Salt and Fire

The Story of Colombia Told Through Its Food

From pre-Columbian fires to Michelin-starred kitchens, Salt and Fire tells the epic story of a nation that cooked its way through conquest, slavery, revolution, and rebirth.

Blending history, memory, and flavor, this sweeping narrative reveals how Colombia’s identity was forged not just in battles, but in kitchens. Through every era — Indigenous, African, colonial, and contemporary — food becomes both witness and resistance.

Follow the scent of ajiaco simmering in Bogotá, taste the Pacific’s secret curries, hear the drums behind the coastal stews, and step inside the coffee farms that fed a dream — and an inequality. From the voices of grandmothers in Palenque to the visionary chefs reinventing tradition, this is Colombia told through its most powerful language: food.

Lyrical as a novel and grounded as an archive, Salt and Fire is both a love letter and a revelation — a portrait of a country that has survived by cooking.

“Food is our memory, our rebellion, our flag.”

If you loved The Taste of Empire by Lizzie Collingham, Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner, or An Edible History of Humanity by Tom Standage, this book belongs on your table.