Sometimes flowers are on the plate. You’ve seen them: little pansies or violas dressing up a dinner or dessert. Sometimes they come in the form of laurels, symbolic marks of honor.
San Antonio has one of those this weekend.
Cookbook author and food blogger Dora Ramírez has brought a bite of gold back to the Alamo City. Her 2025 title, “Comida Casera: More Than 100 Vegan Recipes, from Traditional to Modern Mexican Dishes,” won the James Beard Media Award in the Vegetable-Focused Cooking category. The James Beard Media Awards honor the best in food media, including books, broadcast media and journalism. Winners were announced Saturday during a ceremony at The Art Institute of Chicago.
San Antonio-based author and blogger Dora Ramírez has won a James Beard Media Award for her cookbook “Comida Casera.” (Hachette Book Group)
“You guys!!!!! I can’t believe it!!! I’m a @beardfoundation award winner!” Ramírez wrote in an Instagram post. She followed that up with “Thank you for all of your love and support!! When I quit working in restaurants to start a family I thought my career was over. So I want to dedicate this award to all the moms, especially the moms of special needs children, and my wonderful mom Dora. Mamá y papá los amo, nada de esto hubiera sido posible sin ustedes.”
That last bit in Spanish essentially translates to “Mom and dad, I love you. None of this would have been possible without you.”
GO FOR GOLD: San Antonio author nominated for James Beard Media Award for vegan Mexican cookbook
Sarah Ahn (from left) and Nam Soon Ahn, winners of the U.S. Foodways Book Award, and Dora Ramírez, winner of the Vegetable-Focused Cooking Book Award, attend the 2026 James Beard Media Awards at The Art Institute of Chicago on June 13. (Jeff Schear/Getty Images for the James Beard)
Ramírez drew fast kudos from a wide range of supporters, including some well-known San Antonio-based culinarians.
Fellow cookbook author and media force-of-nature Adán Medrano, who published “The Texas Mexican Plant-Based Cookbook” last year as well, weighed in with, “Congratulations!! So very well deserved!!”
According to a previous post, Ramírez spent 2 1/2 years creating her award-winning title. Within those pages, she translated family-favorite recipes into vegan interpretations and introduced plant-based dishes from her research throughout Mexico. She gave a shoutout to the latter in her celebratory post during her award-acceptance speech: “A special thank you to to the Indigenous men and women who contributed to the Indigenous kitchen chapter,” Ramírez said during the ceremony. “They graciously took me into their homes and allowed me to document their recipes and share them with the world.”
The James Beard Restaurant and Chef Awards winners will be announced Monday beginning at 5:30 p.m. at bonappetit.com, and on the James Beard Foundation’s YouTube channel with programming starting slightly earlier at 5 p.m. The complete James Beard Media Awards presentation also is available on YouTube.com. Ramírez takes the stage a few moments after the 44-minute mark.
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This article originally published at San Antonio cookbook author wins James Beard Media Award.
