Juan Gomez
Lilia Comedor | Portland, OR
JULY 2023
Between family celebrations and eating at his dad’s taco shop in California when he was 13, food was always a big part of Juan Gomez’s upbringing. But it wasn’t until he was incarcerated at age 19 that he took a job in the kitchen. With Julia Child playing in the background while he was working, Gomez grew to love the structure of the kitchen. When he was released at age 21, Gomez went on to work in his uncle’s taco shop, then moved to Arizona to live with his mother. He picked up work at bars, restaurants, and country clubs—anywhere he could learn and improve his culinary skills. In 2015, Gomez visited his uncle in Salem, Oregon, and after an excursion up to Portland, he found where he wanted to be. After a brief stint at Coin Jam in Salem, Gomez moved to the Portland area, where he was introduced to seasonal cooking at Salty’s. He was promoted from the line to sous chef, while also picking up shifts in Vancouver, Washington at Lapellah on days off. He then went on to accept a job at José Chesa’s Masia.
After the pandemic hit, Gomez held positions at a few restaurants, including Peter Cho’s Toki and Mark Wooten’s Little Conejo. After a transformative meal at República, he sent a message to Rising Stars alum Angel Medina asking to work there. He started in 2021 with the simple goal of learning on the line. He moved up to sous, and was eventually offered the chef de cuisine position, and though he initially turned it down, he eventually accepted it. But after a few months, something didn’t feel quite right to Gomez: he felt as though the elevated Mexican food he was cooking was unfamiliar to him, and didn’t resonate with his Mexican-American upbringing. So when the República team approached him about running their new, hyper-local and hyper-seasonal concept, Gomez opened Lilia Comedor, a tribute to his mother. The restaurant is a culinary sandbox for Gomez, who changes the menu weekly and zeroes in on Pacific Northwest cuisine through the lens of a Mexican-American chef. Dishes like his pork collar carnitas with pan Àrabe, fried brussels sprouts, heirloom carrot escabeche, and salsa quemada celebrate technique and stay true to Gomez’s identity.
