| Mole - (MO lay) comes from the Nahuatl MULLI, meaning "sauce". Moles differ from region to region, from village to village and from cook to cook in the same village. The regional characteristics of moles' can be read almost as Mexican history. | |
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Pan de Muertos The Day of the dead offerings have their origin in prehispanic times. An offering similar to the present one was the one given by the Cihuapipiltin goddess, this gift is for the women who died of the first childbirth and went around by the air causing diseases between the children. For this reason they give gifts to in the temple or the crossroads. The offerings consisted of "breads" of diverse figures like butterflies (Papalotlaxcalli) or rays (Xonicuille) created with amaranth or "unleavened bread" that was a dry and toasted maize bread. Apparently these were like tortillas to which an imprint was made to the still crude mass, a seal in butterfly form, and once it was cooked, was colorfully painted. Sahagún described not using lime, this bread is called Yotlaxcalli; others offered tamales (Xucuientlamatzoalli) and toasted maize (Izquitil), almost all the offerings used amaranth because they considered it a special food. An equivalent to the day of the dead bread as we now know it would be the "Huitlatamalli". It was a type of tamale. |
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| Pan de Yema | Tzoalli is a dough
and was prepared with the flour of prince's feather (amaranth) seeds and
the honey of maguey. Depending on the monthly festivity involved, the dough
was used to mould different figures ranging from small pyramids to images
of mountain deities. These idols were handed around in pieces among those
present and were thus eaten. Diego de Durán in his chronicle, relates the story of the offering of Huitzilopochtli, that people in this celebration "no comían otra cosa que no fuera Tzoalli con miel", this mixture with amaranth and honey of wasp or maguey, did great ídolo to image of the God. It was adorned and dressed, elaborated great bones which they deposited on the feet of the ídolo. |