Among Junior and Jachel Pineda’s most treasured photographs of their father, Julio, one of five men killed in the Amazon cargo plane crash in Miami earlier this month, is one of him wearing his favorite red apron. Embroidered on the front are the words Chef Mago – the “wizard chef” in English – and Julio is clutching a ladle and tending to a pot on the stovetop.
The kitchen was one of the 75-year-old Cuban immigrant’s happy places, where he would cook for his family, his friends and his neighbors in the Hialeah community where he lived. He would feed and entertain them even after an exhausting shift for the aircraft cleaning company he was employed by.
