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FUS a S FeSMexicos cuisine is a vibrant mix from around the globe

wordsChris Chavez Weitman photosalBerto Trevio

To much of the U.S., Mexican food tsan all-too-easy stereotype: tacos, tamales andchimichangas.

The truth is so much richer this food isabout honest avor and the march of worldhistory. This is Mexican food: the originalfusion.

The countrys cuisine is a mestizo mash-up of every country that ever tried to remakeMexico in its own image, and every foreignerwho was ever forced to work her land. Invad-

ers brought not only the animals, fruits andvegetables native to their homelands, but alsothose native to the countries they had pillageden route to New Spain, as Mexico was called.

Slaves and other laborers arrived, bring-ing with them avors from lands across theocean, fusing those ingredients with whatthey found locally to create dishes that stillre up the culinary world ve centuries later.

International fusion guided New Spainsculinary development from the beginningof colonization. The Islamic inuence onthe cuisine arrived with the Spanish, whohad adopted many of the avors, dishes andcooking methods used during the centuries

of Moorish rule on the Iberian Peninsula.But even those who arrived involuntarily inNew Spain had a tremendous inuence.

The African inuence is best seen along

the Gulf of Mexico and the Costa Chicaarea, says food writer and historian JeffreyPilcher, referring to the Atlantic coastal areaaround Veracruz and the Pacic coastalregion of Guerrero and Oaxaca. Therewere extensive sugar and coffee plantations,and a lot of African slaves were brought into work these areas. The indigenous Africanfood and culture that was carried over bythem had an impact.

Pilcher, the author of Que Vivan Los

Tamales: Food and the Making of MexicanIdentity, says rice is the most prominentexample of Africas inuence on New Spainscuisine.

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The rice came from Senegal and along the NigerRiver, where a particular form of African rice was grown.This is very different from Asian rice, Pilcher adds. Itis true that rice was in Spain and probably was alsocarried to Mexico by the Spanish, but it was a differ-ent kind of rice, probably more like the Asian rice.

Some of the ingredients that inuenced the cuisine hadto travel around the world and back again before becom-ing part of the countrys legendary cuisine. The peanut, forexample, was indigenous to South America and brought toEurope and Africa by Portuguese explorers. African slaves

brought the peanut back with them.In their homeland, Africans used ground peanuts,

onions and spices to create thick sauces. These Africanrecipes, when combined with the Islamic-inspired Spanishdishes that used ground cinnamon, cloves, cumin, garlicand chiles, may have created some of the rst moles.

Another great example of the African inu-ence are the enormous number of pltano machodishes in the southeastern part of Mexico, particularlyVeracruz, says Rachel Laudan, a food writer and histo-rian. They were masters at cooking with pltanos.

The French and Austrians kept the fusion wheel spin-ning when they briey ruled the country in the 1860s.

Its widely believed that the French are the reason thereare so many bakeries in Mexico, but thats not completelyaccurate. The Spanish were the rst to plant wheat inNew Spain because it was the only grain accepted by the

Roman Catholic Church for communion wafers andbecause, well, the Spanish loved bread. They viewed maize corn as something for the lower classes.

The French inuence can be found in the moresophisticated, richer pastries in Mexican bakeries, likecuernosandpastel de tres leches, a direct descendant of therum syrup-soaked French Savarin cake. French-inspireddishes didnt stop at the bakery door,either. Chiles en nogada, bolovanes,queso fundido and, of course, crepaswere all inspired by French cuisine.

Even Asia got in on the fusionfun not once, but twice. For 250years, the Manila-Acapulco galleonsoperated between the Philippinesand Mexico beginning in the 1500s.The ships brought exotic cargo, suchas palm trees and mangos. Tamarindmay have arrived this way. The secondwave of Asian inuence came in theearly 1900s along the Pacic coast, where descendants of the Chinese who came to work on the rail-roads or in the silver mines still live.

In Baja California, the town ofMexicali has been dubbed MexicosChinese food capital because it claimsto have more Chinese restaurantsthan any other Mexican city. Stir-frieddishes are made with more oil than

traditional Chinese stir-fry becausesome Mexicans usually fry theirrice before cooking it. But perhapsthe ultimate fusion food born in this area is the chimale:masa stuffed with barbecued pork or kung pao chicken.

Air travel and the Internet now puts everythingat our ngertips. The next big thing in the culinary world can ping aroundthe globe in seconds.But Mexicos cuisinehas been avored overthe centuries by manycultures and countries.

Its dishes ultimately becamemestizo Mexicano because ofthe subtle fusion of ingredientsthat the land made its own.

a Mxicn twist on Frnch clssic: crps (or crps) flld withpuerco asado (rostd pork), salsa verde nd queso fresco.

inFluEncEs on MExicAn cuisinE

Other countries and culturescontributing to Mexicos culinaryfusion:

Ecuador and Peru: Ceviche

Germany: Lager beer Rye grains

BlutwurstgMorcilla (blood sausage)Greece:

Feta cheeseg Panela cheese

Italy: Mozzarella cheesegOaxaca cheese Parmesan cheeseg Aejo cheese Spaghetti and tomato saucegFideos

Mennonites: Mennonite cheeseg Chihuahuacheese

United tates: Fajitasg Tacos al carbn

Cream cheese Coca-Cola