Taco Tuesday's Days Might Be Numbered. Because Cultural Appropriation | Intellectual Takeout

A burrito cart in Portland recently closed after citizens of one of America’s most progressive cities
charged its owners with cultural appropriation. Accused of exploiting a marginalized culture by serving its food, two white women and their breakfast burritos were forced into early retirement.

Does this signify the collapse of ethnic cuisine? Are all Mexican food chains doomed? Must Taco Tuesdays in households across America cease?

According to the outraged and offended, households and consumers are in the clear. It’s businesses that need to watch out. Because it’s not about the burritos, really. It’s about power.

What happened to Kali Wilgus and Liz Connelly, the two women who had the misfortune to run a popular food cart in Portland, was this: In mid-May a local publication ran a short profile on the women and their business, Kooks Burritos. Wilgus and Connelly explained that they had visited Mexico and gushed over the tortillas in Puerto Nuevo. So they did what many entrepreneurial people do: they asked the chefs their methods and brought those insights back to their hometown and launched their own food cart.

Portlanders were outraged that the women would snag delicious tortilla recipes from Mexico and popularize them in the U.S. without compensating the Hispanic women who shared their secrets. Within a week, Kooks Burritos had shut down.

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Taco Tuesday's Days Might Be Numbered. Because Cultural Appropriation | Intellectual Takeout