Latin American saucers that conquered the United States

(CNN Español) – Tacos, arepas, empanadas, guacamole, ceviche, and more … are words (and foods) of Latin American origin, but they have conquered the palates in the USA

Undoubtedly Latin American cuisine is very popular in this country, as this region and each country has unique representative food or dishes.

But how did Latin American food get to the United States?

A simple and complex word can explain this phenomenon at the same time: migration. And not just in the last three decades, but throughout history.

For example, according to Jeffrey M. Pilcher, in an article entitled The Latin roots of American food, which is collected in a larger text on the external influences that the United States has received, around 1909 a corn miller named Josep Bartolomé Martínez patented the formula of what are today corn omelettes.

Puerto Ricans also influenced American cuisine by “stimulating trade and food industry in New York City,” Pilcher writes. At the end of the last century, with Puerto Ricans receiving American citizenship, migration was encouraged and many arrived, after military service, and were greeted with dishes such as “rice with green lazy, donuts cod and mofongo with toast “.

Meanwhile, Mexico, a neighbor of the United States, has made a great contribution to American food. According to Pilcher, a Mexican trader was very successful in “franchising ethnic exoticism and giving Anglo-American consumers a chance to try Mexican food.” According to this article, a Mexican immigrant named Juvencio Maldonado – who worked between 1930 and 1960 in a New York restaurant called Xochitl – patented “the original heel cover.”

And more migration brought with it Latin American food in the middle of the last century: the Cuban Revolution, dictatorships in the southern cone in the 1970s, and the Central American civil wars of the 1980s introduced new types of cuisine for restaurants and Latin American food processing companies began to open up space in domestic markets, ”Pilcher wrote.

Now, the influence of Hispanics has grown so much in recent years that their population in the U.S. has doubled in recent decades. According to figures from the Pew Research Center, the Hispanic population in the U.S. rose from just over 35 million people in 2000 to nearly 59 million in 2017.

By 2019, Latinos accounted for 18% of the total population in the United States, according to this organization.

Immigration and the influence on US food

Immigration has influenced local cuisine.

“More recent immigration has introduced a wider variety of recipes from all over Latin America,” Jeffrey M. Pilcher adds in his article.

And Mexico, a neighbor of the United States, was one of the pioneers in bringing local food to a neighboring country, according to Pilcher, who describes how the term “tex-mex” was originally used to label non-authentic American meals, but rather typical of the culinary style of Mexicans living in Texas, dishes such as wheat omelettes and roast meat were early benchmarks of Mexican food.

But, he adds, by the 1990s, “Mexican food was erected in one of the three most popular types of ethnic restaurants, and salsa (a spicy tomato-based pasta) surpassed ketchup as a condiment. bestseller in the United States.

“Cooking is one of the first ethnic markers to be absorbed by local communities,” said Cristiana Diaz and Peter Ori, researchers in the School of Sociology at the University of Arizona’s School of Social and Behavioral Sciences. who published a study on the influence of Hispanic and Asian food in the United States.

According to them, there is “strong evidence that Asian and Hispanic populations are important contributors to local culinary culture.” And they can transform the local population.

“We interpret this as evidence that ethnic populations can transform tastes, demands, and opportunities for those who are not within the ethnic community,” Diaz said.

“We are trying to change the approach to show that the fabric of American culture can be transformed as a result of immigration,” he added.

The last few years

And entrepreneurs have put their share in the US market.

“Political exiles and economic emigrants introduced new types of cuisine for restaurants at the same time that Latin American food processing companies began to open up space in domestic markets, even in relation to staple foods (Maseca omelettes, Bimbo bread) and alcoholic beverages (Chilean wines, Corona beer).

“In this way, the growing demographic importance and higher professional status of Latinos have contributed to a more general recognition and interest in Latin foods,” Pilcher points out.

https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/themestudycomida.htm

The inevitable Latin American dishes in the USA

We’ll probably miss a lot of dishes to name here, but we have a list of some of the most popular Latin foods in the United States, which you can find in almost every corner.

Tacos, tacos, tacos!

According to TasteAtlas ’“ Top 100 MOST POPULAR dishes in the world ”list, which was updated in April 2021, tacos are the most popular Latin American food in the world.

“The tacos are the national dish of Mexico, and go back to the Mexican silver mines of the eighteenth century when the word tac referred to gunpowder that was wrapped in a piece of paper and inserted into the rocks. S used to extract the precious ore from the mines and were called miner’s tacos.Today, the word is widely known to designate Mexico’s main street and fast food: omelettes […] with numerous fillings, folded and that can be eaten without any utensils, ”explains Taste Atlas.

And attached to that, there are the omelettes, which are used for tacos and nachos and, according to this ranking of popular food, they are located in the 9th place in the world and two in Latin America.

Mexican food is very popular in the United States, as in addition to tacos and omelettes, there are also guacamole, burritos, quesadillas and Mexican tamales, among others.

Ceviche

“Ceviche is the national dish of Peru, which consists of slices of raw fish or seafood that are seasoned with salt, onion and chili, and then marinated in lemon juice. Due to the acidity of the juice, the the texture of the fish changes, as does its color: from pink to white, ”describes TasteAtlas.

The Peruvian platter, according to voters on the website, ranked at number 58 of the 100 most popular in the world. In the region, it is number eight.

Barbecue

According to TasteAtlas, churrasco “is a Brazilian barbecue method in which juicy pieces, slices, fillets and ribs of veal, lamb, pork and chicken are placed on large skewers and roasted over a wood fire.” But beware, there is not only Brazilian grilled meat. Argentines and Uruguayans will also claim their share in the roasts and the taste for grills, each in its own way.

arepas

Venezuelans? Colombians? What does it matter! Arepas are arepas here, there and in the United States. It is a bread made from corn or precooked corn flour that is also consumed in various countries such as Colombia, Venezuela, Panama, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.

This is a delicate issue for Venezuelans and Colombians. There is still much discussion about where the arepa was really born, if we know that the world record for the largest arepa is held precisely by Venezuela. On March 23, 2011, the Farina PA brand of Polar Companies, cooked the largest arepa in the world. It weighed 493.2 kilograms and fed 2,800 people.

And in Atlanta, for example, we find a famous arepería called “Arepa Meva”, a restaurant of the Venezuelan Lis Hernández, who as a child -along with her mother- sold arepas in a famous square in Petare, one of the largest neighborhoods east of Caracas. Hernandez left his country in the 1990s and in 2011 opened his restaurant in Atlanta.

Pies

Although they have their origin in Galicia, Spain, according to TasteAtlas, the pies have their own Colombian, Argentine, Venezuelan, Bolivian, Chilean, Mexican version … each country has given this delicious dish its own touch and it is a another of the foods that have conquered the United States.

They can be consumed as a snack, but they may well be a main course for some hardworking people as they “provide them with the energy and nutrients they need for a hard day’s work,” says TasteAtlas.

And how about accompanied by spicy … or guacamole, or tomato sauce or mayonnaise … the combinations are endless.

We know that many Latin American saucers were left out, but the selection would be endless.