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