Wild mushrooms are found in abundance in the states of Puebla, Tlaxcala and Estado de Mexico during and after the rainy season, and used in soups, quesadillas and vegetable dishes. Although the comadre used escobetas (coral mushrooms) the following recipe may be successfully prepared using fresh cultivated mushrooms. Ingredients 2 pounds fresh mushrooms (if using button mushrooms, […]
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There wouldn’t be many Irish people in the United States if it wasn’t for a Mexican fungus. The census of 1841 in Ireland recorded a population of about 8 million. This figure was a staggering 300% more than sixty years earlier. The staple Irish food at that time was the humble potato and Ireland’s rapid […]
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Let’s face it. Escaping Mexico City can be a great thing. Now more than ever. So much so that one would think that this unrestrained monster we call the Federal District, and the paranoia revolving around it, is a modern phenomenon. Time to think again. In the early 1700s a century-old community of monks, dwelling […]
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We were lucky: we managed to visit the famous pyramids of Teotihuacan on a rare sunny winter’s day, when Mexico City’s air was clear and, from our bus, you could actually see the snow capped volcano of Popocatepetl some forty miles away. I should explain that it was Christmas Day, a time of year when […]
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Teotihuacan (pronounced teh-oh-tee-wah-KAHN or teh-oh-tee-WAH-kan — experts differ on which is correct) is an archaeological site some 50 kilometers north of downtown Mexico City but still in the Valle de Mexico (the bowl surrounded by mountains in which Mexico City is on the southwest side). To get here go to the northern bus station from […]
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Chalma, about an hour and a half by car from Cuernavaca, is a rather grubby little town, which few foreigners visit. Yet on weekends and holy days, the place is packed with pilgrims, who come to worship the Dark Lord on the cross. Drawn by its magical spirit, they come by bus, car, bicycle and […]
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My grandfather, Frank Henry, was an English silver mining engineer in Mexico during the Revolution of 1910-16. This is the story of a family’s harrowing escape from marauding bandits at the height of the Revolution. Sadly, it was without my grandfather, as he had been brutally murdered by the bandits while defending their home from […]
Continue ReadingMythology and Legends of the Nahua People: Essays on Ancient Mexico Part 1: “The Creation of the Universe” Part 2: “Legend of the Fifth Sun” Part 3: “Creation of the Fifth Sun at Teotihuacan” In the mythology of ancient Mexico the world began not with a Genesis overseen by one almighty god, but with a creation resulting […]
Continue ReadingA friend from western Mexico is on the phone, planning a trip to visit us down south in Oaxaca. “From the map, it looks like there’s a freeway loop around Mexico City,” he says hopefully. Yes, well. We explain to him that the map was evidently put together by someone with great futuristic vision, because […]
Continue ReadingSome time around the turn of the eleventh century indigenous tribes from the Valley of Anahuac trekked north and settled in the land that Franciscans, half a millennium later baptized, “Tlanepantla”. Today Tlanepantla thrives among Mexico’s largest populations, with nearly twelve million (12,000,000) inhabitants. Below the gray stones of Chiquihuite Hill, smelting, metalworking, machine-building, and […]
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