Flour Power

When Victoria Cappadona was growing up in McAllen in the 1970s, she would pluck ripe beans from wild mesquite trees and pop them in her mouth, savoring their sweetness.

Around 6 inches long, the beans looked like strands of brown beads dangling in bunches from the scrubby trees characteristic of the South Texas landscape. “That was candy for a lot of kids,” Victoria remembers.

Little did she know that she would later play a role in reviving this obscure ingredient for