Food Preparation in Aztec Community

Culinary Sundries

Aztec commoners did not live by maize and beans alone. Tomatoes, avocadoes, and several varieties of squash presented more choices at a meal. Chili peppers were used to flavor foods and were so vital to the Aztec meal that fasting often meant forsaking chilies alone. Ants, grasshoppers, maguey worms, and jumil bugs, all available in large quantities, provided protein. Commoners gathered tequitlatl (blue-green spirulina algae) in large fine nets to provide large harvests of protein. Bernal Díaz del Castillo described the blue-green algae sold as little cakes that tasted like cheese in the markets of Tlatelolco and Tenochtitlan. But these were not the only aquatic goods consumed by the Aztec. Sahagún writes that tadpoles, frogs, and tentnonmichin (thick, large-mouthed fish) were also eaten. Axolotl newts and acocilin (shrimplike crustaceans) offered variety to the diet as well.

Cacao was a popular drink among the royal classes and was a valuable commodity; 100 cacao beans could buy a small mantle. To prepare the beans for drinking, first they would be ground and soaked while being filtered. A frothy head would form on the surface; later this would be discarded. Then water would be added to make a bitter drink. The chocolate drink was so bitter that an assortment of additives would be used to flavor it: flowers, vanilla, honey, and even chile tamed the bitterness of the cacao bean and changed the color of the chocolate drink from white to colors ranging from red and orange to black.

Fruits

The nopalli, or nopal (prickly pear cactus), served as a popular vegetable in the Aztec diet, and Sahagún reported on 13 different varieties in his Florentine Codex. He described the nopal plant as having wide, green branches and a smooth, though thorny, surface that excreted a saplike liquid. The cactus's succulent fruit, the nochtli, or tuna, had a fine and flavorful texture. This fruit, which could be eaten cooked or raw, provided a filling for tamales and was often served as a dessert, though always in moderation. Because the nopal cactus grew throughout Mexico, all Aztec were able to take pleasure in the nochtli fruit; however, only the royal classes enjoyed the more exotic varieties of white, green, and orange nochtli. Quahcamotli and camotli (sweet potatoes); cimatl, a cylindrical or balllike twisted tree root that would cause vomiting and diarrhea if eaten raw; and atzamatzamolli, a bulbous sea plant with white blossoms, were also eaten as fruit.

Animal Foods

Though not a strictly vegetarian society, the Aztec ate mostly from plants that grew in their landscape. Partly due to large population growth and partly due to the lack of many domesticated animals, animal foods were not in significant reserve. Among the domesticated animals were dogs, turkeys (uexolotl), which provided both eggs and meat, and the muscory duck. Archaeologists have found quantities of fish, white-tailed deer, cotton-tailed rabbit, iguana, dog, and turkey bones in trash deposits, although these finds were not in high, dense concentrations. The upper echelon's diet included more variety in animal foods. Rabbit, possum, deer, crane, goose, quail, and eagle meat added variety to the Aztec diet, but these were probably luxuries enjoyed predominantly by the upper class.