Mamá Mambo was the woman who healed, cooked and gathered the family around the table. Today her name returns to the table.
Mamá Mambo was the matriarch of the family. She was born of mixed roots, to a Spanish mother and a Haitian father, and she was a healer: she knew which plant helps with which pain, which tea soothes and which food comforts. For her, cooking, healing and caring were a single gesture. The house takes its name from her.
Her daughter, Maribel, was born in Bahía de las Águilas and trained as a chef in Emilia-Romagna, Italy, where she learned fresh pasta, hand-rolled sfoglia and the rhythm of a kitchen made for sharing. When she came back to Santo Domingo, she brought both cuisines with her: Mamá Mambo's and Italy's.
Maribel's daughter, Giulia is an Italian-Dominican cultural anthropologist and researcher. She looks after the cultural side, the story told at every table and the house's partnerships.
Together they opened a culinary lab and cultural house in a 16th-century home in the Colonial City, a UNESCO World Heritage Site: a place where people cook with their hands, learn where each ingredient comes from, and eat at a long table with strangers who end up feeling like family.
Whoever walks in is not a customer. They are a guest of the house.
Taíno, African and Spanish, plus the family's Italian bond.
Bought from small producers.
Anafres, charcoal braziers, in the courtyard.
Film, conversation, plants and memory.