Related by Bread

for Zulima

A single word, mentioned in passing:
molletes.

For me, it's an aroma,
yeast mingled with anise,
inextricably entwined
with the dust adobe smell
of my grandparents' house.
On a bench in the hall,
next to the furnace grate
the warm heart of the home,
three metal bowls covered
in damp cloths like veils
contain slowly rising
pregnant loaves of bread.
Baked, brushed with butter,
they taste a bit like
Portuguese sweet bread
but with a sharp tang of
licorice.

"Portuguese" was a 16th century
Spanish euphemism for Jewish.

I hand a loaf of bread to a new friend,
an intern teacher at my children's school,
her son a classmate of my elder daughter.
I bake bread daily, and she has tried it before
and liked it, so I brought a loaf
because her husband is ill. I mention,
just briefly, that I'd like to try adapting
my abuela's recipe for molletes. This
surprises her. She is from Zamora, Spain.
She thought molletes were only made there.
She has searched on Google for recipes
with no success. I email her my recipe,
the one I transcribed by watching Abuela
bake them, by making her measure
what she sifts in by instinct and experience.

My friend thinks molletes are converso fare.
Zamora was a center of Jewish culture once,
before the Inquisition. Recipes, though,
are hardy, and like my ancestors,
escaped to the New World.
This recipe had been handed down,
ancestress to ancestress to Abuela to me.
Abuela never knew her Spanish origins.
Her parish church in Mora, NM
burned to the ground shortly after her birth.
Now, perhaps, she'll know.

And perhaps,
just perhaps,
this new friend is an old one,
a blood relative from another continent,
separated by generations,
reunited by a loaf of bread.