History of Mexican Cuisine

History of Mexican cuisine cannot be explained simply. The present Mexican cuisines are actually a blend of different regional cuisines such as African foods, French dishes, American food etc. However, it is believed that original Mexican cooking may be derived from cooking habits of people from Mayan civilization. Mayan Indians were nomadic settlers who usually relied on hunting and gathering for their living. Regular food of Mayan Indians was corn tortillas eaten with paste made out of beans. Since, they were hunters they also ate meat of animals, fish and some tropical fruits. During 1300s when the Aztec empire was flourishing they also found eatable items such as peanuts, vanilla beans, chili pepper, cocoa beans, tropical fruit such as avocado etc.

Mexican cuisines started adopted Spanish flavor since 1521 when Spaniards invaded Mexico. Spanish brought different food items along with them, such as citrus, garlic, cheese, wheat, vinegar etc. Though Spaniards made these introductions to Mexican cuisine they were unable to completely change the Mexican cooking habits and famous dishes. It was this era when Mexican cuisines were blended with other type of cuisine such as American, French, and Portuguese etc; hence it can be said that Mexican cuisine is vast and diverse. However, it should be known that you might not get the traditional taste of Mexican foods as it transforms from region to region.

Mexican Cooking Technique

In the history of Mexican cuisine, most foods are prepared either by grilling or roasting, frying or boiling. These foods were cooked by using famous Mexican tools such as Molcajete, Molino and Metate accompanied with Mano. Though cooking techniques such as frying, boiling etc may seem familiar; however, the ingredients and tools used were dissimilar. They usually adopt iron pots and ceramic containers to cook as well as serve food. Oven was a new thing for them, as they had no knowledge about it. Steaming is another cooking technique that came into picture and was adopted by Mexicans for preparing meals. One known traditional cooking technique was to wrap a loaf of meat in banana leaf and was hung over a vessel filled with boiling water. To make spicy and other kind of paste Mexican used Metate and Mano called as Metate y Mano. This served the faction of a grinder and was generally made out of stones.

Important Ingredients Used in Mexican Cuisines:

Chilies are one of the most common ingredients used in the history of Mexican cuisines as most of the time Mexican foods have spicy essence. To add spiciness to their meals Mexican usually adopt ingredients such as spicy jalapeno, ancho pepper also natively known as poblano and Serrano pepper. These chilies are used in different form, pasted, whole, powdered etc. They had lard to serve the purpose of oil and butter, which also adds aroma and flavor to the food.

Through the course of time the spectrum of Mexican dished has seen new introductions and from different regions they implemented different techniques for cooking. However, despite of so many changes and new cuisines in the list the history of Mexican cuisines remains the same.

From History of Mexican Cuisine to Nicaraguan Food