I was visiting a friend’s family, who actually had immigrated to this area from Ethiopia. The grandmother, head of the family, came in with carrying some gourds filled with an array of delicious foods. Some sort of meat stew, a large piece of flatbread, and this spicy green sauce.

It was one of my favorite meals of that time. I will never forget the sensation of the sweat dripping off my body, a combination of the heat and the chiles, but it was so good that you just had to have one more bite…