76
WBM august 2019
More Than A Dip
Out of the billions of avo-cados
consumed in the U.S.
each year, 1.4 billion pounds
of them are eaten in the form
of guacamole. Considered a
dip by some, the roots of the
word actually mean sauce. It
dates back to 16th-century
Aztecs and comes from a
Nahuatl word, ahuacat,
meaning avocado and mulli,
meaning mixture or sauce.
The Aztecs mixed the
creamy pulp with herbs,
vegetables and spices in a
molcajete (mortar and pestle),
making guacamole one of
the oldest (if not the oldest)
traditional American food still
made today. Cilantro and
lime weren’t added until after
the arrival of the Spanish,
who brought them to the
New World.
Guacamole-making was
originally a men’s-only
endeavor. For the Aztecs, the
avocado had an erotic mean-ing
that symbolized a testicle
and was considered to be
“the fruit of paradise” and a
powerful aphrodisiac. Women
were therefore not permitted
to harvest avocados and defi-nitely
not allowed to crush
them for guacamole.
Journalist Richard Harding
Davis reportedly introduced
avocados to New York high
society; restaurateur Charles
Delmonico and his French
chef Charles Ranhofer put
them on the menu. Avocado
preparations became fashion-ably
exotic after a recipe on
how to prepare them was
published in the New York
Times in 1912.