Issue 04 — Mama’s Best

The new pozole arrives at Querida in May 2026 — the same way it has arrived in Mama Lalis’s kitchen for the last forty years: rojo y blanco, both at once, with the full plate of fixings and tostadas on the side.

This issue is a portrait of a dish and the family table that serves it.

On the menu now

Pozole rojo y blanco is the first major addition to the Querida menu since opening — a lifelong house dish that Mama Lalis has been cooking for her family in Monclova since the 1980s, now built fresh in the Al Barsha kitchen every week.

• Rojo — northern style. Toasted guajillo and ancho chiles, a deep red broth, slightly sweet from the dried fruit notes of the chiles.
• Blanco — clear, garlicky, the original. The way Mama’s grandmother made it in Coahuila.

The bowl is built at the table. Hominy, slow-pulled meat, fresh lime, a mountain of crisp shredded cabbage, sliced radish, raw white onion, Mexican oregano crumbled between the diner’s palms. Tostadas on the side, never in the bowl.

See the dish — Pozole on the menu →

Why pozole now

Pozole is a Sunday dish in most of Mexico. It’s the soup that goes on the stove at 9 AM and is ready when the family arrives at 1 PM. The hominy is nixtamalized field corn — the same starting point as a tortilla, only left whole. The broth is built slowly: bone broth first, then chiles toasted on the dry comal until they smell like dried plums, then re-hydrated in the broth itself.

It’s a dish that resists the shortcut. There’s no good way to make pozole in twenty minutes. Mama builds the broth on Monday for the week, and we serve it Tuesday through Sunday until it runs.

What’s in this issue

The ten pages of this volume are a portrait of the new pozole and the people around the table that serves it.

• Pages 02–04 — the new pozole, three angles. Single bowl in the side-light of the afternoon. Rojo and blanco side by side. The full top-down spread with all the fixings the way it lands on the table.
• Pages 05–06 — Mama Lalis at the family table with the full menu in front of her. Two portraits, taken thirty seconds apart.
• Pages 07–08 — the family. Three at the table in service, the wider team in front of the Mexican flag and the Catrina mural Ernesto painted.
• Pages 09–10 — the cultural room. Mama with the Mexican flag. Mama in the charro sombrero with the luchador-masked Obed beside her. Querida is not just a restaurant; it’s a small piece of Mexico, transplanted.

Photography

Photographed by Rhass on a Sony α series, May 2026, native 32-megapixel resolution. Shot in the room on a Tuesday afternoon — natural side-light from the storefront window. No retouching, no studio. The room as it is, the dish as it lands.

Visit the room

• Walk in — Talal 14 Building, Shop 9, 14th Street, Al Barsha 1. Twenty-six seats. Map →
• Send — WhatsApp pre-order to +971 52 807 7896 (Mauricio · in the kitchen). Talabat and Deliveroo also active.
• Reserve a table — via Zomato

— Mama Lalis · Editor-in-Chief · Querida Mexican Lifestyle Magazine