Meet Agua Lemus | Owner of Amanos.LA | Chef

We had the good fortune of connecting with Agua Lemus and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Agua, what role has risk played in your life or career?
I always felt like I’ve lived in a bubble of my community, the diaspora, the melting pot that is Los Angeles. I never understood the concept of not wanting to bring your food to school because it was funky. What was funky to me, was normal. The smell of my frijoles and guisado in my hello kitty Tupperware, while my friend ate her kimchi fried rice, and my other friend brought a recalentado de mole. These smells, these foods were so normal to me. It wasn’t until I started getting older and moving to a less culturally diverse area and school that I realized what was normal for me wasn’t normal to everyone. So when I think of this, I think of food. I’ve risked my pop up many times to showcase who El Salvador is. I love pupusas but I refuse to have them on my menu because you can go to 3rd and Rampart and get some bomb pupusas. You can go to my favorite PUPUSERIA across the street from Jay’s Market in Arlington Heights and get pupusas, cash only though! There’s an abundance of my food everywhere, or what the audience wants. I want people to understand that Salvadoran cuisine is so deep, rich, and goes way outside of some pupusas. We make ferments, we eat flowers because it’s a tropical country that is abundant in flowers. We eat bitters, we love sour, there’s so much to use beyond what we provide for Los Angeles. We ferment our corns and make Shuco. It terms of something on my menu, Shuco is the biggest risk I’ve taken as a pop up. Even in terms of having it outside of comida dominguera (a Sunday meal), I make it an anytime I pop up. Shuco is Labor of love, it’s funky, takes 3 days to make. I mess up my blender time and time again, to show you the deepness of my culture. Bringing what my grandma fed me, what my mom fed me has been my biggest risk and I’ll keep doing it time and time again. Going against the grain is what has lets me thrive.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
My pop up started out of necessity to feed community. Drinks were needed at this event and so I made a big Jaron de Jamaica and Lemonade and I just started slanging them. I would put edible flowers in the drinks and then I started doing glitters. From there I started doing meal prep for sex workers. Again, femmes have been at the fore-front of my business. I cook for everyone but my priority has and will always be femmes. Cooking is a labor of love and if you don’t have the patience to get better and do better for yourself and evolve, you won’t be thrive in the ways you want too. There will be days where you won’t make a sale because the weather played in your face, or you push your work out but the event isn’t doing their part and you have to be okay with it. How can I make sure that doesn’t happen again? Cooking is definitely the easy part here, it’s evolving and not being bored that’s hard.

I’ve cooked for many reasons, I’ve cooked because someone made me mad and I wanted to prove them wrong. I’ve cooked because I am finding forgiveness in recreating my mom’s food. I’ve cooked because I deeply loved and cared for someone. Cooking is so intentional to me. There’s been so many reasons for me to cook, but love has been at the core. Love for myself, love for community, love for the land that births the most beautiful plants.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
If I’m taking my friend out on a beautiful sunny day, we’re going to make our way to Arroz and Fun. I’ll go a little ham and probably order 3 drinks for us to try, if I’m ballin. We’ll order the Bolo Bun Breakfast with the Chorizo Salvadoreño! Then we will probably go to Fluffy’s on Sunset. We’re gonna stay there for a minute because it’s all about the experience. Maybe this time I’ll order a banana split with the caramalized banana. Once we’re done there we can go to Bar La Fe for a nice little drink

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
The biggest shoutout I can give right now, is to the femmes in my life. My business and my survival wouldn’t be possible without the femmes in my life. Femmes have been my biggest cheerleaders. Femmes have kept me rooted in my truth and have helped me align and grow into my work. Deeply thankful for all the femmes that have come before and me who will come after me.

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