Tex-Mex foods are a combination of Indian and Spanish cuisines, which
came together to make a distinct new cuisine. Foods also reveal some
of the cultural differences between such regional groups as Mexican
Americansqv in South Texas and those in West Texas.

The first Spaniards to arrive in Texas encountered a variety of Indian
groups who ate different diets. The nomadic tribes lived off the land,
eating game, fish, and available edible plants. Sedentary groups, such
as those at La Junta de los Ríos,qv cultivated such crops as corn,
beans, tomatoes, potatoes, squash, pumpkins, sunflower seeds, and
peppers. Their squash was likely the cushaw, a winter squash that
could be eaten in its tender stage or allowed to mature like a pumpkin
and stored for winter. These cultivated foods were supplemented by
wild plants and game, and some Indian groups had the domesticated
turkeys. Wild game included deer, rabbits, javelinas, and quail. Wild
plant foods included such products of cactiqv as nopales (prickly pear
leaves), tunas (prickly pear fruit), and pitahayas (a sweet cactus
fruit). Others were the sotol plant (usually baked in pits), the
century plant and lechuguilla (both members of the agave family), and
the mesquiteqv bean. The Spaniards introduced wheat and a number of
domestic animals-including pigs, goats, cattle, and sheep-along with a
number of fruits and vegetables.

In early times, the Indians ate corn in one form or another at almost
every meal. In its tender (roasting ear) stage, it is eaten fresh as
elotes (either boiled in water or cooked over coals in the shuck) or
boiled and dried for future use. In West Texas, the ears are called
chacales. Boiled and dried fresh corn is also added to various other
dishes, such as the West Texas Lenten dish comida de quaresma. In its
mature stage, corn is toasted on a comal and ground into fine powder
on a metate. This powder can be eaten dry (with cinnamon and
piloncillo-raw sugar) as pinole or cooked in water or milk and eaten
as atole. More commonly, the ripe corn kernels are boiled in water
with lime added to remove the hard shell and swell the corn into a
hominy-like state. It can then be used to make the breakfast dish
posole (cooked with meat, chiles, garlic, salt, and sometimes other
vegetables and seasonings). This processed corn is ground on a metate
to make masa for corn tortillas (later, small hand-mills, or molinas,
became available to speed the process) or to make nixtamal for
tamales. Earlier in the twentieth century, corn tortillas were made
almost daily, but tamales were made only on special occasions,
particularly Christmas.

When wheat flour became readily available in the 1930s, the flour
tortilla began to replace the corn tortilla. Few people make corn
tortillas today. Most buy them from the store and make flour
tortillas, which are so much easier to make, at home. Corn tortillas
form the basis of a number of popular dishes-enchiladas, tacos,
chilaquiles, chalupas, quesadillas, tostadas, botanas, and others. The
masa can be cooked in thicker patties to make gorditas filled with
ground or shredded meat, chopped lettuce and tomatoes, and grated
cheese. Most Texas-Mexican corn dishes, and the equipment used to
prepare them, have names derived from the Aztec language, Nahuatl.

Another staple eaten daily was frijoles, or beans. In the earliest
times, these were either kidney beans, tepary beans, or sometimes the
black beans more common in Mexico. When they became available,
however, pinto beans became the overwhelming popular choice.

These were boiled in an olla (clay pot) and eaten as frijoles enteros,
frijoles de la olla, or frijoles graniados. These may be reheated a
time or two and served in the same form. As they are reheated, they
tend to become soupy, and in this phase are referred to as frijoles
familiares. Then the whole beans are fried as frijoles fritos.
Finally, they are mashed and refried in lard with green chiles and
onions or garlic-the well known dish found in burritos and served as
side dishes with most Mexican foods in restaurants: frijoles refritos
or machacados. Combined with other foods, beans may also be served as
such dishes as frijoles a la charra (beans cooked with tomatoes,
onions, cilantro and chiles), frijoles con queso (frijoles enteros or
familiares with grated cheese), frijoles con chorizo (beans with
Mexican sausage), and frijoles con quelites (beans with pigweed, an
edible plant growing in the wild).

Squash was boiled as calabasa cocida or sliced and dried as rueditas.
The latter could be stored and used later. Perhaps the favorite squash
dish was calabacita, squash boiled, chopped, and fried with onions,
tomatoes, and cheese. Cooked with meat to make a type of stew, it
became calabacita con carne; cooked with chicken, it became calabacita
con pollo. Pumpkins were used to make empanadas, among other dishes.

There were numerous dishes made from various meats, both from domestic
and wild animals. Some of the more traditional ones are from pork,
including chicharrones (fried pork rinds and various internal parts);
from goat, including cabrito and machitos (called buriñate or buruñate
in West Texas and burrañate in New Mexico); and from cattle, including
fajitas. When a goat is butchered, machitos are made from the heart,
lungs, kidneys, liver, and other internal parts, which are chopped and
wrapped in the tela (visceral lining) and tied with a piece of the
tripa, or small intestine. This is then cooked a la parrilla (on a
grill) or al horno (in the oven). Another traditional dish from West
Texas, deprecated by Anglos and acculturated Mexican Americans) is
morcilla, a dish made from pig blood that is still prepared in rural
areas of Spain. The blood is cooked inside the pig's cleaned stomach
and then fried with chile, chopped onion, chopped tomatoes, garlic,
and oregano. An older custom calls for adding raisins and nuts.
Various caldos (soups) and adobos (a type of pickled meat dish) were
also common. When a large animal, such as a steer, was butchered on
the ranch, it was shared among the families there. Meats could be
dried, made into chorizo, or cooked and immersed in lard. Carne seca
(dried meat, sometimes called tasajo, or jerky) could last long
periods and was prepared as guisados (stews) and a popular breakfast
dish, machacado, made of shredded carne seca, eggs, and chiles.
Chickens and turkeys were also common in most rural areas. They
provided such dishes as arroz con pollo (chicken and rice), calabacita
con pollo (chicken and squash), pollo guisado (stewed chicken), and
chicken soup. Eggs could be used in such dishes as chorizo con huevos
(sausage with eggs), papas con huevos (potatoes with eggs), and huevos
rancheros (an egg dish prepared with chiles, onions, and other
spices). Women also made fresh cheese from cow's and goat's milk,
called queso blanco or in West Texas asaderos. They also made butter
and jocoque (buttermilk) and such confections as leche quemada
(caramel candy) and arroz con leche (rice pudding).

Dishes made from wheat flour (brought by the Spaniards) include a
number of breads and confections. The same dough used to make flour
tortillas at home can be cooked in an oven as pan de agua. A popular
pastry, the sopapilla, is made of flour tortilla dough rolled and
folded, then fried in hot lard and served with honey or another
sweetener. Buñuelos are flour tortilla fried until crisp, then
sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. Pan blanco (or bolillos-also a
slang name for Anglos) is a small, spongy loaf. Pan de campo was a
wheat bread commonly cooked in cow camps in both West and South Texas.
The various sweets made from wheat flour are legion, the more common
ones being pan dulce (Mexican sweet bread), bizcochos (anise cookies),
and cupcakes (sometimes called mamones because of their shape). These
various pastries are an integral part of most fiestas, particularly
quinceañeras,qv weddings, birthdays, and Christmas and New Year
celebrations. Desserts include capirotada (a type of bread pudding)
and arroz blanco con leche cocido (or simply arroz con leche), a rice
and milk dessert with raisins and sugar.

Although traditional foods reveal the strong cultural ties between
Mexican Americans in West Texas and those in South Texas, they also
reveal the cultural differences. West Texas Hispanics are much more
closely tied to the New Mexican culture. In West Texas and New Mexico,
for example, enchiladas are typically prepared flat: the tortilla is
dipped into hot grease and then into chile sauce, placed on a plate,
and covered with grated cheese and chopped onions. The process is
repeated until one has a stack of three or four tortillas, upon which
a fried egg may be placed to make enchiladas montadas (mounted
enchiladas). Beef or chicken is reserved for the rolled enchiladas
originally popular in South Texas and now available around the world.
Some dishes are not shared at the folk level but spread in popular
culture (as exemplified by restaurants, for instance). Fajitas, for
instance, widely available in restaurants, are a common folk dish in
South Texas but not in West Texas. Working-class Mexican Americans in
South Texas like tripitas, though the dish is not very popular in West
Texas. (Tripitas are traditionally fried in a cooker made from an old
plow disk set on three legs of pipe over an open fire or coals.)
Morcilla, made of pork blood, is common in West Texas but not in South
Texas. Despite regional differences of taste at the folk level,
however, various Tex-Mex dishes have become popular world-wide.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ernestine Sewell Linck and Joyce Gibson Roach, Eats: A
Folk History of Texas Foods (Fort Worth: Texas Christian University
Press, 1989). John O. West, Mexican-American Folklore (Little Rock:
August House, 1988).
Joe S. Graham

On Feb 17, 4:52 pm, "The Galloping Gourmand" >
wrote:

Or, you could have just dropped a link. But that wouldn't have been
you, would it?

David

"The Galloping Gourmand" > wrote in message
oups.com...
Tex-Mex foods are a combination of Indian and Spanish cuisines, which
came together to make a distinct new cuisine. Foods also reveal some
of the cultural differences between such regional groups as Mexican
Americansqv in South Texas and those in West Texas.

The first Spaniards to arrive in Texas encountered a variety of Indian
groups who ate different diets. The nomadic tribes lived off the land,
eating game, fish, and available edible plants. Sedentary groups, such
as those at La Junta de los Ríos,qv cultivated such crops as corn,
beans, tomatoes, potatoes, squash, pumpkins, sunflower seeds, and
peppers. Their squash was likely the cushaw, a winter squash that
could be eaten in its tender stage or allowed to mature like a pumpkin
and stored for winter. These cultivated foods were supplemented by
wild plants and game, and some Indian groups had the domesticated
turkeys. Wild game included deer, rabbits, javelinas, and quail. Wild
plant foods included such products of cactiqv as nopales (prickly pear
leaves), tunas (prickly pear fruit), and pitahayas (a sweet cactus
fruit). Others were the sotol plant (usually baked in pits), the
century plant and lechuguilla (both members of the agave family), and
the mesquiteqv bean. The Spaniards introduced wheat and a number of
domestic animals-including pigs, goats, cattle, and sheep-along with a
number of fruits and vegetables.

In early times, the Indians ate corn in one form or another at almost
every meal. In its tender (roasting ear) stage, it is eaten fresh as
elotes (either boiled in water or cooked over coals in the shuck) or
boiled and dried for future use. In West Texas, the ears are called
chacales. Boiled and dried fresh corn is also added to various other
dishes, such as the West Texas Lenten dish comida de quaresma. In its
mature stage, corn is toasted on a comal and ground into fine powder
on a metate. This powder can be eaten dry (with cinnamon and
piloncillo-raw sugar) as pinole or cooked in water or milk and eaten
as atole. More commonly, the ripe corn kernels are boiled in water
with lime added to remove the hard shell and swell the corn into a
hominy-like state. It can then be used to make the breakfast dish
posole (cooked with meat, chiles, garlic, salt, and sometimes other
vegetables and seasonings). This processed corn is ground on a metate
to make masa for corn tortillas (later, small hand-mills, or molinas,
became available to speed the process) or to make nixtamal for
tamales. Earlier in the twentieth century, corn tortillas were made
almost daily, but tamales were made only on special occasions,
particularly Christmas.

When wheat flour became readily available in the 1930s, the flour
tortilla began to replace the corn tortilla. Few people make corn
tortillas today. Most buy them from the store and make flour
tortillas, which are so much easier to make, at home. Corn tortillas
form the basis of a number of popular dishes-enchiladas, tacos,
chilaquiles, chalupas, quesadillas, tostadas, botanas, and others. The
masa can be cooked in thicker patties to make gorditas filled with
ground or shredded meat, chopped lettuce and tomatoes, and grated
cheese. Most Texas-Mexican corn dishes, and the equipment used to
prepare them, have names derived from the Aztec language, Nahuatl.

Another staple eaten daily was frijoles, or beans. In the earliest
times, these were either kidney beans, tepary beans, or sometimes the
black beans more common in Mexico. When they became available,
however, pinto beans became the overwhelming popular choice.

These were boiled in an olla (clay pot) and eaten as frijoles enteros,
frijoles de la olla, or frijoles graniados. These may be reheated a
time or two and served in the same form. As they are reheated, they
tend to become soupy, and in this phase are referred to as frijoles
familiares. Then the whole beans are fried as frijoles fritos.
Finally, they are mashed and refried in lard with green chiles and
onions or garlic-the well known dish found in burritos and served as
side dishes with most Mexican foods in restaurants: frijoles refritos
or machacados. Combined with other foods, beans may also be served as
such dishes as frijoles a la charra (beans cooked with tomatoes,
onions, cilantro and chiles), frijoles con queso (frijoles enteros or
familiares with grated cheese), frijoles con chorizo (beans with
Mexican sausage), and frijoles con quelites (beans with pigweed, an
edible plant growing in the wild).

Squash was boiled as calabasa cocida or sliced and dried as rueditas.
The latter could be stored and used later. Perhaps the favorite squash
dish was calabacita, squash boiled, chopped, and fried with onions,
tomatoes, and cheese. Cooked with meat to make a type of stew, it
became calabacita con carne; cooked with chicken, it became calabacita
con pollo. Pumpkins were used to make empanadas, among other dishes.

There were numerous dishes made from various meats, both from domestic
and wild animals. Some of the more traditional ones are from pork,
including chicharrones (fried pork rinds and various internal parts);
from goat, including cabrito and machitos (called buriñate or buruñate
in West Texas and burrañate in New Mexico); and from cattle, including
fajitas. When a goat is butchered, machitos are made from the heart,
lungs, kidneys, liver, and other internal parts, which are chopped and
wrapped in the tela (visceral lining) and tied with a piece of the
tripa, or small intestine. This is then cooked a la parrilla (on a
grill) or al horno (in the oven). Another traditional dish from West
Texas, deprecated by Anglos and acculturated Mexican Americans) is
morcilla, a dish made from pig blood that is still prepared in rural
areas of Spain. The blood is cooked inside the pig's cleaned stomach
and then fried with chile, chopped onion, chopped tomatoes, garlic,
and oregano. An older custom calls for adding raisins and nuts.
Various caldos (soups) and adobos (a type of pickled meat dish) were
also common. When a large animal, such as a steer, was butchered on
the ranch, it was shared among the families there. Meats could be
dried, made into chorizo, or cooked and immersed in lard. Carne seca
(dried meat, sometimes called tasajo, or jerky) could last long
periods and was prepared as guisados (stews) and a popular breakfast
dish, machacado, made of shredded carne seca, eggs, and chiles.
Chickens and turkeys were also common in most rural areas. They
provided such dishes as arroz con pollo (chicken and rice), calabacita
con pollo (chicken and squash), pollo guisado (stewed chicken), and
chicken soup. Eggs could be used in such dishes as chorizo con huevos
(sausage with eggs), papas con huevos (potatoes with eggs), and huevos
rancheros (an egg dish prepared with chiles, onions, and other
spices). Women also made fresh cheese from cow's and goat's milk,
called queso blanco or in West Texas asaderos. They also made butter
and jocoque (buttermilk) and such confections as leche quemada
(caramel candy) and arroz con leche (rice pudding).

Dishes made from wheat flour (brought by the Spaniards) include a
number of breads and confections. The same dough used to make flour
tortillas at home can be cooked in an oven as pan de agua. A popular
pastry, the sopapilla, is made of flour tortilla dough rolled and
folded, then fried in hot lard and served with honey or another
sweetener. Buñuelos are flour tortilla fried until crisp, then
sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. Pan blanco (or bolillos-also a
slang name for Anglos) is a small, spongy loaf. Pan de campo was a
wheat bread commonly cooked in cow camps in both West and South Texas.
The various sweets made from wheat flour are legion, the more common
ones being pan dulce (Mexican sweet bread), bizcochos (anise cookies),
and cupcakes (sometimes called mamones because of their shape). These
various pastries are an integral part of most fiestas, particularly
quinceañeras,qv weddings, birthdays, and Christmas and New Year
celebrations. Desserts include capirotada (a type of bread pudding)
and arroz blanco con leche cocido (or simply arroz con leche), a rice
and milk dessert with raisins and sugar.

Although traditional foods reveal the strong cultural ties between
Mexican Americans in West Texas and those in South Texas, they also
reveal the cultural differences. West Texas Hispanics are much more
closely tied to the New Mexican culture. In West Texas and New Mexico,
for example, enchiladas are typically prepared flat: the tortilla is
dipped into hot grease and then into chile sauce, placed on a plate,
and covered with grated cheese and chopped onions. The process is
repeated until one has a stack of three or four tortillas, upon which
a fried egg may be placed to make enchiladas montadas (mounted
enchiladas). Beef or chicken is reserved for the rolled enchiladas
originally popular in South Texas and now available around the world.
Some dishes are not shared at the folk level but spread in popular
culture (as exemplified by restaurants, for instance). Fajitas, for
instance, widely available in restaurants, are a common folk dish in
South Texas but not in West Texas. Working-class Mexican Americans in
South Texas like tripitas, though the dish is not very popular in West
Texas. (Tripitas are traditionally fried in a cooker made from an old
plow disk set on three legs of pipe over an open fire or coals.)
Morcilla, made of pork blood, is common in West Texas but not in South
Texas. Despite regional differences of taste at the folk level,
however, various Tex-Mex dishes have become popular world-wide.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ernestine Sewell Linck and Joyce Gibson Roach, Eats: A
Folk History of Texas Foods (Fort Worth: Texas Christian University
Press, 1989). John O. West, Mexican-American Folklore (Little Rock:
August House, 1988).
Joe S. Graham


-------------------------

Love it! This was great!

I'm about ready to trash my evening menu and go for the flat enchiladas
mentioned in the article!

Rice was not mentioned except as a drink and not as an important part of a
typical US/Mex dish. I am using US/Mex in order to take Tex-Mex, East NM
Mex, West NM Mex, Cal Mex and the rest. Love 'em all!

Rice was brought to the Americas by the captured slaves from Africa ending
up in all ports. It would be interesting to see how it migrated from poor
food to must-have food later on. I don't know of a single Mexican family,
rich or poor, that does not have rice about once a day in their main meal.
Same for beans, tortillas and bread.

And speaking of bread... as an amateur anthropologist, I'd love to have a
lab where I could trace the various strains of yeast used in the bolillo and
telera as compared to San Fran Sour Dough. I bet the yeast would be more
telling than language or the written word. (Especially since there was no
written word prior to the conquest.. or if so, was destroyed by the
evangelical nuts.

Thanks for sharing this research with us!

On Feb 17, 5:56 pm, "Wayne Lundberg" >
wrote:
>
> Thanks for sharing this research with us!

Please explain why it was necessary to repeat the whole damn thing.

David

On Feb 17, 3:48?pm, "dtwright37" > wrote:
> On Feb 17, 4:52 pm, "The Galloping Gourmand" >
> wrote:
>
> Or, you could have just dropped a link. But that wouldn't have been
> you, would it?

To link, or not to link.
Aye, that is one question.
Whether 'tis effective to gesture,
Or to lecture, or to let the matter
Lapse into silence,
Those are other choices.

"dtwright37" > wrote in message
oups.com...
> On Feb 17, 5:56 pm, "Wayne Lundberg" >
> wrote:
> >
> > Thanks for sharing this research with us!
>
> Please explain why it was necessary to repeat the whole damn thing.
>
> David
>
>
Yes. you are right. This thing about top posting and bottom posting protocol
has me going nuts. Most of us would be happy to simply respond with a top
post, but then others will be unhappy because they did not read the first
posting and wonder what it's all about.

Some monitored newsgroups will kill file a top posting reply. Others simply
cut and paste on the bottom leaving the original message intact.

It all started back with CompuServe. Maybe it's time to take another look at
newsgroup posting protocol!

Wayne

Rather as the title says "A Folk History of Texas Foods" , in fact the
article excerpt you posted was a small teaser for the ladies' book on Texas
Eats. The authors divide the state up into areas and discuss the cuisine as
they know it from their Texcentric perspective or as was told them.

(You forgot the site credits:
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/.../TT/lgtlt.html )

On Feb 18, 11:39 am, "Wayne Lundberg" >
wrote:

> Yes. you are right. This thing about top posting and bottom posting protocol
> has me going nuts.

Well, Wayne, it's easy enough. All you do is delete everything you're
not responding to, and then make your comment just under. Anyone who
needs more information can either look earlier in the thread, or look
it up in Google Groups. Easy! ;-)

David

On Feb 18, 12:15 pm, "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote:

> (You forgot the site credits:http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/.../TT/lgtlt.html)

Good catch!

David

I'm a closet top poster!

Wayne Lundberg wrote:
> "dtwright37" > wrote in message
> oups.com...
>> On Feb 17, 5:56 pm, "Wayne Lundberg" >
>> wrote:
>>> Thanks for sharing this research with us!
>> Please explain why it was necessary to repeat the whole damn thing.
>>
>> David
>>
>>
> Yes. you are right. This thing about top posting and bottom posting protocol
> has me going nuts. Most of us would be happy to simply respond with a top
> post, but then others will be unhappy because they did not read the first
> posting and wonder what it's all about.
>
> Some monitored newsgroups will kill file a top posting reply. Others simply
> cut and paste on the bottom leaving the original message intact.
>
> It all started back with CompuServe. Maybe it's time to take another look at
> newsgroup posting protocol!
>
> Wayne
>
>

On Feb 18, 5:01 pm, "dtwright37" > wrote:
> On Feb 18, 12:15 pm, "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote:
>
> > (You forgot the site credits:http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/.../TT/lgtlt.html)
>
> Good catch!
>
> David

On Feb 20, 12:28 am, Sonoran Dude > wrote:
> I'm a closet top poster!

Apparently not, since you outed yourself!

All it takes, though, to overcome this, IMO, malady, is the
determination to spend a few keystrokes getting rid of extraneous
stuff, and to add your thoughts below what you really want to respond
to.

David, a bottom poster from way back

Good for you!


"dtwright37" > wrote in message
oups.com...
> On Feb 20, 12:28 am, Sonoran Dude > wrote:
> > I'm a closet top poster!
>
> Apparently not, since you outed yourself!
>
> All it takes, though, to overcome this, IMO, malady, is the
> determination to spend a few keystrokes getting rid of extraneous
> stuff, and to add your thoughts below what you really want to respond
> to.
>
> David, a bottom poster from way back
>

On Feb 20, 2:20?pm, "Wayne Lundberg" >
wrote:
> Good for you!

I'm really disappointed in this group.

It seems that the chili-drunk Norte?o tacoheads are more interested in
a meta-discussion about how to post to Usenet (or who has the right to
post to Usenet) than they are in learning more about Mexican cooking.

The article suggested various Mexican dishes that I'd never eaten, or
thought of.

Like calabacita con carne or calabacita con pollo. I would have never
thought of making an interesting dish of squash and chicken. When my
father raised squash, he couldn't sell it, he couldn't give it away,
and I sure as heck wouldn't *eat* it.

What about pumpkin empanadas? I never thought of that either, pumpkin
went into pies, not turnovers in our ethnic cooking.

Now it's time for Mexicans to start eating comida de quaresma, so
that's something to look for in the Mexican food section of the local
supermarkets.

Then there was the business about the emerging popularity of pinto
beans. I never liked kidney beans as a kid, and never ate black beans
until I was an adult, to me a pinto bean was *always* the bean to eat.
So pinto beans must have become popular before I was born.

And what the heck is a "tepary bean"?

The article mentioned frijoles con quelites (beans with pigweed, an
edible plant growing in the wild). What does pigweed look like? Do
Mexican markets sell pigweed?

I've seen recipes for frijoles a la charra (beans cooked with
tomatoes,
onions, cilantro and chiles) on the web, that sounds interesting.

And, why do Mexicans call roasted ears of corn "elote" in one part of
texas and "chacales" in another part? Are they prepared differently?

The article certainly inspired my curiousity.

"The Galloping Gourmand" > wrote in message
oups.com...
>
What about pumpkin empanadas? I never thought of that either, pumpkin
> went into pies, not turnovers in our ethnic cooking.

Try Pumpkin and chorizo empanadas as a nice little tapa with a glass of
Sherry but I do not want to hear that it is not authentic, or needs to be
made without cumin, The pumpkin (or any squash, such as butternut, acorn,
etc) needs some spice, try outside the box with the usual cake spices and
use savory spices ( coriander, cumin, tumeric) and/or cakes spices together.

Also See S. American dishes

So pinto beans must have become popular before I was born.
> And what the heck is a "tepary bean"?

You just said mentioned them, Tepary is the pintolooking bean, also try the
Anasazi bean, or the Hopi ones, I will find my link to post later
>
> The article mentioned frijoles con quelites (beans with pigweed, an
> edible plant growing in the wild). What does pigweed look like? Do
> Mexican markets sell pigweed?

You may know pig weed as the leaves of amaranth, the original ceral grain.
Try the grain too and also Quinoa . You must try epazote( supposed to
help with gas)to get a real flavor of Mexican cooking, a bit unusual but I
like well cooked greens of all types.
>
> I've seen recipes for frijoles a la charra (beans cooked with
tomatoes, onions, cilantro and chiles) on the web, that sounds interesting.

Beans, Rice, Cornbread and green onions was dinner many a day. A soup bone
or hock and even bacon fat was thrown in the beans for flavor along with too
ripe tomatoes, chile peppers & onion. Garlic was always a thing in a salt
shaker thing. Corn tortillas were always around but flour was more readily
available for the same reason it is today (corn is losing the battle in
Mexico ) Corn is used mostly for Cattle feed. (Ever tried to cook and eat
Dent corn ?) Climate and soil dictates diet.

Texas cooking grew out of the Hacendios style of Northern Mexico, Cowboy
cooking if you will, tough meats, limited supply chain, hence the use of
strong spices and hot flavor. The meat was Chuck shanks, briskets, and of
course mostly Ground. Hill country was Sheep, goat and venison. Texas
round steak was fried bologna. An Oil field lunch was a can of Ranch style
beans & Vienna sausages along with stick of Saltine crackers ( an hour's
wages of .75) the Cans were heated up on the manifold of the truck going to
the job site . Enchiladas, Tacos and Tamales were not special occasion
meals but good and inexpensive Truck Stop food when you could get to one or
a small town diner and yes they came with mashed beans, spanish rice and bit
of Iceberg lettuce all on one plate, every meal was on one plate. so the
Combo plate thing is spliting straws for the snobs for me.

Having said all this the East Texas Lady you quote thinks Fort Worth is West
Texas and that West Texas cooking is actually New Mexican Cooking. She is
way off here in understanding of the SouthWest. That is my issue with what
you and Wayne think of Norteno. Know it and understand it first. Each SW
state has as different a style as the southern Mexican States, yet has as
many similiarities. Cumin, it is in Mexican Spanish Cooking as are Chiles
used in dishes. Border cooking is not always for Chileheads either.

The Galloping Gourmand wrote:

> And what the heck is a "tepary bean"?
>

Main Entry: te·pa·ry bean
Pronunciation: 'te-p&-rE-
Function: noun
Etymology: Mexican Spanish tépari, from Ópata or Eudeve (Uto-Aztecan
languages of Sonora, Mexico)
: an annual twining bean (Phaseolus acutifolius var. latifolius) that is
native to the southwestern United States and Mexico and is cultivated
for its roundish white, yellow, brown, or bluish-black edible seeds;
also : the seed


At least us Norte Taco Bending folks know how to use a search engine.
http://www.nativeseeds.org/v2/cat.php?catID=42

On Feb 21, 9:04?am, "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote:

> You may know pig weed as the leaves of amaranth, the original ceral grain.

The article may have been referring to Common Purslane, aka Verdolaga.

I first realized that it was edible when my Armenian neighbors started
picking it out of the cracks in the sidewalk. It grows wild in poor,
sandy soil, which describes my backyard.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portulaca_oleracea

Recipe for pork stew with verdolaga

http://gourmetsleuth.com/verdolaga.htm

More on edible weeds:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pigweed

Pigweed can mean any of a number of weedy plants which may be used as
pig fodder:

Amaranthus species
Chenopodium species
Portulaca species

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaranthus

Amaranth grain is a crop of moderate importance in the Himalaya. It
was one of the staple foodstuffs of the Incas, and it is known as
kiwicha in the Andes today. It was also used by the ancient Aztecs,
who called it huautli, and other Amerindian peoples in Mexico to
prepare ritual drinks and foods. To this day, amaranth grains are
toasted much like popcorn and mixed with honey or molasses to make a
treat called alegr?a (literally "joy" in Mexican Spanish).

Amaranth was used in several Aztec ceremonies, where images of their
gods (notably Huitzilopochtli) were made with amaranth mixed with
honey. The images were cut to be eaten by the people. This looked like
the Christian communion to the Roman Catholic priests, so the
cultivation of the grain was forbidden for centuries
(more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaranthus)

Huauzontle Chenopodium nuttaliae. Sometimes spelled Guausoncle. . A
plant related to epazote whose leaves are coated with batter and
fried.

http://www.lomexicano.com/mexicanfoodrecipeglossary.htm

Huauzontle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huauzontle

Huauzontle, Chenopodium nuttalliae is a Mexican vegetable related to
the common American weed goosefoot, that vaguely resembles broccoli.
As with other members of the goosefoot family, huauzontle is edible
and it is typically prepared in a manner similar to spinach or
broccoli.
Zarela's huauzontle fritters
http://www.zarela.com/new_recipes/to..._brocolli.html

Chenopodium
>From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Goosefoots, genus Chenopodium
Chenopodium is a genus of about 150 species of flowering plants, known
generically as the Goosefoots. It contains several plants of minor to
moderate importance as food crops, both leaf vegetables and pseudo-
cereals, including Quinoa, Ka?iwa, Fat Hen, Good King Henry, and
Epazote.
(more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenopodium)

Portulaca oleracea (Common Purslane, also known as Verdolaga, Pigweed,
Little Hogweed or Pusley), is an annual succulent in the family
Portulacaceae, which can reach 40 cm in height.. It is a native of
India and the Middle East, but is naturalised elsewhere and in some
regions is considered an invasive weed. It has smooth, reddish, mostly
prostrate stems and alternate leaves clustered at stem joints and
ends. The yellow flowers have five regular parts and are up to 0.6 cm
wide. The flowers first appear in late spring and continue into mid
fall. The flowers open singly at the center of the leaf cluster for
only a few hours on sunny mornings. Seeds are formed in a tiny pod,
which opens when the seeds are ready. Purslane has a taproot with
fibrous secondary roots and is able to tolerate poor, compacted soils
and drought.
(more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portulaca_oleracea)

On Feb 21, 10:46?am, Sonoran Dude > wrote:
> The Galloping Gourmand wrote:
> > And what the heck is a "tepary bean"?

> At least us Norte Taco Bending folks know how to use a search engine.http://www.nativeseeds.org/v2/cat.php?catID=42

Sometimes you have to verbally poke a Taco Bender to get him moving to
defend his belief system ;-)

If I went to all the trouble of growing my own tepary beans, would
they have a special flavor that set them apart from pinto beans?

"The Galloping Gourmand" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> On Feb 21, 9:04?am, "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote:
>
>> You may know pig weed as the leaves of amaranth, the original ceral
>> grain.
>
> The article may have been referring to Common Purslane, aka Verdolaga.

Not a lot of Water Cress family being used in West and South Texas, don't
recall it in NM either. But don't get so hung up on what the specific
Greens might be in the dish. Break the dish down , its Greens and Beans,
maybe a piece of fat back, hock or dried beef.

Now see what is available (and reasonably eatable) in your region. It can
be any greens; collards, mustards, spinach, chard greens , kale, Poke
Sallit, Dasheen,even Squash or Pumpkin leaves. It is foraging for something
to give color and a new taste to months and months of eating beans over the
winter. Use what is available and freshest.

On Feb 21, 6:31?pm, "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote:

> Now see what is available (and reasonably eatable) in your region.

I've been pulling up verdolaga every spring for years but didn't know
how to cook it.
My neighbor must have pulled up 20 pounds of the stuff in order to
plant squash, and all I could tell him was that Armenians ate it, so
it must be at least edible.

Plants that I thought might be epazote turned out to be stinging
nettle.

There's another plant in my backyard that grows about five feet tall.
It has leaves similar to a sunflower and the flowers are a tiny spray
of white. The stems are pink or violet and there's a tap root that
looks like a baby carrot, but it's white. That stuff grows everywhere.

> It is foraging for something
> to give color and a new taste to months and months of eating beans over the
> winter.

Well, it's not like I can't get all the produce I want for practically
nothing in this huge agricultural area. I just like to know what the
Native Americans ate when they foraged off the land.

The seasons are funny around here. Spring is in November or December,
whenever we get the first rains. It rarely ever snows at this
elevation, but I can see snow on the Sierra foothills.

The valley oaks will fill out with green leaves and the snow flowers
will blossom on the hillsides along with the orange fiddlenecks and
that's a lovely sight.

The tule fog and the high cirrus clouds keep plants from dying until
the end of May. Then it gets up to 100 degrees everyday, and I have to
water to keep my plants from dying.

"The Galloping Gourmand" > wrote in message
oups.com...
> On Feb 21, 6:31?pm, "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote:
>
> > Now see what is available (and reasonably eatable) in your region.
>
> I've been pulling up verdolaga every spring for years but didn't know
> how to cook it.
> My neighbor must have pulled up 20 pounds of the stuff in order to
> plant squash, and all I could tell him was that Armenians ate it, so
> it must be at least edible.
>
> Plants that I thought might be epazote turned out to be stinging
> nettle.
>
> There's another plant in my backyard that grows about five feet tall.
> It has leaves similar to a sunflower and the flowers are a tiny spray
> of white. The stems are pink or violet and there's a tap root that
> looks like a baby carrot, but it's white. That stuff grows everywhere.
>
> > It is foraging for something
> > to give color and a new taste to months and months of eating beans over
the
> > winter.
>
> Well, it's not like I can't get all the produce I want for practically
> nothing in this huge agricultural area. I just like to know what the
> Native Americans ate when they foraged off the land.
>
> The seasons are funny around here. Spring is in November or December,
> whenever we get the first rains. It rarely ever snows at this
> elevation, but I can see snow on the Sierra foothills.
>
> The valley oaks will fill out with green leaves and the snow flowers
> will blossom on the hillsides along with the orange fiddlenecks and
> that's a lovely sight.
>
> The tule fog and the high cirrus clouds keep plants from dying until
> the end of May. Then it gets up to 100 degrees everyday, and I have to
> water to keep my plants from dying.
>
Have you checked with your local Dept. of Ag. botanist to learn what you can
do to take full advantage of the piece of land you have?

Wayne

The Galloping Gourmand wrote:
> On Feb 21, 10:46?am, Sonoran Dude > wrote:
>> The Galloping Gourmand wrote:
>>> And what the heck is a "tepary bean"?
>
>> At least us Norte Taco Bending folks know how to use a search engine.http://www.nativeseeds.org/v2/cat.php?catID=42
>
> Sometimes you have to verbally poke a Taco Bender to get him moving to
> defend his belief system ;-)
>
> If I went to all the trouble of growing my own tepary beans, would
> they have a special flavor that set them apart from pinto beans?
>
>
Actually I don't like the flavor. You can buy them here in many stores.