Rachel Laudan

Nobody interested in food could live in Mexico and not be interested in the food here.

Why do Mexican moles resemble Indian curries? Is it just coincidence? My answer is no in The Mexican Kitchen’s Islamic Connection. I was thrilled that Mexican photographer, Nacho (Ignacio) Urquiza, agreed to take the photographs for this article.

And again on Mexican food history, here’s a paper on Chiles, Chocolate and Race that I wrote with Jeff Pilcher. It shows hows the Spanish hung on to their food in the colonial period. Not much of that mixing that so many cookbook authors talk about.

For a meeting of the International Association of Culinary Professionals in Puebla, Mexico I put together a booklet, Puebla in the Global Gastronomic Geography (pdf), to explain why Puebla is the epicenter of Mexican cooking.

Were semitas, a bread found on the US-Mexico border, specifically Jewish? I tackle this question in Semitas, Semitic Bread, and the Search for Community. I conclude that semitas are not a specifically Jewish bread. I am continuing to add to this article and the new information about the history of semitas can be found in Semitas.

A distinguished Mexican cook and good friend of Diana Kennedy began the conversation at a group of leading Mexican foodies by saying “What you must realize Rachel is that we never ate Mexican food.” This brief article, which appeared in Repast, the excellent newsletter of the Culinary Historians of AnnArbor, edited by Randy Schwartz, is my attempt to untangle some of the recent history of Mexican food.

Fruits of the Oven, are sold in Mexican markets. I was lucky enough to visit a baker who prepared these pastries. This article appeared in John Thorne’s Simple Cooking.

Mexico’s breadbasket was the Bajio, the high fertile plains that lie to the south of Guanajuato where I live. I wrote this article about the culinary heritage of the Bajio (in Spanish) for a book celebrating Nacho Urquiza’s thirty years photographing the foods of Mexico.

The work of Mexican scholars in investigating the history and current state of Mexican cuisine is quite outstanding. This review, published in the pioneering food journal Petits Propos Culinaires founded by Alan Davidson and now edited and published by Tom Jaine, describes some of the publications that have resulted.