Mexican cuisine consists of the cooking cuisines and traditions of the modern country of Mexico. Its earliest roots lie in Mesoamerican cuisine. Mexican cuisine ingredients and methods begin with the first agricultural communities such as the Olmec and Maya who domesticated maize, created the standard process of nixtamalization, and established their foodways. Successive waves of other Mesoamerican groups brought with them their cooking methods. These included: the Teotihuacanos, Toltec, Huastec, Zapotec, Mixtec, Otomi, Purépecha, Totonac, Mazatec, Mazahua, and Nahua. With the Mexica formation of the multi-ethnic Triple Alliance, culinary foodways became infused.
An enchilada is a Mexican dish consisting of a corn tortilla rolled around a filling and covered with a savory sauce. Enchiladas can be filled with various ingredients, including meats, cheese, beans, potatoes, vegetables, or combinations. Enchilada sauces include chili-based sauces, such as salsa roja, various moles, tomatillo-based sauces, such as salsa verde, or cheese-based sauces, such as chile con queso.
Creole cuisine is a cuisine style born in colonial times, from the fusion between African, European and pre-Columbian traditions. Creole is a term that refers to those of European origin who were born in the New World and have adapted to it. According to Norwegian anthropologist Thomas Hylland Eriksen, "a Creole society (...) is based wholly or partly on the mass displacement of people who were, often involuntarily, uprooted from their original home, shedding the main features of their social and political organisations on the way, brought into sustained contact with people from other linguistic and cultural areas and obliged to develop, in creative and improvisational ways, new social and cultural forms in the new land, drawing simultaneously on traditions from their respective places of origin and on impulses resulting from the encounter."
Adobo or adobar is the immersion of food in a stock composed variously of paprika, oregano, salt, garlic, and vinegar to preserve and enhance its flavor. The Portuguese variant is known as carne de vinha d'alhos. The practice, native to Iberia, was widely adopted in Latin America, as well as Spanish and Portuguese colonies in Africa and Asia.
A chalupa is one of several specialty dishes of south-central Mexico, including the states of Hidalgo, Puebla, Guerrero, and Oaxaca.
Filipino cuisine is composed of the cuisines of more than a hundred distinct ethnolinguistic groups found throughout the Philippine archipelago. A majority of mainstream Filipino dishes that comprise Filipino cuisine are from the food traditions of various ethnolinguistic groups and tribes of the archipelago, including the Ilocano, Pangasinan, Kapampangan, Tagalog, Bicolano, Visayan, Chavacano, and Maranao ethnolinguistic groups. The dishes associated with these groups evolved over the centuries from a largely indigenous base shared with maritime Southeast Asia with varied influences from Chinese, Spanish, and American cuisines, in line with the major waves of influence that had enriched the cultures of the archipelago, and adapted using indigenous ingredients to meet local preferences.
Kare-kare is a Philippine stew that features a thick savory peanut sauce. It is generally made from a base of stewed oxtail, beef tripe, pork hocks, calves' feet, pig's feet or trotters, various cuts of pork, beef stew meat, and occasionally offal. Vegetables, such as eggplant, Chinese cabbage, or other greens, daikon, green beans, okra, and asparagus beans, are added. The stew is flavored with ground roasted peanuts or peanut butter, onions, and garlic. It is colored with annatto and can be thickened with toasted or plain ground rice. Variations of kare-kare can be made with seafood, such as prawns, squid, and mussels, or exclusively from vegetables.
Al pastor, tacos al pastor, or tacos de trompo is a preparation of spit-grilled slices of pork originating in the Central Mexican region of Puebla and Mexico City, where they remain most prominent; today, though, it is a common menu item found in taquerías throughout Mexico. The method of preparing and cooking al pastor is based on the lamb shawarma brought by Lebanese immigrants to the region. Al pastor features a flavor palate that uses traditional Mexican adobada (marinade). It is a popular street food that has spread to the United States. In some places of northern Mexico and coastal Mexico, such as in Baja California, taco al pastor is known as taco de trompo or taco de adobada.
Rajas con crema is the name given to a Mexican dish consisting of sliced poblano pepper with cream. It is very popular in Mexico, particularly in the central and southern parts of the country. It is one of the dishes most commonly served during taquizas, together with tinga, mole, chicharrón, and papas con chorizo. Preparation of the dish involves roasting, peeling and slicing the peppers, sauteing them together with sliced onions, and simmering the mixture with cream. Sometimes chicken broth is added for flavor.
Arroz con pollo is a traditional dish of Latin America. It typically consists of chicken cooked with rice, onions, saffron, and a potential plethora of other grains or vegetables. In the Dominican Republic it is alternately called locrio de pollo, and in Saint Martin it is called lokri or locreo.
Picadillo is a traditional dish in many Latin American countries including Mexico and Cuba, as well as the Philippines. It is made with ground meat, tomatoes, and also raisins, olives, and other ingredients that vary by region. The name comes from the Spanish word picar, meaning "to mince".
Pambazo is a Mexican dish or antojito made with pambazo bread dipped and fried in a red guajillo pepper sauce. It is traditionally filled with papas con chorizo or with papas only but there are different varieties.
The Sierra Norte de Puebla is a rugged mountainous region accounting for the northern third of the state of Puebla, Mexico. It is at the intersection of the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt and the Sierra Madre Oriental, between the Mexican Plateau and the Gulf of Mexico coast. From the Mesoamerican period to the 19th century, this area was part of a larger region called Totonacapan, and area dominated by the Totonac people, extending further east to the Gulf of Mexico. Political maneuvers to weaken the Totonacs led to the region being divided between the modern states of Puebla and Veracruz with the Puebla section given its current name. Until the 19th century, the area was almost exclusively indigenous, with the four main groups still found here today, Totonacs, Nahuas, Otomis and Tepehuas, but coffee cultivation brought in mestizos and some European immigrants who took over political and economic power. While highly marginalized socioeconomically, the area has been developed heavily since the mid 20th century, especially with the building of roadways linking it to the Mexico City area and the Gulf coast.
Mole, meaning 'sauce', is a traditional sauce and marinade originally used in Mexican cuisine. In contemporary Mexico the term is used for a number of sauces, some quite dissimilar, including mole amarillo or amarillito, mole chichilo, mole colorado or coloradito, mole manchamantel or manchamanteles, mole negro, mole rojo, mole verde, mole poblano, mole almendrado, mole michoacano, mole prieto, mole ranchero, mole tamaulipeco, mole xiqueno, pipián, mole rosa, mole blanco, mole estofado, tezmole, clemole, mole de olla, chimole, guacamole and huaxmole.
Memelas, also known as memelitas, are fried or toasted cakes made of masa topped with different fresh ingredients eaten as antojitos or snacks in the states of Guerrero, Oaxaca, Tlaxcala, and Puebla, Mexico, which has its origins in prehispanic food. They are similar to fresh corn tortillas, but are slightly thicker and usually oblong/oval in shape. Memela is the local name for the almost identical sope and huarache served in other parts of Mexico, but with different toppings.
The seco is a stew typical of Ecuadorian and Peruvian cuisine. It can be made with any type of meat. According to an Ecuadorian popular etymology, the name of seco comes from the Península de Santa Elena in Ecuador, where at the beginning of the 20th century a camp English did oil work in Ancón, when referring to the second course of food, in English "second", the Ecuadorians repeated deforming the word until they reached the current "seco", which has been widely disseminated, despite being a myth, since records of this dish have been found since 1820, almost a century before the English presence in the Santa Elena Peninsula. At that time, deer and Creole goats abounded. According to the Dictionary of Peruvianisms of the Peruvian Wings University, seco is a «stew of beef, kid or another animal, macerated in vinegar, which is served accompanied by rice and a sauce of ají, huacatay and cilantro". Thus, its main characteristic is to marinate and cook the chosen meat with some type of sauce acid, such as chicha, beer, naranjilla or vinegar.
A meatball is ground meat (mince) rolled into a ball, sometimes along with other ingredients, such as bread crumbs, minced onion, eggs, butter, and seasoning. Meatballs are cooked by frying, baking, steaming, or braising in sauce. There are many types of meatballs using different types of meats and spices. The term is sometimes extended to meatless versions based on legumes, vegetables, mushrooms, fish or other seafood.
The cuisine of Chiapas is a style of cooking centered on the Mexican state of the same name. Like the cuisine of rest of the country, it is based on corn with a mix of indigenous and European influences. It distinguishes itself by retaining most of its indigenous heritage, including the use of the chipilín herb in tamales and soups, used nowhere else in Mexico. However, while it does use some chili peppers, including the very hot simojovel, it does not use it as much as other Mexican regional cuisines, preferring slightly sweet seasoning to its main dishes. Large regions of the state are suitable for grazing and the cuisine reflects this with meat, especially beef and the production of cheese. The most important dish is the tamal, with many varieties created through the state as well as dishes such as chanfaina, similar to menudo and sopa de pan. Although it has been promoted by the state of Chiapas for tourism purposes as well as some chefs, it is not as well known as other Mexican cuisine, such as that of neighboring Oaxaca.
The pepito is a sandwich prepared with beef, pork, or chicken originating from Spain and also very popular in Latin America. It is a common street food in Venezuela and is also available at some U.S. restaurants. For the beef version, various cuts of beef are used, and myriad additional ingredients can also be used in its preparation.
