Colombian Traditional Cooking · Research · Memory · Transmission
El Toque Colombiano is a family-led project dedicated to cooking, researching, documenting and transmitting Colombia’s traditional foodways.
The project began publicly in 2014 in response to a practical need: relatives and Colombians living abroad wanted to reproduce the foods and flavours they remembered. What began with family recipes gradually expanded into research on ingredients, techniques, regional preparations, culinary memory and food heritage.
Today, the core team is primarily formed by Zoraida “Chori” Agámez, Heidy Pinto and Diana “Lulú” Tolosa. Three women from the same family whose different experiences bring together lived tradition, culinary practice, research, documentation and transmission.
Our work begins with a simple idea: traditional cuisine is not something frozen in the past. It is living knowledge. It travels, changes, adapts and survives when people continue to cook it, understand it and pass it on.
A Collective Practice
El Toque Colombiano brings together different ways of building culinary knowledge.
We cook and reconstruct preparations; investigate their histories, names, ingredients and territories; exchange knowledge with cooks and tradition bearers; compare sources; test techniques; document processes; create workshops, publications and culinary experiences; and use digital tools to organise and circulate that knowledge.
Through this process, knowledge that often travelled primarily through oral transmission and family practice has also become material that can be documented, taught and passed on. el toque colo;biqno qportes cqd…
The Team
Chori Agámez
Colombian traditional cook and tradition bearer. Her knowledge comes from decades of cooking, memory and exchange with other cooks. Within El Toque Colombiano, she brings lived culinary knowledge, traditional techniques and a way of teaching rooted in practice.
Read Chori Agámez’s full profile →
Heidy Pinto
Traditional cook, Colombian Creole pastry specialist, author and culinary researcher. Her work combines family knowledge, culinary training and a distinctive craftsmanship involving leaves, wrapping techniques and natural containers and food packaging.
Read Heidy Pinto’s full profile →
Diana “Lulú” Tolosa
Colombian traditional cook and historical-cultural researcher. Her work connects cooking with history, territory, diaspora and digital tools, including research, writing, mapping, documentation, translation and the development of El Toque Colombiano’s digital archive.
Read Diana “Lulú” Tolosa’s full profile →
From Research to Publication
One of the projects that best represents our way of working is the research into Colombian envueltos.
A family conversation about preparations that remained in memory grew into a broader investigation of territories, recipes, wrapping techniques, doughs, leaves, cooking methods, terminology and history. el toque colo;biqno qportes cqd…
The process resulted in Envueltos de plátano, yuca y maíz en las cocinas tradicionales de Colombia, currently credited to Zoraida “Chori” Agámez, Heidy Pinto and Diana “Lulú” Tolosa. The project brought together traditional knowledge, culinary research, historical research, documentation and mapping.
The book received international recognition at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards, including continental and worldwide recognition.
Beyond the Blog
Over time, the work developed through El Toque Colombiano has entered festivals, universities, publishing, television, national awards and international cultural settings.
Members of the project have participated in Colombia’s National Traditional Cuisine Awards, appeared as guest experts on MasterChef Celebrity Colombia, led university workshops, represented Colombian traditional cuisine in Washington through activities connected with the Organization of American States, and participated in Colombia’s Cultural Diplomacy programme in Panama.
These recognitions emerged from work that began much earlier: cooking, questioning, researching and sharing.
What We Do
El Toque Colombiano develops work around traditional cooking workshops and demonstrations; envueltos and wrapping techniques; corn, cassava, plantain and leaf-based culinary traditions; Colombian Creole pastry and confectionery; natural food containers and packaging; food heritage research and documentation; talks and educational programmes; culinary experiences; editorial and digital projects; Colombian cooking in diaspora; biodiversity and food culture; gastronomic mapping and digital archives; and collaborations with universities, cultural institutions, embassies, restaurants and research projects.
Our working process can be expressed simply:
cook → question → research → test → document → share → cook again.