SOUP AT THE DISTINGUISHED TABLE IN MEXICO CITY, 1830-1920

Nanosh Lucas

A Thesis

Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

May 2017

Committee:

Amílcar Challú, Committee Co-Chair

Franciso Cabanillas, Committee Co-Chair

Amy Robinson

Timothy Messer-Kruse

© 2017

Nanosh Jacob Isadore Joshua Lucas

All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT

Amílcar Challú, Committee Co-Chair

Francisco Cabanillas, Committee Co-Chair

This thesis uses soup discourse as a vehicle to explore dimensions of class and hierarchies of taste in Mexican cookbooks and newspapers from 1830-1920. It contrasts soups with classic European roots, such as sopa de pan (bread soup), with New World soups, such as sopa de tortilla (tortilla soup) and chilaquiles (toasted tortillas in a soupy sauce made from chiles). I adopt a multi-disciplinary approach, combining quantitative methods in the digital humanities with qualitative techniques in history and literature. To produce this analysis, I draw from Pierre Bourdieu’s work on distinction and social capital, Max Weber’s ideas about modernization and rationalization, and Charles Tilly’s notions of categorical inequality. Results demonstrate that soup plays a part in a complex drama of inclusion and exclusion as people socially construct themselves in print and culinary practice. Elites attempted to define respectable soups by what ingredients they used, and how they prepared, served, and consumed soup. Yet, at the same time, certain soups seemed to defy hierarchical categorization, and that is where this story begins.

iv

To Lisa and Isadora Lucas. Thank you for your sacrifices.

To Esther and Bruce Lucas, my parents. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am grateful for…

My wife, Lisa, and daughter, Isadora, for their patience and understanding during the many nights I wore a dent in the couch and was slow to wake up in the morning to join the family. Three moves and three years away from home, we return with two freshly-minted

Master’s degrees and a wealth of experiences to share.

The abiding faith and encouragement of Dr. Amílcar Challú, who read and re-read my work with interest and incisive feedback. Our conversations these past two years have been some of the most thought provoking in my academic career. I will cherish the time I spent under his mentorship. After having read so many books from his personal library, I have begun to plagiarize his annotation style of triangles, jagged underlining, and asterisks.

The support and encouragement of Dr. Amy Robinson, whose phone call while I was in a parking lot in Phoenix, Oregon, convinced both Lisa and me to come to Bowling Green, and who has left an indelible imprint on my thinking and scholarship. Her mentorship, especially in this final stage, has been imprescindible.

The penetrating intellect of Dr. Francisco Cabanillas, who forced me to examine my binary modes of thinking, both in class and on paper.

The wit and intellect of Dr. Timothy Messer-Kruse, whose course in American Culture

Studies will stand out in memory—he strikes the final note in the quartet of this thesis committee.

Dr. Ruth Herndon, who in three semesters convinced me to take myself and my work as a professional historian seriously. I thank her for any grey hairs she may have added under my tutelage. Her question, “What sacrifices will you make?” will continue to challenge me to find balance as I enter this new phase. vi Dr. Michael Brooks, without whose assistance in the History Department at key moments would have left me floundering.

Dr. Apollos Nwauwa, in whose class I cut my teeth as a graduate assistant at Bowling

Green State University.

Dr. Lynn Pearson, for her support throughout my Spanish teaching at Bowling Green

State University.

Dr. Javier Blanco Planelles, Dr. Susana Juarez, Dr. Elisabet Magro García, Dr. Roshan

Samtani, and Magda Gallinat from the satellite school in Alcalá de Henares, all who were instrumental in preparing me for my Spanish qualifying exams and facilitating life in Spain with a family.

My two-decade friendship with Dr. Joseph Woolcock, who was on the ground floor of my intellectual awakening and has seen me through some of the most difficult challenges in my life.

Clint Rodreick, at Phoenix High School in Phoenix, Oregon, a history teacher who inspires his students and colleagues every day to think critically. He has been my friend and mentor since we both started teaching in 2008.

My family, whose value for education has been an underlying source of inspiration.

Friends and acquaintances who have endured my obscure emails, random texts, and the long answer to the question, “How is your thesis coming along?”

Faculty and Staff at the Departments of History and Spanish, and especially Tina

Thomas, who has imparted much wisdom over the last few years. Rachel de La Cruz and Amy

Smith, for their forever-filled bowls of candy, assistance in times of dire need, and cheerful energy.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

INTRODUCTION ...... 1

CHAPTER 1. SETTING THE TABLE: CONTEXT, THEORY, AND METHODS ...... 4

Thesis and Contributions ...... 4

A Brief Historiography of Food in Mexico ...... 7

What is Soup, Anyway? ...... 9

The Porfiriato ...... 11

The Gente Decente ...... 16

Theoretical Framework ...... 16

Methods ...... 20

CHAPTER 2. A STEW OF INGREDIENTS: CALDO IN FAMILY MENUS AND

PUBLIC DISCOURSE ...... 23

Vignette: Rafaelita ...... 23

The Clock in the Kitchen, 1909 ...... 26

A Weberian Weekly Menu: Advice to Newlywed Housewife ...... 27

Text Mining ...... 30

Cookbooks ...... 31

Newspapers ...... 34

Caldo Recipes ...... 37

CHAPTER 3. BREAD AND SOPA DE PAN: TEXT MINING FOR STORIES AND

RECIPES ...... 40

viii

You are What You Eat ...... 40

Text Mining Pambazo and Cemitas in Google Ngrams ...... 42

“Sopa de Pan” in Cookbooks and Newspapers ...... 43

Vignette: The Last Supper ...... 48

Sopa de Pan Recipes ...... 50

CHAPTER 4. CHILAQUILES AND SOPA DE TORTILLA: THE SAME SOUP IN

DIFFERENT RECIPES? ...... 59

Cantinflas and the Chilaquiles ...... 59

Trends in Newspapers and Cookbooks ...... 61

Chilaquiles and a Family Budget ...... 66

Chilaquiles in a Poem ...... 67

Chilaquiles in a Family Meal ...... 67

Sopa de Tortilla: The Not-so-Splendorous-but-Acceptable Rustic Meal ...... 68

What Happens when the Country Mouse Comes to the City? ...... 69

CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSIONS ...... 74

BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 76

APPENDIX A. FIGURE 5: INGREDIENTS IN FIVE COOKBOOKS:

ORGANIZED BY FREQUENCY OF MENTION ...... 84

APPENDIX B. FIGURE 6: INGREDIENTS IN FIVE COOKBOOKS:

ORGANIZED BY RANKING AND TYPE ...... 86

APPENDIX C. FIGURE 11: NEWSPAPERS: “SOPA DE PAN”

MENTIONS, 1800-1920 ...... 88

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

1 Restaurant Advertisement ...... 1

2 Rafaelita, lectura para niñas, 1906...... 24

3 Kitchen in 1909 ...... 26

4 Suggested Weekly Menu ...... 29

5 Ingredients in Five Cookbooks: Ranked by Frequency of Mention ...... 31

6 Ingredients in Five Cookbooks: Organized by Ranking and Type ...... 33

7 Newspapers: Mentions of “Sopa de” and “Sopa de Pan”, 1800-1920 ...... 35

8 “Sopa de” vs. “Sopa de Pan,” 1800-1920 ...... 36

9 Instances of “Pambazo(s)” Measured Against Instances of “Cemita(s)” ...... 42

10 Percentage of Soup Recipes with Bread: 1831-1920 ...... 44

11 Newspapers: “Sopa de Pan” Mentions, 1800-1920 (abbreviated) ...... 45

12 Newspapers: “Sopa de Pan” organized by theme, 1800-1920 ...... 47

13 Triple Suicide ...... 48

14 Simple or Natural Soup ...... 52

15 Mentions of “Chilaquiles” in Newspapers, 1830-1920 ...... 61

16 Mentions of “Sopa de Tortilla” in Newspapers, 1830-1920 ...... 62

17 Frequency of Mentions of “Chilaquiles” in Google Ngrams ...... 63

18 Mentions of “Chilaquiles” and “Sopa de Tortilla” in Cookbooks, 1830-1920 ...... 64

19 Side-by-Side Comparison of Chilaquiles and Sopa de Tortilla Recipes ...... 65

1

INTRODUCTION

Figure 1: Restaurant Advertisement

Source and Notes: “En La Calle de Jesus,” El Siglo Diez Y Nueve, November 8, 1842, 4 col. 4. “On Jesus Street, next to number 9 at Friendship Diner, we serve caldo, soup, puchero, main course, beans, dessert and bread for one real, and it is served with the greatest cleanliness and punctuality.”1

In respected circles in the nineteenth century, soup was an important aspect of the daily meal. This is a history of certain soups during the long nineteenth century (1830-1920) in

Mexico—it begins just after Mexican Independence and ends in the revolutionary period. I use it to highlight hierarchies of taste in print culture during a period of modernization in Mexico that culminates in the Porfiriato.2 Drawing primarily from cookbooks and newspapers, I focus on the discourse around soups, including their type, order, frequency, and composition. This thesis adopts an intra- and interdisciplinary approach—it employs methods germane to both historical investigation and the digital humanities (text mining, tracking instances of word mentions over time, and contextualized narrative) as well as principles familiar to literary critique. I grapple with how Mexico’s gente decente (middle class) wrote about (or did not write about) soups as they aspired upward and sought to distinguish themselves from the working classes. Soup is a unique vehicle to understand hierarchies of taste because people from all classes ate soup in

1All translations are mine unless otherwise noted. 2 This is the term widely used to describe the government led by Porfirio Díaz that lasted from 1876-1910 with an interregnum between 1880-1884. 2 some form or another.

This thesis is roughly organized per the menu advertised in Figure 1 above, progressing from lighter to heavier soups, with chapters on caldo (broth), sopa de pan (bread soup), chilaquiles (tortillas in broth) and sopa de tortilla (tortilla soup). In another sense, it is organized like the Spanish olla podrida (literally, “rotten pot,” but understood as stew), with ingredients meant to highlight the culinary contributions from more than one region. It juxtaposes bread soups against soups made with corn, symbolizing the struggle for dominance between wheat and corn and highlighting Fernando Ortiz’s concept of transculturation.3 It also juxtaposes soups made with bread and soups made with corn against themselves, emphasizing the superficial changes that make a soup seem fit for one class and unfit for another.

Soup had a strong role on the elite dinner table. In 1850, Richard McSherry chronicles his stay in Mexico and describes a multi-course meal with soups taking a central role. He says,

“Now for the dinner. In the first place comes soup (caldo), say plain chicken soup, such as you find at our hotels where French cookery is adopted; then, one or more sopas of rice, fideós [sic]

(vermicelli), or bread, in a semi-fluid state; then El Puchero, a mixed dish of homely ingredients, of exceeding popularity among all classes of Spaniards.”4 A progression from light to heavy, from simple ingredients to complex, and to a progressively blended origin of ingredients was in vogue in the mid-nineteenth century.

The advertisement in Figure 1, although written apparently in an objective tone, is packed

3 Fernando Ortiz, “Los Factores Humanos de La Cubanidad,” Perfiles de La Cultura Cubana XlV, no. 3 (1969): 1–15. 4 Richard McSherry and David Holmes Conrad, El Puchero: Or, A Mixed Dish from Mexico, Embracing General Scott’s Campaign (Philadelphia: Lippincott, Grambo & co., 1850), 184. https://archive.org/details/elpucherooramix01conrgoog. The authors define caldo as soup, though their definition is what I translate to broth. 3 with subjectivity. First, this is not a menu of choices, but the spelling out of a multi-course meal that reveals a certain taste and sensibility. The comida (meal) began with caldo, the broth that El cocinero mexicano, a cookbook originally published in 1831 and reprinted several times, called

“the essential basis of the food used to sustain the strength of a patient, or to preserve a continual state of activity of the person who finds himself in perfect health.”5 In addition to its perceived health benefits, caldo gave the soups in the next courses their flavor. The advertisement does not specify which soup is served on the menu next, but the puchero (stew) that comes third, deserves attention because of its similarity to the olla podrida, a peasant dish King Alfonso XII once served for his birthday.6 If the progression from light to heavy soup reflects a form of taste and sensibility of what is a decent food, we also see that cleanliness and punctuality are also values.

These are hallmarks of modernity emphasized during the Porfirian regime, and strong class markers that are repeated throughout the nineteenth century and underlined in this study.

5 El Cocinero Mexicano O Colección de Las Mejores Recetas Para Guisar Al Estilo Americano, Y de Las Más Selectas Según El Método de Las Cocinas Española, Italiana, Francesa E Inglesa (Mexico City: Galvan, 1831), http://biblioteca.herdez.com.mx/index.php/memoria-del-mundo- tomo-1, 2. “La base esencial del alimento empleado para sostener las fuerzas de un enfermo, ó para conservar un estado de actividad continua las de la persona que se halla en perfecta salud.” My translation. 6 Lara Anderson, “The Unity and Diversity of La Olla Podrida: An Autochthonous Model of Spanish Culinary Nationalism,” Journal of Spanish Cultural Studies 14, no. 4 (2013): 400–414. 4

CHAPTER 1. SETTING THE TABLE: CONTEXT, THEORY, AND METHODS

Thesis and contributions

This thesis aims to contribute to our understanding of Mexican history and culture through one aspect of elite Mexican cuisine: soup. It is well known that, in more than one way, elites in Mexico attempted to limit access to their social fields: they dictated people’s dress, defined and attributed negative social behaviors to “inferior” social classes, and they used their access to print media to establish hierarchies of taste.7 I propose that these hegemonies of taste are projections of elite desire and anxieties, not necessarily reality. The dishes themselves do not always obey the rigid class boundaries prescribed them. Below I outline my contributions, moving from broad to specific.

I synthesize theoretical approaches that are often utilized separately, such as Pierre

Bourdieu’s distinctions, Max Weber’s rationalization, and Charles Tilly’s bounded categories.

Combining and synthesizing theoretical frameworks in response to the sources gives this thesis a certain flexibility to tease out latent themes and read recipes and stories in between the lines. My synthesis is especially suitable to identify how the context in which soup is treated conditions its interpretation, giving readers enormous flexibility in how they understood and prepared soups.

This is particularly clear in the case of sopa de pan: a simple modifier in how it is presented can

7 For dress and fashion: Julia Tuñón Pablos, Women in Mexico: A Past Unveiled, ed. Alan Hynds (Texas: University of Texas Press, 1987), 56. For negative social behaviors: Julio Guerrero, La Génesis Del Crimen En México: Estudio de Pisquiatría Social (Mexico City: Libreria de la Vda de Ch. Bouret, 1901). For print and other forms of media: Angel Rama, La Ciudad Letrada (Hanover: Ediciones del Norte, 1984); Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (New York: Verso, 1991); François-Xavier Guerra, “Forms of Communication, Political Spaces, and Cultural Identities in the Creation of Spanish American Nations,” in Beyond Imagined Communities: Reading and Writing the Nation in Nineteenth-Century Latin America, ed. Sara Castro-Klarén and John Charles Chasteen (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), 3–32; William E. French, “Prostitutes and Guardian Angels: Women, Work, and the Family in Porfirian Mexico,” The Hispanic American Historical Review 72, no. 4 (1992): 529–53. 5 make it the soup of the rich, or the soup of the wretched poor. This gives food more malleability than the themes of national and ethnic identity usually found in the literature because it shows how the practice of cooking crossed artificially-constructed lines of identity.

It is well known that city dwellers ate bread in large quantities.8 Bread symbolized the hegemony of the Spanish menu, which privileged wheat over corn-centered native cuisine. Yet, how people ate bread has remained elusive. The consumption of soup and bread together seems to partially answer this quandary. The way the food was prepared, its ingredients, and the process of preparation is where I find distinctions of class and social position. I apply the same lens to tortilla soup and a typical popular dish, chilaquiles, and I find that small modifiers similarly reveal prestige, respectability and distinctions of class. In this way, soup equalizes the Spanish and native ingredients (bread and tortilla) but depending on its context a soup can end up on the table of the rich or the poor.

This thesis is organized in five parts:

In this chapter, I lay out the arguments I make about soup in Mexico in the nineteenth century and discuss my contributions to the literature. The historiography of soup offers an overview of soup in history and a narrower discussion of soup during the period 1830-1920.

Soup has not always had a consistent definition, so I explore its etymology in dictionaries in

Latin and Spanish. Because the Porfiriato is central to the concepts of modernization and class, I provide a separate historiography of that period. The theoretical framework outlines the way in which I analyze the results of the research. The methods section emphasizes a multi-disciplinary

8 Jeffrey M. Pilcher, ¡Que Vivan Los Tamales!: Food and the Making of Mexican Identity (New Mexico: University of New Mexico Press, 1998); Robert Weis, Bakers and Basques: A Social History of Bread in Mexico (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2012). 6 approach that brings quantitative and qualitative research methods to bear on cookbooks and literature in newspapers.

In chapter 2, “A Stew of Ingredients, Caldo in Family Menus and Public Discourse,” I take the reader on a journey of soup in context, beginning with a dramatization of a nineteenth- century broth recipe and progressing to a suggested weekly menu to show how soup fits into the middle-class imagination. Text mining results offer powerful insight into the presence of ingredients in a sample of digitized cookbooks from 1831-1898. Finally, I include an 1831 recipe for puchero that also produces broth and soup, a culinary triptych that folds the essential beginnings of a meal at privileged tables in early nineteenth-century Mexico.

In chapter 3, “Bread and Sopa de Pan: Text Mining for Stories and Recipes,” I separate out bread as an essential element in soup preparation in the earlier part of the nineteenth century.

I also use it to emphasize the gradations of bread analogous to the class structure. Next, I examine the evolution of sopa de pan between 1830-1920. In newspapers, I explore a certain evolution that seems to take place in the discourse on sopa de pan. It begins with the preoccupation with sopa de pan and health and evolves through stages of connections to poverty, religion, and literature, finally settling in a discussion of recipes. I also demonstrate the usual themes associated with sopa de pan for the period. Next, I study at a kitchen in the early twentieth century and an unfortunate but sensational story about a small, working-class family that perishes to suicide, their last meal a bowl of sopa de pan. Lastly, I consider several recipes for sopa de pan.

In chapter 4, “Chilaquiles and Sopa de Tortilla: The Same Soup in Different Recipes?” I begin with a 1960s scene from “El Padrecito,” a film starring Cantinflas, in which he sets the stage for a gendered discussion of chilaquiles. Next, I examine the presence of chilaquiles and 7 sopa de tortilla in both cookbooks and newspapers. A side-by-side comparison of recipes for chilaquiles and sopa de tortilla reveal that chilaquiles by another name can be a respectable meal.

The superficial changing of names that also takes place in the evolution of sopa de pan recipes over the century is mirrored here with these two recipes, although later they become quite distinct both in style and substance. The chapter follows with analysis of some of the literature found in newspapers. For chilaquiles, I explore an article critiquing a family budget, a poem, and a description of a family meal. Regarding sopa de tortilla, I examine a rustic meal in the country and compare it to what happens when the meal is brought to the city.

Translation is prone to errors and misinterpretations, but it adds value in expanding the audience of this work and creating connections with our present day. Spelling, and most commonly accentuation, are unpredictable in the sources, so in all cases the original Spanish texts are copied verbatim, allowing the reader to easily refer to the original text in the footnote.

Unless I make a special note, the reader should treat these copies as such (sic). I define all terms in parentheses, but I use certain terms such as “broth” and “caldo” interchangeably, preferring one to the other where it appears most appropriate.

A Brief Historiography of Food in Mexico

Historiographies of Mexican food focus heavily on how culinary and national identities were created in tandem. Sarah Bak-Geller Corona notes that what became known as “Mexican” food is heavily influenced by French editors of cookbooks and is a “continual social construction, product of a history of searches more than encounters.”9 Salvador Novo’s Cocina

9 Sarah Bak-Geller Corona, “Los Recetarios ‘afrancesados’ Del Siglo XIX En México,” Anthropology of Food, 2009, https://aof.revues.org/6464. “Es una continua construcción social, producto de una historia de búsquedas más que de encuentros.” See also Jules Gouffé, El Libro de Cocina. Contiene La Cocina Casera Y La Gran Cocina Y Un Tratado Especial de La Cocina 8

Mexicana: Historia gastronómica de la Ciudad de México (Mexican Cooking: Gastronomic

History of Mexico City) attempts to identify the national character of the Mexican plate.

Weaving recipes together with literary excerpts, he invites the reader on a journey from the pre-

Hispanic Nahua corn to the various influences on what would later be called “Mexican” cuisine.

Jeffrey Pilcher has framed the history of Mexican culture as the conflict between “the people of corn” and the “conquests of wheat.”10 He explains the complex role cookbooks play in the construction of Mexican national identity. “Cookbook authors help unify a country by encouraging the interchange of food between different regions, classes, and ethnic groups, and thereby building a sense of community within the kitchen. But these same works also have the power to exclude ethnic minorities or the lower classes by designating their foods as unfit for civilized tables.”11 In his book, Planet Taco, he discusses the many attempts to define “national”

Mexican cuisine as a multi-party conflict between foods of indigenous descent, such as the tortilla and tamale, Creole inventions, such as mole de guajalote, and French and Spanish dishes, as well.12 To show how quickly a dish could move from one periphery to another, he notes that

“By the time of the Mexican Revolution of the early twentieth century, élite Mexican food had changed yet again as a result of strong French influence in the late nineteenth century. So, when on December 12, 1926, in the national newspaper Excelsior, the story of the origins of mole

Mexicana Formado Expresamente Por Una Cocinera Poblana. (Mexico City: E. Rogríguez y Co., 1893) for an example of a French cookbook published in Mexico City. 10 Jeffrey M. Pilcher, ¡Que Vivan Los Tamales!: Food and the Making of Mexican Identity (New Mexico: University of New Mexico Press, 1998), Chap.1&2. 11 Ibid., 2. 12 Ibid.; Jeffrey Pilcher, Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012); Jeffrey M. Pilcher, “The Whole Enchilada: A Full Plate of Food History,” Journal of American History 103, no. 3 (2016): 694–96, doi:10.1093/jahist/jaw333. 9 appeared, it quite plausibly appeared to the readership as an authentically Mexican dish.”13 The problem with a “national” dish in a heterogeneous society like Mexico or any other place is that it does not always include the diverse cultural heritage of the people it purports to represent.

What is Soup, Anyway?

Historians of Mexican food rarely focus on the humble soup—a dish that is featured in the public discourse on food. A pot of soup is an excellent way to make use of unexpended fuel, and broth is a useful way to revive stale bread. Soup is so strongly connected to bread that the very etymology of the word “soup” contains bread. Spain’s most prestigious dictionary, the

Diccionario de la lengua española, lists five definitions for sopa, two of which contain bread.

The first is “A dish comprised of slices of bread soaked in nutritious liquid.”14 The second is “A piece or slice of bread that is soaked in a liquid.”15 The New Lexicographical Treasure of the

Spanish Language hosts online dictionaries beginning in 1495.16 The forty dictionaries dating from 1495 to 1914 in French, Latin, and Spanish, all contain some variation that combine soup and bread as one. The Spanish-Latin dictionary edited by Antonio de Nebrija lists three definitions for sopa: “1. Bread soup. A little bread.” 2. “Small soup, a little piece of meat.” 3. To sop wet soup. A little. To dip or baptize.”17 Right after the Columbus’s landing in the Caribbean,

13 Jeffrey M. Pilcher and Rachel Laudan, “Chiles, Chocolate, and Race in New Spain: Dancing Backward to Spain or Looking Forward to Mexico?,” Eighteenth-Century Life 23, no. 2 (1999): 59–70., 67. 14“1. Sopa,” Diccionario de La Lengua Española (Real Academia Española, 2014), http://dle.rae.es/?id=YNaQdnN.“Plato compuesto de un caldo y uno o más ingredientes sólidos c ocidos en él.” My Translation. 15 Ibid., “2. Sopa.” “Plato compuesto de rebanadas de pan empapadas en un líquido alimenticio.” My Translation. 16 El Nuevo Tesoro Lexicográfico de la Lengua Española. My translation. 17 Antonio de Nebrija, ed., Vocabulario Español-Latino (Salamanca, 1495). http://buscon.rae.es/ntlle/SrvltGUILoginNtlle “Sopa de pan.offa panis; Sopa pequeña.offula.ç.offella.e; Sopear mojar fopas.offas.intingo.ís.” My translation. 10 this was the definition common to the colonizers that had endured for centuries.

In 1822, just after Mexican Independence, the Real Academia published its sixth edition of the Diccionario. Most of the entries mimic previous definitions; however, the following includes sobering descriptions of class division. “SOUP. The meal given to the poor in convents, the larger part of which is bread and broth.”18 By 1899, well into the Porfiriato, the same dictionary in its thirteenth edition retains many of the previous entries, but adds the following two definitions: “Dish comprised of slices of bread, starches, rice, noodles or other pastas, and the broth that was cooked in the pot” and “Pasta, starches, or vegetables that are put in the dish of the same name.”19 By the end of the nineteenth century, soup had begun to adopt the ingredients most contemporary readers will be familiar with.

Soup has been integral to the human diet for centuries and front and center in class conflict. Whether cooked by hot stones in a trough lined with animal skins or in a sturdy kettle, soup revolutionized the way people ate. It breaks down meat and vegetable fibers and creates a delicious broth. “Ancient Roman cuisine indicates evidence that soup making had evolved to the point that peasants and soldiers relied on it for basic sustenance, while well before that time wealthy, eccentric gourmands prepared it as either a precursor to a banquet or a highly seasoned substantial dish served in its own right.”20 Soup has always been in the middle of the drama between different social groups. It provides sustenance, and its prominence at the privileged

18 Diccionario de La Lengua Castellana Por La Real Academia Española., 6th ed. (Madrid: Real Academia Española, 1822). “SOPA. La comida que dan á los pobres en los conventos por ser la mayor parte de ella pan y caldo.” My translation. 19 Diccionario de La Lengua Castellana Por La Real Academia Española, 13th ed. (Madrid: Sres. Hernando y compañia, 1899). “Plato compuesto de rebanadas de pan, féculas, arroz, fideos ú otras pastas, y el caldo de la olla, en que se han cocido.” “Pasta, fécula ó verduras que se emplean en el plato de este mismo nombre.” My translation. 20 Victoria Rumble, Soup Through the Ages: A Culinary History with Period Recipes (Jefferson, North Carolina, and London: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2009), 7. 11 table in nineteenth-century Mexico makes it ripe for a discussion of class and distinctions.

A bowl of sopa de pan, delicately served from a tureen, might be a fitting first course before a group of honorable guests. It could also be the main meal of the day in a house for people without means. In nineteenth-century Mexico, broths and soups were considered the most wholesome meal for people suffering from cholera or the frailty associate with old age.21 Soup can be simple or sophisticated, require few or many ingredients, call for fewer or more steps, and need general or specific knowledge to prepare it. Soup can be cooked in a pot over an open fire or on a wood stove inside an apartment. Nineteenth-century Mexican recipes reveal attempts to transform simple soups into food for the gente decente. In the end, however, soup is a one-pot meal dominated by the quality of the soup stock. The rest is culinary sleight-of-hand.22

The Porfiriato

The presidency of Porfirio Díaz is first and foremost characterized by political stability and uneven economic growth within a framework of capitalist modernization. Initially a footnote in Mexican historiography, Porfirio Díaz’s government has been a subject of interest in recent decades. The “more than thirty years of relative economic and political stability, especially notable in light of what had been the history of Mexico since 1821” has contributed to a slow chipping away of the “black legend” of the Porfiriato and has heralded new scholarship of the period.23 Aurora Gómez-Galvarriato argues in her case study of the Mexican textile industry that

21 See Figure 10. 22 Michael Ruhlman, Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking (New York: Scribner, 2009), 103. “The liquid is the flavor-delivery device, both of the actual ingredients and the garnish in the soup, as well as the infusion of aromatic goodness.” Ruhlman offers an appreciation of the subtle shift in ratios to make different recipes. 23 Mauricio Tenorio Trillo and Aurora Gómez-Galvarriato, El Porfiriato (México, D.F.: Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2006). “…de más de treinta años de relativa estabilidad económica y política, especialmente notable a la luz de lo que había sido la historia de México a partir 1821.” My translation. 12 while “new steamship lines and railroad networks greatly reduced transport costs and permitted the growth of modernized retailing and manufacturing firms,” trusted social networks of capital- generating entrepreneurs created some of the economic stability, given weak institutional protections by the Porfirian government.24

From an economic point of view, the Porfiriato was a period of fast but uneven economic growth. John Coatsworth claims that “Between I877 and 1910 national income per capita grew at an annual average rate of 2.3 percent—extremely rapid growth by world standards, so fast indeed that per capita income more than doubled in thirty-three years.”25 His work compares Mexican national per capita income with that of other countries, revealing that economic development of

Mexico is on par with other nations until 1800. Significant economic growth in per capita income, however, does not mean even distribution—more recent research has presented a bleaker picture of the period. Amílcar Challú and Gómez-Galvarriato’s study of real wages, measuring people’s purchasing power using food baskets, not per capita income, offers a sobering story of wage stagnation, but ultimately it is a more accurate and comparable framework to understand what people could afford to buy with their money.26

24 Aurora Gómez-Galvarriato, “Networks and Entrepreneurship: The Modernization of the Textile Business in Porfirian Mexico,” Business History Review 1885, no. Autumn (2008): 475. Weis, Bakers and Basques: A Social History of Bread in Mexico. also discusses the trusted social networks that allowed Basque bakers to dominate the Mexican bread market. 25 John H Coatsworth, “Obstacles to Economic Growth in Nineteenth-Century Mexico,” The American Historical Review 83, no. 1 (1978): 81. 26 Amílcar E. Challú and Aurora Gómez-Galvarriato, “Mexico’s Real Wages in the Age of the Great Divergence, 1730-1930,” Revista de Historia Económica 33, no. 1 (2015): 83–122. Moramay López-Alonso adds to the historiography by using a multi-faceted approach to measure living standards. Prior to 1950 and the creation of comparable living standards data, anthropomorphic data, particularly height, is a valuable tool because it can measure aspects of nutrition. Moramay Lopez-Alonso, Measuring Up: A History of Living Standards in Mexico, 1850-1950 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2012). 13

John Tutino’s From Insurrection to Revolution in Mexico: Social Bases of Agrarian

Vionece, 1750-1940 supports the notion that gains in wealth were uneven. Focusing on landed elites during the Porfiriato, he demonstrates how railroads streamlined Mexico’s growing agricultural export-focused market by providing transportation of goods as well as an armed militia to quell agrarian discontent.27 Díaz was effective in convincing rural elites to cede political power for economic gain, allowing him to “remove local oligarchs from high political offices across the nation and to replace them with politically loyal agents.”28 Even though the people working these lands were treated poorly and subject to debt peonage, Tutino argues that risking their lives in open rebellion would have had to involve serious threats to their food security and autonomy.29

Many authors have argued that print media was one way in which elites promulgated a sense of nationhood. In Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities, he argues that “the convergence of capitalism and print technology on the fatal diversity of human language created the possibility of a new form of imagined community, which in its basic morphology set the stage for the modern nation.”30 According to Anderson, the creation of a widely-distributed print vernacular meant “bourgeoisies were the first classes to achieve solidarities on an essentially imagined basis.”31 Anderson’s innovative work spans multiple countries and time periods. His arguments have been partially historicized by several authors in an edited volume by Sara

Castro-Klarén and John Chasteen. In it, François-Xavier Guerra showcases the many ways

27 John Tutino, From Insurrection to Revolution in Mexico: Social Bases of Agrarian Violence, 1750-1940 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Presss, 1988): 281. 28 Ibid, 279. 29 Ibid, 289. 30 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (New York: Verso, 1991), 46. 31 Ibid, 77. 14 discourses of nationhood entered public and private spheres—in art, sermons, ceremonies, hand- written missives, broadsides read aloud, and of course books and newspapers. He argues that

“the print media played an ever increasing [sic] role in [the] process of creation and political socialization, but never an exclusive one.”32

Along with the political and economic transformations, the Porfiriato saw significant change in subjectivities and sensibilities. Viviane Mahieux brings to the forefront the anxieties over modernization as expressed by journalists such as Manuel Gutierrez Nájera, who lamented the advent of the telegraph and the commodification of the newspaper. “Newspapers had been closely associated with the state and state opinions, but they then began to rely on the profit principles of commerce. Writing for the press thus became a profession intrinsically linked to the market and to the informative demands of journalism.”33 Joel Vargas Domínguez highlights the rationalization of the Mexican diet and “The interest of the government in the use of science to legitimize its practices, such as its intent to control and govern the body of the individuals as much as the social body.”34 William French shows how “middle-class Porfirians in general transferred the debate from the subject of class conflict and the economic conditions of workers

32 François-Xavier Guerra Guerra, “Forms of Communication, Political Spaces, and Cultural Identities in the Creation of Spanish American Nations,” in Beyond Imagined Communities: Reading and Writing the Nation in Nineteenth-Century Latin America, ed. Sara Castro-Klarén and John Charles Chasteen (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), 32. In some ways, Anderson’s work echoes Angel Rama’s La Ciudad Letrada (The Lettered City), in which he argues that the Latin American city is an embodiment of the reasoned approach of the enlightenment, a Foucauldian-style hegemony, and a “blank slate” onto which colonial powers could project an imagined future. 33 Viviane Mahieux, Urban Chroniclers in Modern Latin America: The Shared Intimacy of Everyday Life (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2011), 10. 34 Joel Vargas Domínguez, “Alimentar El Cuerpo Social: Ciencia, Dieta Y Control En México Durante El Porfiriato” (Universidad Autónoma de Méxic, 2011), 10. “El interés del gobierno y el uso de la ciencia para legitimar sus prácticas, así como su intento de controlar y gobernar tanto el cuerpo de los individuos como el cuerpo social.” My Translation. 15 to that of the supposed moral degeneracy of the working class.”35 His article also juxtaposes the

Porfirian image of the respectable household woman with the prostitute to establish how all classes attempted to relegate females to the role of obedient worker, whether in or outside of the home. Women frequently did leave the home to work, and Susie Porter offers a reading of the regulation of women in the public sphere during the Porfiriato. The widespread presence of lower-class women in public spaces “clashed with ideas held by the upper classes that to be properly female meant limited interaction with the lower classes and a limited presence in public space.”36

The bourgeois was not the only class to develop imagined communities. Robert

Buffington addresses class struggle and subtle forms of resistance within Mexico City during the

Porfiriato in his exploration of the penny press. Even with the population more than doubling from 1877 to 1910, he notes that urban workers had strong artisan skillsets and high literacy rates

(up to fifty percent). The penny presses, dependent on income from sales, had to be responsive to working-class issues. In exchange for facilitating “the imagining of a Mexican national community grounded on the honest, productive and patriotic toil of Mexico’s working classes,” authorities gave the presses license to “criticize political corruption, crony capitalism, and exploitation of the working class so long as editors did not personally attack President Díaz or espouse overtly revolutionary ideas.”37 The presses highlighted the working classes’ subtle, ambiguous, and constant resistance in many directions. Transcending Manicheaen perspectives

35 William E. French, “Prostitutes and Guardian Angels: Women, Work, and the Family in Porfirian Mexico,” The Hispanic American Historical Review 72, no. 4 (1992): 538. 36 Susie S Porter, “‘And That It Is Custom Makes It Law’: Class Conflict and Gender Ideology in the Public Sphere, Mexico City, 1880-1910” 24, no. 1 (2000): 115. 37 Robert Buffington, A Sentimental Education for the Working Man; The Mexico City Penny Press, 1900-1919 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2015): 7-9. Quotes on page 9. 16 on the Porfiriato that would either celebrate it or vilify it, these historiographies offer a kaleidoscope of interpretations that continue to inspire subtler and subtler studies of the period.

The Gente Decente

In this thesis, I use the Spanish term “gente decente” to characterize the upper echelons of

Mexican society with more education and status. All social constructions are somewhat permeable, and the gente decente are no exception. Some authors describe them as people who made an outward show of sophistication and

based their propriety on their ability to acquire and deploy a material culture of European provenance, even if at times it relied on cheap, domestically-produced copies and brands that satisfied their needs and their income levels. Innovative credit formats, such as layaway and rent-to-own, made the trappings of gente decente class aspirations accessible, as did a thriving trade on used goods.38

The gente decente occupied various professional trades, including printing and journalism. Their position in society was “fluid, rather than fixed, circumstantial, rather than predetermined.”39

They tended to consider their position in society as a function of natural talent and not a privilege.40 Here I use it as a term to describe a loosely-associated group of people with self- determined moral authority, defining themselves less in terms of who they were but in opposition to the lower classes whom they considered “debased, deviant, and prone to criminal behavior.”41

Theoretical Framework

Authors across multiple disciplines have emphasized a binary mode of inquiry into

Mexican culture, and this also applies to food. The well-worn dichotomies of modern and

38 Gabriela Soto Laveaga and Claudia Agostini, “Science and Public Health in the Century of Revolution,” in A Companion to Mexican History and Culture, ed. William Beezley, 1st ed. (West Sussex: Blackwell Publishing, Ltd., 2011), 72. 39 Buffington, A Sentimental Education for the Working Man; The Mexico City Penny Press, 1900-1919. 40 Ibid., 25 41 Ibid., 179. 17 backward, rural and urban, rich and poor beg for refinement.42 Soup provides a nuanced gaze at identity and class. To accomplish this, I adopt a theoretical approach rooted in the ideas of four theorists: Weber (rationalization), Bourdieu (social capital, distinction), Tilly (bounded categories), and Luis Reygadas (applies Tilly in a Latin American context).

The Porfiriatio is known for its economic growth, modernization, and technocratic leadership style.43 Theorist Weber juxtaposed the bureaucratization of government and the routinization of family life. He saw bureaucracy as not only efficient, but superior—a reflection of modernity, and encompassing all aspects of life.

The development of modern forms of organizations in all fields is nothing less than identical with the development and continual spread of bureaucratic administration. This is true of church and state, of armies, political parties, economic enterprises, interest groups, endowments clubs, and many others. Its development is, to take the most striking case, at the root of the modern Western state.44

This approach could categorize and order daily life for maximum efficiency. Models for how to live an organized life would have been found in the Church, but also in newspapers and cookbooks, which form the corpus of this research. Even with a wide circulation, these print forms of disseminating specialized cultural knowledge may have been less accessible to most of the population of Mexico, making them more exclusive.45 Cookbooks include more than recipes;

42 Raymond Williams, The Country and the City (New York: Oxford University Press, 1973). 43 Trillo and Gómez-Galvarriato, El Porfiriato. 44 Max Weber, Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology, ed. Guenther Rother and Claus Wittich, 4th ed. (New York: Bedminster Press Incorporated, 1978), https://archive.org/details/MaxWeberEconomyAndSociety. We can safely assume Weber was not referring to Mexico while writing this, even though geographically and economically it was as “western” as any of the other countries usually included in that canon. See John Tutino, Making a New World: Founding Capitalism in the Bajío and Spanish North America (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2011). 45 Max Roser and Esteban Ortiz-Ospina, “Literacy,” OurWorldinData.org, 2016, https://ourworldindata.org/literacy/. For a comparative historical perspective on literacy rates. In 1900, Mexican literacy was at 24 percent. By 1910, Mexico had slightly exceeded the world literacy average at 30 percent, but was well behind other countries (Chile: 53 percent; Argentina: 18 they are a blueprint for living a moral, healthy, and respectable lifestyle. By prescribing what foods to eat and the way to eat them, they necessarily exclude some foods. Newspapers receive a wider audience, and they perform a similar function: providing models of success and examples of failure.

While Weber emphasizes rationalization, Bourdieu explains the reciprocal intermingling of elite ideals and behavior with material success. If satire is a form of admiration, perhaps he receives his highest compliment in Dr. Seuss’s Sneetches. This children’s story illuminates the friction between social classes. Unlike in Bourdieu, there are only two classes: the Star-Belly

Sneetches and the Plain-Belly Sneetches. The Star-Belly Sneetches construct their identity and exercise privilege based on their outward appearance, but when the Plain-Belly Sneetches change their appearance to match their counterparts, the “original” Star-Belly Sneetches must remove their stars to maintain their power and difference.

When the Star-Belly Sneetches had frankfurter roasts / Or picnics or parties or marshmallow toasts, / They never invited the Plain-Belly Sneetches. / They left them out cold, in the dark of the beaches. / They kept them away. Never let them come near. / And that's how they treated them year after year.46

The ensuing back-and-forth dynamic illustrates Bourdieu’s theory of distinction. Wealthier classes marked their position in society with their material possessions, but they excluded other classes with their access to social capital.47 Taste forms a part of this cluster of capital. Whether

60 percent; U.S.: 92 percent). However, Buffington describes literacy rates encouragingly, especially for the working class. Buffington, A Sentimental Education for the Working Man; The Mexico City Penny Press, 1900-1919. 46 Theodor Seuss Geisel, The Sneetches, and Other Stories. Written and Illustrated by Dr. Seuss (New York: Random House, 1961), 7. 47 Pierre Bourdieu and Loïc J. D. Wacuqant, An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology, Chicago (University of Chicago Press, 1992). “Social capital is the sum of the resources, actual or virtual, that accrue to an individual or a group by virtue of possessing a durable network of more or less institutionalized relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition. Acknowledging that 19 we are talking about bread, tortillas, or soup, they can all be analyzed under a hegemony of taste.

Although they appear to be dictated by elites, a multiplicity of tastes form through a complex web of social interaction and relations of power. The Sneetches’ stars symbolize Bourdieu’s more sophisticated schema of the social order.48 Thus, the way a person talks about his or her food betrays his or her position in society as much as it attempts to mark others’.49

In Dr. Seuss’s allegory, the Sneetches can, albeit at a cost, adapt to changing circumstances to acquire more social capital. However, per Tilly, “paired and unequal categories do crucial organizational work, producing marked, durable differences in access to valued resources. Durable inequality depends heavily on the institutionalization of categorical pairs.”50

He shows how these superficial qualities can result in lasting and “bounded” categories.51

Of these categories, Reygadas stresses their malleable and socially constructed nature and

capital can take a variety of forms is indispensable to explain the structure and dynamics of differentiated societies.” 48 Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986), 470. “The network of oppositions between high (sublime, elevated, pure) and low (vulgar, low, modest), spiritual and material, fine (refined, elegant) and coarse (heavy, fat, crude, brutal), light (subtle, lively, sharp, adroit) and heavy (slow, thick blunt, laborious, clumsy), free and forced, broad and narrow, or, in another dimension, between unique (rare, different, distinguished, exclusive, exceptional, singular, novel) and common (ordinary, banal commonplace, trivial, routine), brilliant (intelligent) and dull (obscure, grey, mediocre), is the matrix of all the commonplaces which find such ready acceptance because behind them lies the whole social order.” 49 William E French, A Peaceful and Working People (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1996), 4. He argues that “the middle class and the working class constructed themselves reactively, that is, in relation to one another.” That is, class identity is negotiated. This implies that working-class people are not passive agents; they distinguish themselves by reacting, opposing, and compromising. 50 Charles Tilly, Durable Inequality (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 8. 51Ibid., 230. “Exploitation, opportunity hoarding, emulation, and adaptation that incorporate asymmetrically paired categories have for millennia promoted most of the inequality that historians commonly attribute to individual differences in capacity or enterprise. These causal principles combine with a vast historical record to provide the means of constructing counterfactual accounts of durable inequality.” 20 emphasizes how they vary in place and time, “inequality is not an immutable essence but a mutable historical construction: the levels and types of inequality change from one country to the next as well as vary through time. They are products of complex and contradictory processes, not of a cultural or economic destiny.52 Inspired by Reygadas, this thesis investigates trends in soup during the long nineteenth century, paying attention to ways it questions socially-constructed boundaries.

Methods

In this study, I draw a link between the two sources: cookbooks and newspapers.

Cookbooks were detailed guidebooks on how to prepare meals, but they also showed how to live a moral and successful life that imagined an ideal class identity. Newspapers enjoyed a wider circulation than cookbooks and offered similar examples of how to live in a modernizing era.

The newspapers are available in digital format, and the cookbooks are a combination of in situ archival research and digital cookbooks. The overarching questions I ask of the sources are:

What aspects of the recipes, instances of phrases (such as “sopa de pan” or “puchero”) or the surrounding context evince an attempt by the middle class to define and distinguish itself? What trends in soup reveal themselves over the long nineteenth century? Do certain soups permeate class barriers, or are they stigmatized as soups for people with little means?

The research for this project is grounded in two complementary methodologies: historical vignettes and text mining. Vignettes are familiar to the historical profession; I scrutinize texts and their contexts to construct narratives that highlight the quantitative portions of the research.

The ingredients within recipes often reveal an attempt at class distinction, but the recipes’

52 Luis Reygadas, “The Construction of Latin American Inequality,” in Indelible Inequalities in Latin America: Insights from History, Politics, and Culture (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2010), 23. 21 contexts are also rich sources of data. In newspapers, the context of the page shows ways in which the middle class imagined an ideal life, usually a woman’s life. By compliment, cookbook introductory remarks speak on proper etiquette, health, and other matters pertaining to the class of people that could both read and afford to buy cookbooks.

I use text mining to “computationally explore historical data in a way that would previously seem resistant to quantification.”53 The concept is not new, but the technologies that allow it to function, such as Optional Character Recognition (OCR), web-based digital archives, and software that can search for trends are incredibly valuable. Graham, Milligan, and Weingart reference two software applications I explore in this study: Google ngrams and Voyant Tools. I also use analog techniques for mining cookbook contents. Combined, these methods offer an interesting window into the culinary world of nineteenth-century Mexico City.

To my knowledge, this is the first application of text mining techniques in a cultural history of cookbooks. I employ digital text mining to determine the prevalence of certain foods in cookbook collections, and I enumerate and catalogue mentions of dishes in newspapers.

Digital text mining provides the researcher a lens not available to the naked eye—it signals areas for further inquiry or highlights silences in the text. On the other hand, a qualitative investigation of the resources brings to light what a birds-eye view from the text mining cannot. For example,

I know from text mining how many times cookbooks employed the term “caldo,” signaling its relative importance, but it does not demonstrate the different ways caldo can be prepared—with different ingredients, that it should be served prior to the first soup, and that it can be used to heal the sick. I subject the same digitally-analyzed corpus to a reading that helps me reconstruct a

53 Shawn Graham, Shawn Milligan, and Scott Weingart, Exploring Big Historical Data: The Historian’s Macroscope (London: Imperial College Press, 2015), 3. 22 portrait of elite culinary imagination, putting these complementary frameworks in dialogue with one another.

Ngrams allows users to search for words and phrases within Google’s vast collection and track instances over time. The tool does not yet allow the user to isolate information by region of publication, and it is limited to Google’s selection of digitized books. Therefore, tracking phrase such as “gente decente” in Mexico would be difficult. Instead, phrases exclusive to Mexico were helpful, such as cemitas and pambazos, the least expensive breads in Mexico.

Voyant Tools is the other online software tool I used. It can analyze URLs or allow a user to upload materials in text or PDF form. I uploaded five cookbooks ranging from 1831-1898 and used them to compare instances of ingredients with one another. One of the more prominent features of the software is the ability to count words and to compare them in line graphs that divide the book into segments, where a term’s location in a cookbook can be significant. It also allows the user to quickly find words in context and to create word clouds that represent word frequency overall by their size in the word cloud. I chose to concentrate on a simple tally of word frequencies.

The chapter on sopa de pan most effectively employs the combination of quantitative and qualitative methods; however, the thesis overall employs a mixed approach, which allows for trends to be grounded in the sources, and the sources to be grounded in trends.

23

CHAPTER 2. A STEW OF INGREDIENTS: CALDO IN FAMILY MENUS AND PUBLIC

DISCOURSE

In the previous chapter I set the “set the table” so to speak, developing the context, theory, and methods I would apply to this thesis. In this chapter, I synthesize a broad swath of material that offers the reader an overview of those techniques in practice, using contextualized narrative, text mining, and showcasing recipes in the literature to offer a portrait of the nineteenth-century table.

Vignette: Rafaelita

Soup is a combination of liquid broth and another substance, so it is appropriate to begin with a vignette devoted to caldo, the broth from which soups derive their “soupiness.” The following explores the importance of caldo in El cocinero mexicano, the earliest printed cookbook in Mexico. Soup is made from adding other ingredients, and bread happens to be one of the most common of those ingredients during the early part of the nineteenth century. Caldo’s role as a healing broth and a fortifying beverage has endured the test of time, whether in Spain’s cafés and restaurants, or at taco stands in Mexico City.

The image below comes from a book written in 1906 designed to educate girls on various domestic topics, including how to cook. It features Rafaelita, the cocinera (cook), preparing food over a bench stove. I use it here to help visualize what it might have looked like to cook soup, along with a contextualized narrative.

24

Figure 2. Rafaelita, lectura para niñas. 1906.

Sources and Notes: María M. Rosales, Rafaelita: Historia de Una Niña Hacendosa : Libro de Lectura Para Uso de Las Niñas (Moral, Higiene, Historia Patria, Ciencias, Gramática, Urbanidad, Artes, Industrias, Economía Doméstica, Cuidado de La Casa Cocina, Lecciones de Cosas Etc.), ed. M Rodríguez-Navas, 1906, https://books.google.com/books?id=Jk9jrgEACAAJ. Digital Image. Available from https://aof.revues.org/docannexe/image/6464/img-1.png (accessed December 14, 2012).

A bench stove warms the kitchen. Between her other duties, the cocinera gently replenishes the wood fire through the rectangular hole under the fogón and checks to make sure the pot is at a gentle simmer. A perfect fuego suave is a sign of an experienced cook. She deftly skims the espuma off the top of the stock and stokes the fire with a fan, allowing it to cook just a bit faster. Eventually she captures all the foam. She leaves the pot to attend to the rest of the ingredients, checking in frequently to make sure the several pounds of beef are not cooking too quickly or slowly. After about four hours, she puts the vegetables into the pot to complement the meat: three medium carrots, an equal number of turnips, four leeks cut lengthwise, a generous handful of parsley, and an onion with a few cloves inserted and a little salt. By now she needs to add a little hot water to keep the pot from losing too much volume. To complete the caldo gordo, 25

(fat broth) perhaps she adds a half a large hen or a similar bird, turkey giblets or roast mutton bones, depending on what is available. Four more hours and a rich broth forms the base for any soup.54

The complete title of this three-volume cookbook translates to, The Mexican Cook, or

Collection of the Best Recipes for Cooking the American Way, and of the Most Select According to Spanish, Italian, French, and English Kitchens, Volume I. Part of the title gives away how the authors defined themselves as gente decente, “…with the simplest procedures to make doughs, sweets, liqueurs, ice cream, and everything necessary for decent service at a good table.”55 The chapter that begins the book is on how to properly set a table, which is key to keeping a “good” household. Another aspect of distinction is in the recipes themselves; the author discusses the importance of how to make a good broth for a soup because it can heal the sick or maintain a person in good health.56 The reader is promised that following these directions will allow the impression of coming from a prosperous and respected home.

54 “Caldo de carne que sirve para todas sopas, y los franceses llaman caldo gordo. 5. Se toman desde dos hasta seis libras de vaca que se echan en una olla con cuatro cuartillos de agua para cada libra de carne, poniéndola á un fuego suave que se irá aumentando poco á poco para estraer todas las partes sanguinolentas que se designan con el nombre espuma. Esta se irá quitando á medida que aparezca en la superficie hasta que no quede nada. Se deja después sobre un fuego igual y moderado á lo menos por ocho horas consecutivas. Cuando solo hayan pasado cuatro, se echan en la olla tres zanahorias medianas, tres navos y cuatro puerros, partido todo por la mitad, un manojito de perejil, mas ó menos grande, una cebolla cabezona, en la que habrían prendido dos ó tres clavos de especia y sal en suficiente cantidad. Con agua caliente que se tendrá á mano, se compensará la que se evapore. Si á todo esto se añade una ave entera, ó lo que es lo mismo, media gallina grande, el menudillo de un guajolote ó huesos de carnero asado, se obtendrá pro este procedimiento, tan sencillo y fácil de ejecutar, todo lo que hay mejor en un caldo gordo.” My translation and dramatization. 55 El cocinero mexicano o colección de las mejores recetas para guisar al estilo americano, y de las más selectas según el método de las cocinas española, italiana, francesa e inglesa, Tomo I. Mexico: Galvan, 1831. http://biblioteca.herdez.com.mx/index.php/memoria-del-mundo-tomo- 1 56 Ibid., 2. 26

The Clock in the Kitchen, 1909

Figure 3: Kitchen in 1909

Source: “La mujer en el hogar: la cocina,” El Mundo Ilustrado, February 7, 1909, 300.

The illustration offers a glimpse into an imagined kitchen of 1909, equipped with a modern notion of cleanliness, the proper tools in their proper places, and above all, a clock: “As an indispensable object in the kitchen, we point out the clock, which we see located on the first edge of the cupboard. Without the clock, it is impossible for a kitchen to be complete; therefore, it is necessary to have it at hand to consult the time that the food is boiling to make sure it is not under or overcooking.”57 While time is an important concept in cooking, this article and many like it perform a successful coup in making the clock a focal point. The clock can tell whether

57 “La mujer en el hogar: la cocina.” “Como objeto indispensable en una cocina, señalaremos el reloj, el cual vemos colocado en primer término en el hueco del armario. Sin el reloj, es imposible que una cocina esté completa, pues es preciso tenerlo á la mano para consultar el tiempo que las viandas están hirviendo, á fin de evitar que les falte ó les sobre cocimiento.” My translation. 27 the food is cooking properly; the chef need no longer rely on her eyes, ears, or sense of taste to determine doneness. The clock takes over the chef’s judgement. The message is clear—consult the recipe book, and we will tell you how long to cook it for. Whether cooking by time eclipsed tasting the food is an area outside the purview of this chapter, but the clock was a powerful marker of distinction; it signaled order and embraced a modern approach to the art of cooking.

A Weberian Weekly Menu: Advice to Newlywed Housewife58

If order is key in distinguishing oneself, a rationalized and orderly schedule for the week’s meals sets one apart as modern and sophisticated. The following weekly schedule from

1905 gives insight into how the middle class imagined a week’s worth of meals. They are revealing—a heavy comida in the afternoon reflects a Spanish tradition, which projects a sense of refinement.59 Mutton was highly prized and is a prominent part of the diet toward the end of the week. The variety of the meals is also an important class marker; the diet of the working classes was more limited in scope. The schedule is perfectly suited to the constructed image of modernity during the Porfiriato—it is rational: it implies a budget, it runs on a schedule, and it depends on an organized person to do the shopping and prepare ingredients in advance. The newspaper article does not include the recipes, so the assumption is that the reader will already

58 “En El Hogar,” El Mundo Ilustrado, April 9, 1905, http://www.hndm.unam.mx/consulta/publicacion/visualizar/558a33b87d1ed64f169a1af0?intP agina=5&tipo=pagina&palabras=buey_cocido_con%3Bmundo+ilustrado&anio=1905&mes=04 &dia=09. “Mezclados manteca y buen aceite de olivo, se frien allí gitomates asados y molidos, cebolla picada; se sazona la salsa que resulta con sal y pimiento, agregando caldo ó agua, la suficiente cantidad para que quede caldosa; estando hirviendo se le ponen unas hojas de tomillo, orégano y mejorana, y al último el pan bien tostado y en rebanadas delgaditas del ancho de la pieza; luego que se ponga el pan se retira del fuego, se polvorea con perejil picado fino y queso rayado, procurando pasarla á la sopera suavemente, y se le pone un poquito de aceite y manteca quemada en el momento de servirla.” My translation. 59 In Spain, Comida is a heavy meal usually eaten in the afternoon (3-5pm); “dinner” is usually much lighter and served later in the evening. 28 know how to make (or can find a recipe for) eel “a la tártara.”

A somewhat gendered reading adds dimension to the menu. It is presented as part of a larger article in three parts: advice to the newly married woman without a servant, a weekly cleaning schedule, and the menu found below. On Monday, she wakes up at five to begin the daily chores. “The recently married woman should feel happy with her new life. To secure success in her tasks, she should use good judgment and be ordered and systematic.”60 Health, morality, and a woman’s proper place in the home are key to the happy home. “Healthy ingredients, regularity in activities, rest and recreation are the principal factors of health.”61

Finally, soup is served at each main meal, but many different types of soup are served. A discerning eye reveals sopa de pan is served on Friday. It is named caldo de cortezas y legumbres (broth with crusts and legumes), but it is identical to a basic sopa de pan recipe. One thing is clear: soup is a part of this daily combination of activities. Soup, when varied and international, is a first-class member of the gente decente’s dream of modernity.

60 Ibid. “La recién casada debe sentirse feliz con su nueva vida. Para tener éxito seguro en los trabajos, debe usar buen juicio y ser ordenada y sistemática.” My Translation. For comparable sources in Canada, Dianne Dodd, “Advice to Parents: The Blue Books, Helen MacMurchy, MD, and the Federal Department of Health, 1920-34.,” Canadian Bulletin of Medical History = Bulletin Canadien D’histoire de La Médecine 8, no. 2 (1991): 203–30. 61 Ibid. 29

Figure 4: Suggested Weekly Menu62

Morning Mid-day (Comida) Evening

Sun Oranges, cakes, eggs, Soup with sorrel, “Gardener” mutton Bread and butter, and coffee. chops, hake with capers, stuffed coffee or tea. tomatoes, lettuce, cheese and poached eggs.

Mon Tapioca with milk and Onion soup, rice with cod, roasted ox Toast, ribs, and tea. vanilla, fried bacon and hip, fresh radishes, salmon apples. mayonnaise and peach preserves.

Tue Oats, veal steak, pear Italian macaroni soup, ox cooked with Cookies, grilled jam and coffee. hot sauce, English peas and milk apples, with ham sorbet. and tea.

Wed Egyptian sponge cake, “Magistral” broth, meat stew, Fried potatoes, fried pigeon, rice mountain trout, turnips in bechamel, strawberry cake, and pudding and coffee. flan, milk, and tea. mutton testicles and coffee.

Thu Raw, sliced tomatoes Consommé of bird in cream, rice Potato salad, fried dusted with sugar, soup, Aragonese pig ears, bream with sole, meringue, and Majorcan mutton mushrooms, duck pastry and chocolate. kidney, cakes and mantecados. coffee.

Fri Egg frittata, chicken Broth with crusts and legumes, calf Dried fruit, hot liver in buttered paper, “tapa” with spinach, leg of roast cakes, sautéed butter and tea. mutton, eel “a la tártara,” olives, chicken, cream and sausage and “cartuja” of apples. tea. Coffee or tea.

Sat Coastal bananas with Semolina soup, fried brains, calf head Lobster, roast beef, sugar and milk, fried “al natural,” soft beans (habas) with plums, raisins, and ham, mutton chops and milk, foie gras cake, brandied cherry coffee. coffee. jelly and raisins.

62 “En El Hogar.” My translations. 30

Text Mining

Having had a brief view into a middle-class kitchen and a sense of what a week’s worth of meals might look like, I now consider a larger selection of texts to see what kinds of ingredients were most prevalent. Voyant tools gives a sense of a word’s overall value; however, it is less useful when attempting to research more specific aspects of the recipes. For example, bread appears 311 times in the 1845 cookbook Diccionario, but from this the user cannot tell how many soup recipes contained bread, whether the term “pan” duplicated itself in the same recipe, or whether it was part of a recipe at all (see Figure 5: Diccionario). Further, to a way to compare the relative frequency of an ingredient in one book with another, I went back through each cookbook and counted soup recipes with bread in them versus those without (Figure 8) either by hand or using the “find” command in Google books and Archive.org when available.

In Figures 5 and 6, I rank ingredients from the digital corpus in order of how many mentions they receive in each book. The size of the books explains why some of the cookbooks have different total numbers of ingredients in the rankings in the appendix (A and B). In Figure

5, I color code the ingredients roughly divided into proteins, cereals, fats, vegetables and fruits.

In Figure 6, I rank the same ingredients within the food groups. While general, the groupings offer a point of departure for discussing the relative variety in the diet, which is a class marker.

Finally, some ingredients are still in Spanish because they are better expressed that way, such as caldo.

31

Cookbooks

Figure 5: Ingredients in Five Cookbooks: Ranked by Frequency of Mention

Proteins Cereals Fats Vegetables Fruits

Novísimo - Diccionario Perfecto - Poblana Recetas 1831 1845 1883 1890 1898 1 eggs eggs water water eggs 2 lard water lard lard sugar 3 water salt eggs salt water 4 sugar sugar caldo eggs milk 5 cinammon lard salt pimienta lard 6 almonds caldo chicken garlic butter 7 salt pimienta garlic onions cinammon 8 milk salsa onions caldo salt 9 garlic butter wine carne flour 10 syrup garlic cinammon oil pimienta 11 clove cinammon clove parsley masa 12 chicken bread vinegar chiles almonds 13 pimienta onions chiles bread onions 14 wine oil pimienta salsa vinegar 15 caldo milk oil vinegar loin 16 carne almonds carne sugar carne 17 bread vinegar sugar milk garlic 18 vinegar masa almonds flour salsa 19 onions syrup bread cinammon syrup 20 masa flour masa tomatoes caldo 21 flour vino fish wine oil 22 chiles carne caldillo fish oregano 23 jamón caldillo syrup almonds postres 24 raisins jamón flour jamón wine 25 pasta clove tomatoes butter chiles

32

Results from Figure 5 show that caldo, the most important ingredient in any soup, stay within the top twenty most-mentioned foods. “Soup” itself is mentioned more modestly, never extending its reach into the first twenty-five foods. Bread also maintains a strong presence in cookbooks—it comprises, in every case except the last, the most prominent form of cereal or grain. Figure 6 better compares rankings within food groups.

33

Figure 6: Ingredients in Five Cookbooks: Organized by Ranking and Type63

Proteins Cereals Fats Vegetables Fruits

Novísimo - 1831 Diccionario 1845 Perfecto -1883 Poblana 1890 Recetas 1898 eggs eggs eggs eggs eggs almonds milk chicken carne milk milk almonds almonds milk almonds chicken carne fish fish loin carne jamón jamón almonds carne bread bread bread bread flour masa masa masa flour masa flour flour flour masa postres pasta pasta fritters rice bread rice rice rice potatoes rice lard lard lard lard bolillo oil butter oil oil empanadas butter oil butter butter lard cream garlic garlic garlic butter garlic onions onions onions oil onions parsley chiles parsley onions chiles chiles parsley chiles garlic parsley olives oregano thyme oregano oregano lemon tomatoes tomatoes chiles raisins raisins raisins lemon salad tomatoes tomatoes olives olives tomatoes olives water fruit orange pineapple papaya salt lemon raisins olives lemon sugar water water raisins water caldo caldo salt lemon sugar pimienta salt pimienta sugar cinammon wine caldo water salt cinammon salsa cinammon syrup salt pimienta

63 Abbreviated to the first five of each category. For complete table, see appendix 2. 34

The above table suggests a balanced diet with a variety of meats and other foods that would have been unavailable to the poorest of the working class. However, it is significant that eggs are the most consistent source of protein because chickens are much easier to raise than cattle. Chile also deserves mention because it consistently stays in the top three or four vegetables in this data set. These results demonstrate that even though there were apparent attempts to mark certain foods as backward or irrelevant, such as the Sneetches, their transformations were often superficial in nature.

Newspapers

I use newspaper records available online to chart the instances of “sopa de pan” from

1800-1920. 64 To track “sopa de pan” over the period, I catalogued how many instances and in which years it appeared, limiting my search to publications in Mexico City. Issues surfaced— short words such as “sopa” easily elicit false positives due to inaccuracies in the scanning and

OCR. However, the word “soup" in Spanish is almost always followed by the preposition “of”

(as in “sopa de pan”). By searching for the combination “sopa de,” I acquired more relevant data.

I spot checked the results by checking every few links, and the results were encouraging.

Figures 7 and 8 are visual representations of the trends in mentions of sopa de pan compared to mentions of soup overall. Results from this text mining suggest that instances of sopa de pan play a small but substantial role in relation to other soups in newspapers over the long nineteenth century until references to soup fall off just before the revolutionary period. One

64 The Hemeroteca Nacional Digital de México houses a large collection of searchable newspapers ranging from the penny press to state-sponsored papers. Just over half of the roughly 7.5 million records are viewable to the public from a computer anywhere. The other half require a visit to the facility. Users access the archives from a computer lab located on the fourth floor of the Biblioteca Nacional de México on the edge of the sprawling campus of the Universidad Autónoma de México in Mexico City. 35 year, 1907, stands out because of a spike in soup mentions. Significantly, 96 of the 132 mentions of “soup,” or 73 percent of the rise can be attributed to just one newspaper, El Diario.65 Eight of the nine mentions of “sopa de pan” in that year can be attributed to the same paper. Spikes in mentions of “soup” in 1882 (62 percent), 1909 (50 percent), and 1910 (52 percent) also originate from El Diario, signaling this newspaper’s efforts to promote soup at the respectable table.66

Figure 7: Newspapers: Mentions of “Sopa de” and “Sopa de Pan”, 1800-192067

65 “Hemeroteca Nacional Digital de México,” Biblioteca Nacional Digital de México. http://www.hndm.unam.mx/consulta/busqueda/avanzada. 66 Ibid. 67 Thanks to John Dutton for his assistance with this chart. 36

Figure 8: “Sopa de” vs. “Sopa de Pan,” 1800-1920

1850 10 0 1886 36 3 1851 6 1 1887 38 1 1852 4 0 1888 30 1 1853 7 1 1889 25 1 1854 55 0 1890 27 1 1855 20 0 1891 52 2 1856 4 1 1892 33 7 1857 3 0 1893 43 1 1858 2 0 1894 27 1 1859 25 0 1895 40 1 1860 36 0 1896 21 2 1861 3 0 1897 57 2 1862 21 0 1898 58 0 1863 1 0 1899 37 0 1864 0 0 1900 50 2 1865 2 0 1901 43 4 1866 3 0 1902 56 2 1867 10 1 1903 48 1 1868 7 0 1904 45 2 1869 7 0 1905 44 4 1870 22 0 1906 60 3 1871 4 0 1907 132 9 1872 27 0 1908 50 2 1873 5 0 1909 82 2 1874 7 0 1910 96 2 1875 6 0 1911 38 3 1876 12 2 1912 34 1 1877 10 0 1913 31 5 1878 27 2 1914 13 1 1879 27 0 1915 15 0 1880 9 0 1916 9 0 1881 23 0 1917 16 1 1882 99 2 1918 39 0 1883 18 0 1919 7 0 1884 36 2 1920 26 0 1885 24 0 37

The rise in “sopa de pan” and “sopa de” mentions between 1900-1910 seems to contradict evidence of the gradually decreasing percentage of bread in soup from 1800-1920

(Figure 10). To explore this discrepancy, I review each of the “sopa de pan” mentions in newspapers (Figure 11). From these results, “sopa de pan” appeared to serve multiple functions—during a time of decadence for many, it was comfort food for the wealthy steeped in

European tradition, but at the same time it highlights the gente decente’s search for legitimacy.

Attempts to rename it, modify it, and to find other substitutions all point to the fact that by the end of the nineteenth century, “sopa de pan” became a clear marker of poverty. But the same soup by any other name could be acceptable by the gente decente.

The earliest sopa de pan recipe I found at the Hemeroteca Nacional Digital did not surface until 1884, well into the Porfiriato. Until then, about a third of “sopa de pan” occurrences reference illness, with the rest comprised of descriptions of hospital and convent conditions, restaurant advertisements, some fiction writing, and a recommended diet for women who want to gain weight for better appearance (see Figure 11). Sopa de pan continues to provoke curiosity because it was sustenance for the frail and food for the poor, but subtle changes made it fit for a distinguished table.

Caldo Recipes

This chapter began with a menu that includes caldo, sopa, and puchero, so it is fitting that this chapter ends with a recipe for the same meal. Puchero is an efficient way of offering three dishes in one, a benefit to any household because of its economy. It is interesting to note that this

1831 recipe clearly values the short thirty minutes it takes to prepare – the meat is cut up beforehand to facilitate the rapid creation of the caldo, and the ingredients are combined in the same pot. Water leeched from the simmering meat and vegetables turn the plain water to broth. 38

While the water undergoes its transformation, it is used to prepare the starch, whether rice or pasta. The “flavorful” puchero is the result.

Below is a recipe for Caldo, sopa y puchero del momento (Broth, soup and puchero of the moment).

7. Cut a half pound of beef into small pieces with a carrot, an onion, a turnip, a little celery and a clove. Put water and sufficient salt, having put the whole thing in a cazuela, pan, or pot that will boil and defoam it. After a half hour, strain the caldo through a sieve. To make the rice, noodles, or semolina, fill a small bag with them and put them in the water over the fire at the same time. When they have boiled, untie them and put them in a tureen, pouring the corresponding caldo above. Fry herbs in lard or butter with a little flour: wet it with caldo, keeping it a little thick, add the cooked, chopped beef from the beginning, adding salt, pepper, and eggs sunny side up or hard if you like them more. In this way one obtains, in a half an hour, caldo, soup and puchero, or a flavorful stew.68

Other authors commented on the centrality of soup at the respectable table. Just a few years prior, in 1842, Frances Calderón de la Barca, wife of the Spanish nobleman by the same name, describes an elegant scene in her collection of letters, Life in Mexico. In the sixteenth letter, she says of her arrival in Tulansingo, “we found dinner laid for forty persons, and the table ornamented by the taste of the gardener, with pyramids of beautiful flowers,” and later: “Every

68 El Cocinero Mexicano O Colección de Las Mejores Recetas Para Guisar Al Estilo Americano, Y de Las Más Selectas Según El Método de Las Cocinas Española, Italiana, Francesa E Inglesa. 7. “Se corta menudamente media libra de carne con una zanahoria, una cebolla cabezona, un nabo, un poco de ápio y un clavo de especia, se le echa encima el agua y sal suficiente, habiéndose puesto todo en una cazuela, sartén ú olla que se hará hervir y se espumará. Despues de media hora se pasa el caldo por un tamiz. Para hacer el arroz, fideos ó sémola, basta llenar de estas sustancias un pequeño saquito y echarlo en la agua sobre el fuego al mismo tiempo. Cuando haya hervido, se echa en una sopera desatado el saquito con su correspondiente caldo por encima. Se fríen yerbas finas en manteca ó mantequilla con un poco de harina: se humedecen con caldo, dejándose un poco espeso, se añade la carne picada y cocida que se dijo al principio, echándole sal, pimienta y huevos estrellados, ó duros si gustare mas. De este modo se obtiene en media hora caldo, sopa y puchero, ó gigote bien sabroso.” 39 dinner has puchero immediately following the soup.”69 Again, the order of the soups was as important as their place at the table.

In this chapter, I brought to light a variety of ways in which privileged classes attempted to distinguish themselves. Loaded terminology such as “good,” emphasizing order and cleanliness, rationalizing the menu, having access to kitchen tools, having a variety in diet, and eating in distinguished company were all markers that defined the wealthy against the relief of the poor, even though all were surely eating soup. In chapter 3, I examine the hierarchy of bread and the ways in which its most common form of consumption (soup) defied attempts to paint it into a hierarchy of food.

69 Francés Calderón de la Barca, Life in Mexico: The Letters of Fanny Calderón de La Barca, ed. Howard Fisher and Marion Hal Fisher (New York: Anchor Books, 1970), 228. De la Barca’s emphasis. 40

CHAPTER 3. BREAD AND SOPA DE PAN: TEXT MINING FOR STORIES AND

RECIPES

The previous chapter offered a smörgåsbord, or perhaps an olla podrida of “ingredients” the gente decente employed used to keep themselves distinct. This chapter narrows that approach to a specific soup, sopa de pan, and discovers that the people who called themselves “gente decente” might have been eating the same soup that was consumed in the convents, prisons, and working-class apartments.

You Are What You Eat

People’s ethnic categories had long been tied to the food they ate. Jeffrey Pilcher establishes the link in the eighteenth century between the “pure” white, pan francés and the upper class, pan floreado (flowered bread) for wealthy creoles, and pan común (common bread - cemitas and pambazos) for the mixed-race masses. According to Pilcher, “At the bottom of this hierarchy were Indians, who, even in Mexico City, consumed large quantities of corn tortillas, as did many other plebeians unable to afford the cheapest bread.”70 Bread was an important enough commodity that it could be bartered for wages.71 For example, in one instance reported in the El

Diario del Hogar, workers complained because they were paid only in pambazos, a good example of how owners tried to maintain class boundaries in both pay and food.72

70 Jeffrey Pilcher, Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 30. 71 Margaret Chowning, Rebellious Nuns: The Troubled History of a Mexican Convent, 1752- 1863 (Oxford University Press, 2006),169-171. See Margaret Chowning’s section on bread expenditures for La Purísima convent in Guanajuato. In the late 18th century, the convent would purchase bread for giving away to the poor, but also nuns used bread and mutton as bartering tools in exchange for personal conveniences, particularly hired help. 72 “Falta de Pagos,” El Diario Del Hogar, June 11, 1892, 3, col. 6. “Leemos en El Presente de Puebla: “Cuatro trabajadores de los que prestan sus servicios en la reparación de la línea entre Puebla y Atlizco, de los telegrafos del Estado, nos han venido á participar que en dos semanas consecutivos no se les han pagado sus labores, y que solo han recibido en cuenta de ellos, dia con 41

Another type of bread: pan frío, the bakeries’ “day-old” bread, also distinguished those with and without means, and it could be used to mark a divide between city and country folk.

The following excerpt from an 1895 Catholic newspaper, El Tiempo, praises the benefits of modernization. It speaks highly of the many artisanal products available in Coyoacan market and describes a government-backed program to encourage farmers to raise carp. Primarily, however, it serves to define city folk as refined and modern and country folk as stubborn and ignorant.73

It is neither an indiscretion nor a lie to say that very wealthy property owners, ranchers who enjoy sufficient rents, have a table that is not decente that they offer their own and their guests’ stomachs: they eat terribly, if eating is what we can call devouring the many things on which they feed themselves. Those of us who have traveled a bit far outside the Republic, testify to these acts! These farms could have magnificent vegetables; they only have lettuce and onions. They could have a small hand mill to make excellent bread; they eat only detestable pan viejo or no bread the entire year. They could have not just chickens, but also many other types of poultry. They have chickens, the great dish they let themselves offer as a great luxury to their guests.”74

The authors’ view of the wealthy rancheros (farmers) during the Porfiriato shows how class was

dia medio real de pambazos duros, que es el único alimento que han tomado.” “We read in El Presente from Puebla: Four workers of the kind who lend their services to the reparation of the line between Puebla and Atlizco, of the State telegraphs, have conveyed to us that in two consecutive weeks they haven’t been paid for their work, and all that they’ve received on their account, day after day is a half a real of hard pambazos, which is the only food they have eaten.” My translation. 73 Robert Weis, Bakers and Basques: A Social HIstory of Bread in Mexico (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2012), 135. “Day-old bread, known as pan frío (cold bread), could be up to three weeks old and would be sold for two-thirds the price of fresh bread, or pan caliente (warm bread). On hot days, bread baked any time in the previous year could be sold as caliente. Violators of the regulations would suffer ‘three days of…bread and water.’” Author cites “Pan al alcance de todos,” Fantoche, May 10, 1929. 74 “Cronica,” El Tiempo, April 28, 1895, 1, col. 7. “No es una indiscrecion ni ménos una mentira decir que hacendados muy ricos, rancheros qué gozan de rentas suficientes, tienen una mesa que no es decente, que ofrezcan á sus estómagos ni á sus huéspedes: comen pésimamente, si es que comer se puede llamar á devorar esas muchas cosas con que se alimentan! Los que hemos viajado un poco léjos del centro de la República, damos testimonio de esos hechos! Pueden esos campesinos tener hortalizas magnificas; tienen sólo lechugas y cebollas; pueden tener un pequeño milinito de mano para hacer un pan excelente: comen un pan viejo, detestable ó no comen pan en todo el año; pueden tener no sólo gallinas, sino otras muchas aves de corral: sólo tienen pollas que es el gran plato que se permiten ofrecer como gran lujo á sus convidados.” 42 not simply about wealth, but also about sophistication. Rancheros should accept the proposals for modernization that the Ministry of Development offered: exert dominion over nature by farming non-native fish species, grow wheat instead of corn, and mechanize their production with flour mills to eat fresh bread. Eating not just any bread, but high-quality, fresh bread was a way of projecting oneself as modern and respectable. That is, wealth could afford access to more prestigious social fields.

Text Mining “Pambazo” and “Cemitas” in Google Ngrams

Figure 9: Instances of “Pambazo(s)” Measured Against Instances of “Cemita(s)”

While I was unable to compare cemitas and pan frío, I used Google’s Ngrams to compare cemitas and pambazos, the least expensive breads that are unique to Mexico. When I spot checked the results in the chart below, with a few exceptions, most books in the corpus were printed in Mexico. While the cemita enjoys less dramatic variation, both appear to rise during the

Porfiriato and fall as it comes to an end.75 While the steep decline just before the Mexican

75 “Google Books Ngram Viewer,” accessed December 13, 2016, https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=cemita_INF%2Cpambazo_INF&case_insensiti ve=on&year_start=1800&year_end=1920&corpus=21&smoothing=6&share=&direct_url=t1%3 B%2Ccemita%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cpambazo%3B%2Cc0. To repeat this graph, choose parameters “between 1800-1920,” “Corpus Spanish,” “case-insensitive,” and finally in the search string “pambazo_INF, cemita_INF”. This last step allows for inflections such as singular and plural. 43

Revolution may be partially explained by a decline in printing, the rise in pambazo signals the importance of bread during the Porfirian era, and specifically bread for people with fewer means.

“Sopa de Pan” in Cookbooks and Newspapers

Figure 10 demonstrates the historical migration of bread out of soups and into other recipes in cookbooks.76 In this table, I hand-counted or used “find” tools where possible to ascertain the percentage of recipes with bread soup from 1831-1908. There is an unambiguous decline from bread’s inclusion in soup over the period. These results, compared with the centrality of bread in Figure 6, demonstrate that as soup recipes with bread in them declined, the use of bread was still strong in other areas. This hints at sopa de pan losing most of its prestige by the beginning of the twentieth century.

76 The cookbook selections analyzed with Voyant Tools from the previous tables are in bold. SDP indicates a cookbook that has “sopa de pan” or a very close second such as “sopa común,” which followed the same or similar recipe. I also included “sopa de pan” with addition of fish or another food item in the title. 44

Figure 10: Percentage of Soup Recipes with Bread, 1831

#Soup #With % with In Year Title recipes bread bread SDP Digital Situ Publication Mexico 1831 Novísimo arte 21 16 76% x x City Mexico 1836 Nuevo y sencillo arte 39 25 64% x x City Mexico 1843 Manual de la cocinera 17 7 41% x x City Mexico 1845 Diccionario 152 76 50% x x City Mexico 1866 El tesoro de la cocina 118 64 54% x x City Mexico 1883 El perfecto cocinero 19 10 53% x x City Mexico 1890 La cocinera poblana 100 35 35% x x City 1898 Recetas para cocina 33 7 21% x Guadalajara 1908 La cocinera moderna 32 7 22% x x Guadalajara Mexico 1913 La cocina en el bolsillo 3 1 33% x City

45

Figure 11: Newspapers: “Sopa de Pan” Mentions, 1800-1920 (abbreviated)77

1 July 28, 1833 El Fenix de la Treatment for cholera. Libertad 2 August 6, 1833 El Fenix de la Cure for illness. Libertad 3 January 25, El Cosmopolita Treatment for chickenpox. 1840 4 June 24, 1843 El Siglo Diez y How women can gain weight for better appearance. Nueve 5 July 5, 1847 El Monitor Description of sopa de pan in a hospital. Republicano ………. 19 July 15, 1884 El Nacional Description of "El Hospital de los Capuchinos." 20 October 18, El Diario del Sopa de pan á la francesa (French Bread Soup). 1884 Hogar 21 May 30, 1886 El Diario del Sopa de pan recipe with how to use onions if desired. Hogar 22 August 6, 1886 La Patria Sopa de pan is eaten once a day in a hermitage in San Sebastian, Spain. ………. 37 March 9, 1894 La patria Under the heading “A Million Recipes,” a sopa de pan recipe. 38 April 23, 1895 El Correo Description of a banquet given to prisoners in Puebla Español during holy week. It included a glass of chocolate, milk, bread, tortillas, caldo, rice soup, Sopa de pan, cod, other whitefish, salad, salmon, sardines, a shrimp cake, beans, sweets, and wine. 39 February 12, El Siglo XIX A short story entitled, “A Good Example,” in which a 1896 man feeds his parrot sopa de pan and chocolate. 40 February 15, La Farmacia Advice for old people during the winter: “The old 1896 person’s breakfast should consist of milk, in Winter above all, and he can drink it solo, with toasted bread, and better yet, Sopa de pan prepared with milk makes a good and easy to digest meal.”78 41 March 28, The Mexican Entertaining story about a father who brings a melon 1897 Herald home and thinks about eating it before the sopa de pan and beans.

77 Complete 81-record version in Appendix 3. 78 La leche debe consistuir el desayuno del viejo, en invierno sobretodo, y la puede tomar sola, con pan tostado, y mejor aún, la sopa de pan preparada con leche constituye un buen alimento y de fácil digestión. 46

42 April 20, 1897 El Diario del Sopa de pan adornada (adorned) recipe. Hogar 43 February 2, El Chisme Article about a shelter for the homeless in England that 1900 feeds and seeks employment for their patrons. Article takes a humorous approach that belies a negative attitude toward people out of work. Those who drink alcohol are confined to bread and water for 15 days. “Breakfast of café con leche and two pieces of bread. Main meal: caldo, sopa de pan; two dishes of legumes, roast chicken, when available, beans and water.”79 ………. 77 May 17, 1913 El Diario Sopa de pan de lechuga (bread soup with lettuce) recipe. 78 June 20, 1913 El Diario Sopa de yerbas a la Italiana recipe. Part of a suggested menu, but it does not offer the other recipes. 79 March 30, El Imparcial: Gran sopa de pan aderezada (great seasoned bread soup) 1914 Diario Ilustrado recipe. de la mañana 80 May 12, 1918 El Informador Sopa de pan a la francesa (French bread soup) recipe. Part of a suggested menu including “English” soup, a fish dish, foie gras, bird with truffles, fish fillets, and apricot ice cream. 81 July 17, 1920 El Informador Sopa de pan mentioned in context of a bread maker strike.

79 “Desayuno de café con leche y dos piezas de pan. Comida: caldo, sopa de pan; dos platillos de legumbres, asado de pollo, cuando se proporcione, frijoles y agua. Cena lo que sobre de la comida.” My translation. 47

Figure 12 below organizes “sopa de pan” mentions by theme. This and Figure 11 show that references to “sopa de pan” evolved in clusters. It began in the early nineteenth century as a health remedy. By the 1890s, it was included in a mixed bundle of recipes, religious vows of poverty, literature, and descriptions of prisons. Finally, it not only transformed in name only to different soups, but it was strongly connected to recipes—the other connections receding into the background. The full version of Figure 11 (Appendix C) allows the reader to witness the nuanced evolution, but the abbreviated version above offers a general sense of a progression. Writers add ingredients and change the name, but the recipes, as discussed in the next section, are structured around pre-existing knowledge of sopa de pan.

Figure 12: Newspapers: “Sopa de Pan” organized by theme, 1800-1920

48

Vignette: The Last Supper

Figure 13: Triple Suicide

Source: “Comierion pobremente, cerraron las puertas y esperaron la muerte: triple suicidio,” El Imparcial: Diario Ilustrado de la Mañana, April 12, 1910.

Working class city dwellers also ate sopa de pan, as evidenced by the following account.

It is fitting to conclude this chapter with a story from 1910, at the end of the Porfiriato. The newspapers that recount the story are riddled with marked criticism over the plight of upstanding working class citizens who faced destitution in an unforgiving economic environment. Even in their telling, however, the descriptions make it plain that sopa de pan is food for the working class.

On April 12, 1910, a sensational yet tragic news story reaches the front pages of El

Imparcial. A family of three had committed suicide. Stopping the airflow from their bedroom to the outside, they barricaded themselves in their apartment with their two dogs, lit a coal cooking 49 fire, and slowly asphyxiated on the fumes and lack of good oxygen. Their two dogs survived, and their barking alerted servants of neighbors that something was out of the ordinary.

According to Mariano Arce Gálvez’s suicide note, he was a barber who had been losing clients due to his failing vision. He was fifty-six years old and had worked since he was a young boy.

His mother was paralyzed and blind, and his sister was partially paralyzed and somewhat blind.

Two months behind on the rent, their fear of selling everything they owned bit by bit and eventually joining the ranks of the destitute drove them to end their lives. The authors speculated that they had taken a liquid tranquilizer before carrying out their plan.80

Three separate pages of the newspaper discuss Don Mariano and his family’s plight.

They include a family photo, additional haunting photos of their cadavers, a discussion of the criminality of suicide weighed against the family’s difficulties, and attention-grabbing headlines.

A short notice in El Diario Oficial was written in 1905 about Don Mariano’s application to the

Ministry of Development so they could “examine a vegetable lotion in order to prevent hair loss” he was presumably trying to use for his business.81

In the newspaper Imparcial, editors pay close attention to the meal. The headline on one story is titled, “They Ate Poorly, They Shut the Doors and Waited for Death.” The heading, “The last dinner,” leads into explanation: “The proximity of their deaths must have killed the appetite of these helpless people, for they barely tried any of their sopa de pan and fried potatoes. They also fried beans, but nobody ate any of them. The rest of the dinner sat atop a dilapidated table found bordering the kitchen.”82

80 “Comieron Pobremente, Cerraron Las Puertas Y Esperaron La Muerte: Triple Suicidio,” El imparcial: diario ilustrado de la mañana. April 12, 1910, 9, col. 3. 81 “La Misma,” Diario oficial Estados Unidos Mexicanos, April 8, 1905. 82“Comierion Pobremente, Cerraron Las Puertas Y Esperaron La Muerte: Triple Suicidio.” “La proximidad de la muerte debe haber alejado el apetito de los validos, pues apenas probaron de 50

Don Mariano and his family took great pains to appear sane and that they were doing this only, as another subheading said the following day, “for fear of hunger.”83 He meticulously settled the family’s accounts in his suicide note by defining their property in the apartment and directed authorities to pay the missing rent from the sale of their furniture.84 Given their meticulous attention to appearing as rational as possible, the cooking fire in their bedroom and the location of their meal would have been the only things out of order.

They likely used pan frío to make the soup, and it probably did not contain the extra meat, vegetables, legumes, and other ingredients that would have distinguished the dish, but nonetheless, sopa de pan was the prominently featured dish, symbolizing their decline. The newspaper took pains to point out the dilapidated table on which their dinner sat. They were all living off whatever meager earnings Don Mariano made as they slid from the middle-class into poverty.

Sopa de Pan Recipes

No author agreed on a recipe for sopa de pan, except that it have bread and liquid. A few early recipes have a tomato base (see Figure 5 below), but the majority use a meat-based caldo.

The simplest recipes are prescribed to the poor, sick, and elderly, while more ornately designed soups appear in more privileged contexts. The recipe names are important—when referring to people without means, sopa de pan will be unadorned; however, when a soup recipe is for the gente decente, sopa de pan will either change to another name (i.e. sopa de yerbas a la italiana)

una sopa de pan y de unas papas fritas. También frieron frijoles, pero nadie comió de ellos. El resto de esta cena quedó sobre una mesa destartalada que se hallaba frontera á la cocina.” My translation. 83“Un Acontecimiento Excepcional En Nuestra Criminalidad,” El Diario, April 13, 1910, 3, col. 3. “Triple suicidio por miedo de la hambre.” My translation. 84 “Un Hijo Narcotizo a Su Madre Y Hermana Y Prendio Fogatas Para Morir Todos Asfixiados: Tragica Muerte de Una Familia Miserable,” El Diario, April 12, 1910, 1, col. 5. 51 or include more expensive and harder to find ingredients.85 The following recipes from 1831-

1914 explore different dimensions of sopa de pan.

In its primitive and most thorough meaning, it is nothing more than the slice of bread dipped in some broth and for antonomasia was thus called sliced or crumbled bread, moistened with broth from the pot and seasoned with fat and spices, with which meals begin. Afterwards, extensive preparations were made with floury substances to substitute the bread to vary this first dish, and now it is applied to all the potages, even those with legumes and foods, which are offered first to guests at the table. The thicker or thinner consistency of the soups vary according to the taste of each household; but imitation of the French in vogue today, some soups are so soupy that it is with difficulty we find in them the other substances that give its name. 86

Similar to what we find in older dictionary definitions of soup, the bread is inseparable from the broth. This author implies that evolution of soup is synonymous with the substitution of bread with other foods and served at the table. The way the bread was eaten, dipping it into the pot becomes inappropriate. In fact, a mark of distinction seems to be present in the way it is served, with the caldo poured in a bowl atop the bread, encouraging the use of utensils.

85 See Figure 10, #58. 86 Novisimo Arte de Cocina, Ó, Escelente Colección de Las Mejores Recetas : Para Que Al Menor Costo Posible, Y Con La Mayor Comodidad, Pueda Guisarse Á La Española, Francesa, Italiana E Inglesa : Sin Omitirse Cosa Alguna de Lo Hasta Aquí Publicado, Para (Mexico City: C. Alejandro Valdés, 1831). Also: Galván-Rivera, Diccionario de Cocina, O El Nuevo Cocinero Mexicano En Forma de Diccionario, Que Contiene Todos Los Procedimientos En La Alta, Median Y Pequeña Cocina, La Lista Normal, de Los Platillos Que Deben Componer Las Distintas Comidas, Que Con Variedad de Nombres (Mexico City: Imprenta de I. Cumplido, 1845), 794. https://archive.org/stream/bub_gb_NdQqAAAAYAAJ#page/n7/mode/2up. “Esta voz en su primitivo y rigoroso significado, no es otra cosa que la rebanada de pan mojado en algún licor y por antonomasia se llamó asi el pan rebanado ó desmoronado, humedecido con caldo de la olla y sazonado con grasa y especias, con que se dá principio á las comidas. Despues se hizo extensivo preparaciones de sustancias harinosas, que sustituyen al pan para variar este primer platillo, y ya se aplica á todos los potages aun de legumbres y de viandas, con que se obsequia primeramente á los convidados en una mesa. La mayor ó menor consistencia de las sopas varia según el gusto particular de cada casa; pero á imitación de los usos franceses están hoy en boga entre nosotros unas sopas tan caldosas, que con dificultad se encuentran en ellas las otras sustancias que les dan su nombre.” This entry for soup is followed by five recipes for different variations of sopa de pan. 52

Figure 14: Simple or Natural Soup

Sources and Notes: El cocinero mexicano o colección de las mejores recetas para guisar al estilo americano, y de las más selectas según el método de las cocinas española, italiana, francesa e inglesa (Mexico City: Galvan, 1831), http://biblioteca.herdez.com.mx/index.php/memoria-del-mundo-tomo-1., 11.

53

This recipe, published in El cocinero mexicano in 1831, firmly establishes that the meaning of soup in the early part of the 1800s is broth with toasted bread in it. Whatever else is added is considered secondary.

In a tureen, place slices of bread, dried in the oven or toasted in a comal or grill, so that they turn out golden and not burnt. Take caldo from where it is bubbling in the pot where to avoid getting the fat, and pour the caldo over the bread through a cloth. Do this right before serving. The moment you bring the soup to the table, put legumes over the soup or serve them on a separate plate.87

The distinctions in this recipe are subtle; for example, bread is to be sliced, not broken into bits, assuming the cook will have utensils to cut the bread. Tamiz translates to “sieve,” but in 1831 it was a fabric made from silk or horsehair, an expensive option for people without means.88 The sopera (tureen) implies elegance: not just any vessel will do. Even the presumption of a table and separate plates distinguishes between those with and those without. The inclusion of comal and parilla in the same sentence is revealing. Comal was not accepted into Diccionario de la lengua española until 1884, fifty-three years after Cocinero was published, yet the indigenous clay comal shares space with the iron Spanish parrilla, a relationship that seems to evince Ortiz’s concept of transculturation, a multicultural influence on this recipe.89

This next sopa de pan “recipe” from 1837 was the very first mention of sopa de pan I could find in any newspaper in the Hemeroteca Nacional Digital’s collection. In fact, it is more of a prescription for recovering from cholera. It calls for “beginning with three half jars of thin atole (corn beverage) in the morning, mid-day, and evening. The second day a jar at the same

87 El cocinero mexicano o colección de las mejores recetas para guisar al estilo americano, y de las más selectas según el método de las cocinas española, italiana, francesa e inglesa. 88 “Tamiz,” Diccionario de La Lengua Castellana Por La Real Academia Española, 7th ed. (Madrid: Real Academia Española, 1832). Ortiz, “Los Factores Humanos de La Cubanidad.” 89 Diccionario de La Lengua Castellana Por La Real Academia Española., 12th ed. (Madrid: Real Academia Española, 1884). 54 times, and when it is convenient add two spoonfuls of sopa de pan frío (cold bread soup, or bread soup made with old bread), and in this way continue augmenting the meal…”90 The two spoonfuls of soup made from old bread to restore the patient are in context of a cholera outbreak the same year in Mexico.91 Figures 11 and 12 show a tendency for sopa de pan to be a remedy for illness in the early half of the nineteenth century. The curative properties of sopa de pan recede in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, but its association with people without means remains. It is also impossible not to notice the value attributed to atole’s healing powers.

Sopa de pan becomes more associate with poverty than health toward the end of the century.

This evidence suggests that authors preferred other cures as Mexico continued to embrace modernity.92

1831: Sopa de pan:

Put a blend of seventeen tomatoes in rendered (burnt) lard cooked with two whole garlic cloves. Take the garlic out as you add the tomatoes and finely chopped onion. When it is cooked, put sufficient water in with very thinly prepared slices of pan francés that were

90 “Receta Para Curar El Chólera, Que Ha Producido Los Mejores Resultados En La Villa de Tula de Tamaulipas, Adoptada Por Un Médico de Mucha Nombradia En La Villa de Lagos, Llamado D. Martin Del Campo,” El Fenix de La Libertad, July 28, 1833, 1, col. 1. “…comenzando con tres medios pozuelos de atole de maíz delgado por mañana, medio dia y noche: el segunda dia un pozuelo de lo mismo á las propias horas, y cuando mas añadir dos cucharadas de sopa de pan frio, y asi se irá aumentando el alimento…” 91 Gabriela Soto Laveaga and Claudia Agostini, “Science and Public Health in the Century of Revolution,” in A Companion to Mexican History and Culture, ed. William Beezley, 1st ed. (West Sussex: Blackwell Publishing, Ltd., 2011), 562. 92 Donald E. Stevens, “Eating, Drinking, and Being Married: Epidemic Cholera and the Celebration of Marriage in Montreal and Mexico City, 1832-1833.,” Catholic Historical Review 92, no. 1 (2006): 76. In his article on cholera and marriage, Donald Stevens notes that “Early publications on cholera prophylaxis are rife with social prejudice and condemnations of the lifestyles of the poor and infamous.” The prescription requires that the patient not try to eat too much too quickly, which could tenuously be connected to moral judgement. On August 6th of the same year, the advice is reprinted with the warning that caldo, the broth in sopa de pan, is “detrimental” and should only be given to the patient on “after the first three days” of illness. 55

toasted on a comal. Once it is reduced and as thick as you would like it, without stirring bring it to the table.93

Like the recipe for “natural” soup, this simple sopa de pan is distinguished by its location in a cookbook, the specificity of the number of ingredients, the delicately sliced and more expensive pan francés, and the table on which it is served. The comal is again present here, and a quick assessment of the ingredients: tomatoes, lard, garlic, onions, and bread reveal a simple and affordable recipe made with common ingredients.

Not all recipes include caldo made with meat. This one calls for a tomato base and is more reminiscent of a soupy version of pan con tomate (bread and tomato), a popular breakfast tapa (appetizer) in Spain. In fact, several recipes for sopa de pan in this cluster do not use a meat-based caldo; they use water and the flavors from the ingredients. One recipe calls for beans, another for raisins, almonds, and green tomatoes, and another for chile. This highlights the malleable nature of sopa de pan and the eventual turn toward ingredients more difficult to procure to distinguish the gente decente from the working classes.

The earliest sopa de pan recipe appropriate for regular consumption I could find in newspapers did not surface until 1884, well into the Porfiriato. Until then, about a third of “sopa de pan” occurrences reference illness, with the rest comprised of descriptions of hospital and convent conditions, restaurant advertisements, some fiction writing, and a recommended diet for women who want to gain weight for better appearance. The following recipe gives a sense of how they were changing to suit the changing tastes of the gente decente.

93El Cocinero Mexicano O Colección de Las Mejores Recetas Para Guisar Al Estilo Americano, Y de Las Más Selectas Según El Método de Las Cocinas Española, Italiana, Francesa E Inglesa., 28. 56

1884: El Diario del Hogar: French-Style Bread Soup

Fry roasted and ground tomatoes with chopped onion in a mix of lard and good olive oil. Season the resulting salsa with salt and pepper, adding caldo or water, adding a sufficient amount for it to be soupy; while boiling add a few leaves of thyme, orégano, and marjoram. At the end add paper-thin slices of well-toasted bread and remove from the heat. Dust with finely chopped parsley and grated cheese, gently transferring to the tureen. When serving, add a little oil and burnt (rendered) lard.94

This recipe also uses a tomato base, but two ingredients make it stand out: olive oil and cheese. Two different fats are vying for the same place on the table. By reviewing the rankings of fats in Figure 5, we can surmise that this recipe is an example of the apparent struggle for primacy in the recipe. Good olive oil would have been more expensive to procure than lard, and cheese as well. The inclusion of grated cheese here is another aspect that would have distinguished this dish because it required special equipment. Also interesting is the option to include water or caldo. Like in other recipes, the paper-thin slices of bread require a sharp knife, and it also implies the gente decente were capable of more restraint than their less fortunate peers. The use of a grater to finely grate the cheese also distinguishes this dish—“fine” as opposed to “coarse,” a dichotomy that we can easily connect to Bourdieu’s schema or Tilly’s bounded categories. Therefore, it is not only the plate that is distinguished, but the people who consume it.

The final sopa de pan recipe I select is the last available in the digital corpus of

94 “Menu Del Diario Del Hogar,” El Diario Del Hogar, October 18, 1884, 4, col. 1. “Mezclados manteca y buen aceite de olivo, se frien allí gitomates asados y molidos, cebolla picada; se sasona la salsa que resulta con sal y pimienta, agregando caldo ó agua, la suficiente cantidad para que quede caldosa; estando hirviendo se le ponen unas hojas de tomillo, orégano y mejorana, y al último el pan bien tostado y en rebanadas delgaditas del ancho de la pieza; luego que se ponga el pan se retira del fuego, se polvorea con perejil picado fino y queso rayado, procurando pasarla á la sopera suavemente, y se le pone un poquito de aceite y manteca quemada en el momento de servirla.” 57 newspapers up to 1920. It is distinguished by the cooking method and its ingredients. Good bread might be interpreted as fresh bread that is more expensive and then toasted on a parrilla as opposed to a comal. Later the ingredients in the pot force us to rethink the definition of soup. In the present day, we presume it is watery, but the recipe described below of layered ingredients topped with an egg wash compels the reader to envision a casserole, not a soup. Like soup, however, a casserole is an efficient way of providing sustenance in one vessel.

This soup attempts to distinguish itself by embellishing its name and ingredients; it is not an ordinary sopa de pan that the poor line up at convents to eat, but a rich concoction of ingredients, some of them expensive Italian imports. The bread is high quality, not the pambazo or cemita purchased by the working classes. It is toasted on a parrilla, a grill, as opposed to the comal. Whether the parrilla was available to the working classes or not, the comal mentally was left behind.

Cut chunks of good bread long and thin, and toast them on a net grill so that they don’t burn. Next, fry a few pieces of thin bread with tocino negro (black bacon from Nebrodi, Italy), bird or kid (goat), and when done frying, put a little bit of parsley and well- chopped hard-boiled eggs, a little bit of grated cheese, a small amount of clove and cinnamon and remove from the heat. In a casserole dish or tureen, put a layer of bread from earlier, and another layer of the chopped eggs, and leave it this way until finished. Right away pour caldo or “substancia de carnes” enough to soak it. Next, return it to the fire, and if it is too dry, add more caldo, but in very small quantities. Once the soup is cooked, beat an egg and place on top, covering the tureen or casserole dish with a lid and a few embers on top so it will turn golden. If you want to embellish it, you can top it with artichoke leaves, fried birds, bird breasts, small slices of cheese, etc.95

95 “Plato del dia,” El Imparcial: Diario Ilustrado de La Mañana, March 30, 1914. “Gran sopa de pan aderezada.—“Se cortan sopas de buen pan a lo largo y delgadas, y se tuestan en la parrilla de red sin que se quemen, después se fríen otros pedacitos de pan delgados, con tocino negro, asadura de cabrito o de aves, y cuando esté hecha la fritura se echa un poco de perejil y huevos duros, bien picado, un poco de queso rallado, clavo y canela en corta cantidad y retírese del fuego. Póngase en la cazuela o sopera una capa del pan tostado que hemos dicho primero, y otra capa del picado hecho después, y así hasta concluír: en seguida se echa caldo del cocido o sustancia de carnes, para que se moje, y luego se pone al fuego, y si quedase muy seca, se le puede añadir más caldo, pero en corta cantidad: luego que esté la sopa cocida, se hace un batido de huevo y se echa por encima, cubriendo la sopera o cazuela con una tapadera y encima algunas 58

Sopa de pan and Mexico are an unlikely pair. Mexico can claim so many other soupy dishes to its various regions—the delicious puchero (stew) and pozole (hominy stew) easily come to mind. When we invoke the term “bread soup,” it conjures a bowl of toasted bread soaked in a thin broth. However, with a few embellishments, we can call it French onion soup or gazpacho, two dishes that evoke elegance and cosmopolitanism—white napkins, finely-dressed company, and a bottle of red wine to accompany a rich first course.

This chapter began with an exploration of distinction within bread itself—it is hard to imagine a more engineered difference than colored bread. This research demonstrates how even with a concerted effort, it took time during the long nineteenth century for what someone ate to clearly mark them in a certain class. Sopa de pan has proven a true adversary to hierarchies of taste; it was a backdrop for a discussion of social problems, served at a respectable table, and part of the process of a slow decline in prestige and increase as a marker of poverty. The next chapter investigates two unlikely soups: sopa de tortilla and chilaquiles, and how they came to similarly establish categorical differences between gente decente and those without means.

ascuas de fuego para que se dore. Si se quiere adornar se pueden poner encima cogollos de alcachofa, pájaros fritos, pechugas de ave, rodajitas de huevo, etc.” 59

CHAPTER 4. CHILAQUILES AND SOPA DE TORTILLA: THE SAME SOUP IN

DIFFERENT RECIPES?

Chilaquil: Tortilla in chile broth and, by analogy, a rumpled or jumbled in the way skirts hang or are wrinkled.

--El Periquillo Sarniento, José Joaquín Fernández de Lizardi, México, Glossary, Libería de

Galván, 1842

Cantinflas and the Chilaquiles

Padrecito: “And the wife should be the Mrs. of the house. And it occurs to me that you do not know how to cook.” Novia: “Yes I do, Father.” Padrecito: “Let’s see how you make some chilaquiles.” Novia: Well, you cut the tortillas, fry them, put them in salsa and when they are dry put the cheese in. Padrecito: And what happened to the garlic, onion, and epazote? You see how she does not know? Novio: So you do not even know how to make chilaquiles!96

The dialogue comes from Cantinflas’ Padrecito, a film released in 1965 about Father

Sebastián (Cantinflas), a young priest who is assigned to the town of San Jerónimo el Alto. In this scene, he counsels a prospective couple and moralizes on the role of husband and wife. The husband’s role is laborer, and the wife’s role is to manage the home and cook. When Father

Sebastián proves the novia (bride) cannot properly recite how to make chilaquiles, he rejects her

96 Miguel M. Delgado, El Padrecito (Mexico: Columbia Pictures, 1964). Padrecito: “Y la mujer debe ser muy señora de su casa. Y que se me hace que Usted no sabe cocinar. Novia: “Sí sé, padre.” Padrecito: “A ver como se hacen unos chilaquiles.” Novia: Pues, se cortan las tortillas, se les fríen, se le ponga la salsa y cuando ya está seco se ponga el queso. Padrecito: ¿Y que pasó con el ajo, la cebolla, y el epazote? ¿Y vio como no sabe? Novio: ¡Así que ni siquiera sabes hacer chilaquiles! 60 readiness for marriage and effectively renders null her status as a woman in society. He also humorously admonishes the groom because, though he works from “sol a sol” (sunup to sundown), Father Sebastián chastises him for not working when it is cloudy.

In addition to reinforcing the Catholic Church’s gender roles and maturity rituals, Father

Sebastián simultaneously rejects the young novia’s culinary skills and invokes a precise sequence of preparation and ingredients that make chilaquiles authentic. When they fail his litmus test and march off in a bout of mutual recrimination, Father Sebastián eulogizes the aborted marriage, “Ya se les quemaban los chilaquiles” (they already burned the chilaquiles).97

As the scene closes, chilaquiles graduate from a metaphor of the authentic, Mexican woman to a symbol of the relationship between man and woman. Despite Father Sebastián’s insistence on the authenticity of his imagined recipe, there are as many variations of chilaquiles as there are people who make it.

By affirming the authenticity of the chilaquiles, Father Sebastián demonstrates how the working class could attain a level of acceptance through hard work and proper living— knowledge of how to prepare chilaquiles was a part of that equation. However, the food knowledge prescribed to the gente decente in earlier sources in Mexico reveals that they were derided for eating chilaquiles because of their working-class and indigenous origins. Another dish, however, sopa de tortilla, does not appear to carry the same stigma. Today, we would never equate sopa de tortilla with chilaquiles, but they have striking similarities in the late 1800s, and for this reason I argue they are both soups and should be considered side by side. This chapter explores the class relationship between chilaquiles and sopa de tortilla. It is divided into sections: first, I determine the scope of the discourse in newspapers and cookbooks. I then study recipes

97 Ibid. 61 for chilaquiles and sopa de tortilla, commentaries on the middle-class budget, and an imagined family dinner. To bring a contemporary retrospective, I include an essay by Meredith Abarca, who talks with her mother about the food traditions in her family.98 I end with vignettes from newspapers from this selection.

Trends in Newspapers and Cookbooks

Figure 15: Mentions of “Chilaquiles” in Newspapers, 1830-192099

Year Newspaper Date Subject 1883 La Familia 1-Aug In an index. 1885 El Tiempo 12-Jul In a poem. 31- “The Budget.” Outward display of wealth while eating 1890 El Universal Aug chilaquiles privately. 20- Part of a discussion about opening a new newspaper in 1898 La Patria Apr Guadalajara. 1898 Cómico 30-Oct In a poem (Antonio Chilaquiles). El Diario del 1899 Hogar 9-Nov La Familia Peredo (partial story). 1901 Cómico 17-Feb Story about an invitation. Chilaquiles as a cheap source of food in context of marriage, 1903 El Popular 30-Jun household budget, and gender. El Colmillo 1903 Público 11-Oct In a poem. 1904 La Patria 21-Oct Critique of Francisco Bulnes.

Not a single recipe for chilaquiles can be found in the newspapers during the period

1830-1920; references instead occur in poems and stories. Most of the commentary is derisive of chilaquiles, minus a biting critique of Francisco Bulnes (La Patria, 1904), the Mexican senator who once said, “the race of wheat is the only truly progressive one” and that “maize has been the

98 Meredith E Abarca, “Los Chilaquiles de Mi ’Ama: The Language of Everyday Cooking,” in Pilaf, Pozole, and Pad Thai: American Women and Ethnic Food, ed. Sherrie A. Inness (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2001). 99 “Hemeroteca Nacional Digital de México,” Accessed January 15, 2017. Omitted false result from 1892 and 4 locked records only available in situ from 1913, 1914 (2), and 1918. 62 eternal pacifier of America’s indigenous races and the foundation of their refusal to become civilized.”100 Despite the limited timeframe of the digital collection, a few results stand out, and I consider them in greater detail in the next sections.

Figure 16: Mentions of “Sopa de Tortilla” in Newspapers, 1830-1920101

Year Newspaper Date Subject El Monitor 23- 1870 Republicano Dec Story with sopa de tortilla as a humble, yet delicious meal. El Diario del 26- 1882 Hogar May Sopa de tortilla on a suggested menu. El Siglo Diez y 1887 Nueve 4-May Official banquet with sopa de tortilla. La Lira 1894 Michoacana 1-Jan Listed in an index as a specialty of Michoacán. 23- 1900 El Chisme Mar Used to satire critics who say the poor eat too much meat. El Diario del 1903 Hogar 3-Nov Recipe included "sopa de tortilla en leche." 29- 1908 El Diario Mar Recipe for "sopa de tortilla al vapor." 11- 1911 El Diario Nov "Sopa de tortilla al vapor" as part of suggested menu. Entertaining story about eating sopa de tortilla and getting sick. Establishes it as a country dish, but also calls it a gran platillo (great dish) that was served as an entrada 1912 La Opinión 2-Mar (starter). Another sign that the order of dishes is important.

In contrast to the mocking discourse about chilaquiles, authors discuss sopa de tortilla more favorably. Editors reference sopa de tortilla in stories, menus, official banquets, and as a symbol of regional pride. Both chilaquiles and sopa de tortilla surface in newspapers in a very limited way and only in the late 1800s. These results correlate somewhat to a search for chilaquiles using Google’s ngrams, with a small blip in the late 1800s followed by a significant

100 Cited in Jeffrey Pilcher, Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 82. 101 “Hemeroteca Nacional Digital de México.”Accessed February 6, 2017. 63 rise as the Porfiriato ended.

Figure 17: Frequency of Mentions of “Chilaquiles” in Google Ngrams.

The almost complete absence of chilaquiles recipes in cookbooks during the period follows Jeffrey Pilcher’s assertion that “Indian foods were largely excluded from notions of proper Mexican cuisine.”102 Sopa de tortilla, however, can be found in over half the set of cookbooks. When juxtaposed, the recipes for chilaquiles and sopa de tortilla can look strikingly similar. In much the same way as sopa de pan undergoes changes in name, sopa de tortilla could be accepted as a rustic dish.

102 Pilcher, Planet Taco: A Global History of Mexican Food, 15. 64

Figure 18: Mentions of “Chilaquiles” and “Sopa de Tortilla” in Cookbooks, 1830-1920 Year Title #chilaquiles #Sopa Digital In Situ Publication recipes de tortilla 1831 El cocinero mexicano 4 1 x Mexico City 1831 Novísimo arte 1103 0 x Mexico City 1836 Nuevo y sencillo arte 0 2 x Mexico City 1843 Manual de la cocinera 0 0 x Mexico City 1845 Diccionario 0 1 x Mexico City 1866 El tesoro de la cocina 2 0 x Mexico City 1883 El perfecto cocinero 0 1 x Mexico City 1890 La cocinera poblana 0 3 x Mexico City 1898 Recetas para cocina 0 0 x Guadalajara 1908 La cocinera moderna 0 0 x Guadalajara 1913 La cocina en el bolsillo 0 1 x Mexico City

103 Contains a similar recipe for guisado de tortilla en salsa (tortilla stew in sauce). My translation. 65

Figure 19: Side-by-Side Comparison of Chilaquiles and Sopa de Tortilla

1866 – El Tesoro de la cocina 1883 El perfecto cocinero Chilaquiles en gitomate.104 38.—SOPA DE TORTILLA.105

Choose some big red tomatoes, roast them, Burn some lard with three chopped garlic wash them, rub them, fry them in lard, add cloves and fry the tortilla until it is hard. sliced poblano chile, chopped onion and Take the tortilla out and fry tomatoes and meat broth. Let it season and adorn it with chopped onion, return the tortilla to the pan fried pork, longaniza, sliced onion, little with sufficient broth, a bunch of epazote and tortillas and slices of fried bread. You can some pieces of ancho chiles toasted in lard on also use a broth from tomato, mole, or a thick top. chile salsa.

The recipes differ in many ways; however, their similarities are too strong to ignore.

There is a question of order—which to fry first, the tomatoes or the tortillas. The meat in the chilaquiles is also quite heavy in this recipe. Overall, though, they are both comprised of some type of caldo (often tomato) with tortillas and either chopped or ground chiles and onions. The epazote and cheese are sometimes part of each recipe. I make the claim that if sopa de tortilla is a soup, chilaquiles are arguably soup, as well. The difference in name and changes to the order and type of some of the ingredients appear to make one dish more palatable to the middle class than another. Some of the following examples of the discourse on chilaquiles highlight this difference.

104 El Tesoro de La Cocina : Diccionario de las familias, la cocina puesta al alcance de todas las inteligencias y fortunas (Mexico City: Imprenta de Juan Nepomuceno, 1866), 169. “Se escogen unos gitomates grandes y clorados, se asan, se lavank, y se restregan se fríen en ateca, se les echan chiles poblanos en rajas, cebolla picada y el caldillo de la carne. Se le echan tortillas despedazadas, se deja que sasone y se adorna con carne de puerco frita, longaniza, cebolla rebanada, tortillitas y rebanadas de pan fritas, Tambien se pueden hacer en caldillo de tomate, mole ó pipian.” Emphasis added. 105 El perfecto cocinero: coleccion de las mejores recetas al gusto europeo y al mexicano. van añadidas algunas reglas para el buen servicio de una mesa y algunas de urbanidad para asistir á ella (Mexico City: Imprenta de Aguilar e Hijos, 1883), 22. “Se pone á quemar manteca con tres dientes de ajo machacados y allí se frie la tortilla hasta que quede tiesa. Luego se saca la tortilla, se frie jitomate y cebolla picada, se vuelve á echar allí la tortilla con caldo suficiente, una rama de epazote y unos pedazos de chile ancho tostados en manteca por encima.” Emphasis added. 66

Chilaquiles and a Family Budget

In an 1890 article entitled, “The Budget,” the author decries middle-class fiscal irresponsibility because it erodes the entire class itself. The author differentiates between two types of people, the worst of whom spend so much on clothing, furnishing, and their overall bien aparecer (good appearance) that they neglect to eat well. The author continues to say this lack of equitable distribution of household funds “annihilates health and disappears from the social house, an important factor, the middle class.”106

“Others make an at home banquet of migas and chilaquiles when not fasting as long as this frugality does not cost them any sacrifice.”107 If it was not clear from the author’s point of view that chilaquiles are a second-class dish, he later contrasts it with his own preferences, saying, “I’m more inspired to respect the artisan who wears a blouse, eats meat, and buys cloth sheets.”108 That is, dressing more simply and eating better (defined by consuming meat) is preferable to dressing well and eating poorly (defined by eating chilaquiles).

If Father Sebastián’s take on marriage was not dark enough, a 1903 article written for El

Popular offers a sobering commentary. According to the author, every marriage gets cold “like soup” and ends up in conflict. The husband begins to pay the rent late, eat with friends and

“return to the nest, irritated and dreaming of divorce.”109 As for the wife, she “stops kissing, wears her Sunday clothes every day, does tend to for the kitchen and says the money is not

106 X.I., “El Presupuesto,” El Universal, August 31, 1890. “Aniquile la salud y haga desaparecer, de la casa social, un facto importante, la clase media.” My translation. 107 Ibid. “otros hacen at home banquete de migas y chilaquiles cuando no toca ayuno, sin que esta frugalidad les cueste ningún sacrificio.” Emphasis in original. 108 Ibid. “A mí me inspira más respeto el artesano que viste blusa, come carne y gasta sábanas de manta.” 109 “Cabos Sueltos,” El Popular, June 30, 1903, 1, col. 1. “Llega tarde al nido, hosco y durmiendo divorciado.” 67 enough even for chilaquiles.”110 Chilaquiles are thus marked as a dish one would eat on a budget.

Chilaquiles in a Poem

Another subtle example of the association of the working class with chilaquiles is an entertaining poem by Augustín Valero Méndez, published in 1898 in the newspaper Cómico. The principle characters are a pair of newlyweds in a conversation about premarital chastity the day after their wedding. Marianito Chilaquiles, the new husband, asks his wife, “As I want, my love, to be very obvious / tell me without beating around the bush / why didn’t you crown my desires / when I was your fiancée?”111 Her reply and the punchline, is that she was afraid that he would leave her “like the others who had loved her before.”112 While Marianito may be a clever opportunist, next to his young wife he appears a simpleton. His gullibility is an example of a class marker subtly associated with chilaquiles. Therefore, one who eats chilaquiles may also be marked as unintelligent or ripe for cuckolding and vice versa—this represents a subtle attempt to bind these concepts to makers and eaters of chilaquiles.

Chilaquiles in a Family Meal

“Finger-licking good,” murmured Silvester, with fingers dirty with mole, like the other guests, since silverware was unknown in the carpenter’s house. “More tortillas,” asked Clara. “I’m going to make chilaquiles with my caldo that came out so tasty.” said Georgina, tearing two tortillas and putting them in the sauce. While the mole was disappearing from the plates, the glasses of pulque increased. The cheeks on all the guests, females and males, began turning purplish, effect of the heat of the mole, and of the repeated libations of the pulque.”113

110 Ibid. “Ella pára la trompita, echa para el diario los vestidos domingueros, deja el cuidado de la coccina y la mesa á la gata, dice que el gasto no le alcanza ni para chilaquiles.” 111 Augustin Valero Méndez, “Confession Inocente,” Cómico, October 30, 1898. “Como quiero mi vida, ser muy obvio,/ Dime sin más rodeos: / ¿Por qué no coronaste mis deseos / Cuando yo era tu novio?” 112 Ibid. “Como los otros que me amaron antes.” 113 “Las Peredo: Un Almuerzo Popular,” El Diario Del Hogar, November 9, 1899, 1, col. 1. “--De chuparse los dedos.—Murmuró Silvestre, con los dedos sucios de mole, como los demás comensales, pues los cubiertos eran desconocidos en la casa del carpintero. 68

The Familia Peredo ate a delicious meal. That should be the end of the story, but read deeper and we find that the author makes subtle value judgments about the family that dipped their tortilla in the mole. First, they do not eat with silverware even when they have guests. This immediately sets them further down the class continuum. It also connects them to indigenous traditions in which the tortilla was a versatile and edible utensil. Paula Morton describes a scene that appears to be taken from conqueror account of the Aztecs in which “men, women, and children kneeled and leaned back on their feet tucked under the body. Using three fingers of the right hand each picked up a plain tortilla, folded it into a cone and scooped up the molli, a sauce made of chiles ground with water.”114 Next, we learn that at least a portion of household expenses are paid for by money earned from carpentry, a skilled but working-class job. By tearing the tortillas and putting them in the sauce, Georgina has “made” chilaquiles—this tells us that chilaquiles are simply torn up tortillas tossed in a sauce and do not require much culinary knowledge. The heat of the chiles and the purple faces drinking pulque, the alcoholic beverage derived from corn, from the point of view of the gente decente, are signs of excess and poor taste in beverages.

Sopa de Tortilla: The Not-So-Splendorous but Acceptable Rustic Meal

Truth be told: lunch was not splendorous; but it was known that the mother and the sisters of Emigdio understood how to arrange it. The tortilla soup perfumed with fresh herbs from the vegetable garden; the fried bananas, shredded beef and flour bread rolls, the excellent chocolate from the land; stone cheese, milk bread and water served in large,

--Más tortillas.—Pidió Clara. --Yo voy á hacer chilaquiles, con mi caldo, que está tan sabroso.—Dijo Georgina, despedazando dos tortillas, y echándoles en el caldillo. A medida que el mole desaparecía de los platos, los vasos de pulque menudeaban. Las mejillas de todos los comensales, hembras y machos, comenzaban á cubrirse con un color purpúreo, efecto de lo picante del mole, y de las repetidas libaciones de pulque.” 114 Paula Morton, Tortillas: A Cultural History (Albequerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2014), 25. Emphasis in original. 69

antique silver pitchers, did not leave anyone wanting.115

This 1870 excerpt about a country folk meal draws on the senses to evoke pleasant emotions. Immediately the reader is shown that the lunch is simple; it lacks the sophistication of city life, but the description of the meal is couched in a scene of idyllic beauty. Not only is the food simple, but Emigdio’s mother and sisters are as well. They know how to “arrange” the meal and can produce food that tastes good and is filling, all of which shows that they have received an education appropriate to their rural class. The pitcher is antique, signaling a respect for tradition, which also implies that this country scene is resistant to the changes brought on by encroaching modernization.

The author also addresses the value of labor and land in this excerpt. The herbs come directly from the garden and are not purchased in the market, as is the chocolate. One presumes that the milk comes from a nearby cow as well. The inclusion of bread rather than tortillas shows the reader that this is a respectable family in the countryside. In all, this pleasant scene stands in stark contrast to the previous examples of consumers of chilaquiles who were spendthrifts, simpletons, unsophisticated slobs, or ate them out of necessity.

What Happens when the Country Mouse Comes to the City?

A tlacotalpeño, a friend of mine, was invited to eat by a family who live in this city and are from the same country as he. My friend agreed to the invitation in which they served, ‘as a starter,’ sopa de tortilla. This soup, which to many is a great dish, made my friend the effect of a laxative of sodium sulfate. Juan Jose’s countryman did, however, hiding his fear with a smile on his lips, swallowed the food that, by its abundance, was almost spilling from a plate that looked like a tray. At the end, he saw the sky open and gave a

115 “No Title,” El Monitor Republicano, December 23, 1870. “Sea dicha la verdad: en el almuerzo no hubo grandezas; pero se conocía que la madre y las hermanas de Emigdio entendian eso de diponerlos. La sopa de tortilla aromatizada con yerbas frescas de la huerta; el frito de plátanos, carne desmenuzada y roscas de harina de maíz; el excelente chocolate de la tierra; el queso de piedra, el pan de leche y el agua servida en antiguos y grandes jarros de plata, no dejaron que desear.” 70

long sigh of satisfaction: but no sooner had he said, by obligation, of course, that it was exquisite, the hosts burst in with a second course of the soup. Needless to say, my friend was sick to his stomach. Three days later he was invited again to eat with his countrymen. The guests in the living room were moving to the dining room when the lady of the house, trying to flatter the guest, said to him smiling and affectionately, "As the other day I noticed what you liked most about the lunch, today I made you tortilla soup.” And my friend had a strong urge to punch the interlocutor.116

At a first glance, this story does not appear to support the argument that sopa de tortilla is more prestigious than chilaquiles, especially as it is labeled a sulfurous laxative. However, I argue that this story places emphasis on the place it is prepared and the people who cook it. First, the setting is important. We are clearly in the city but with two sets of people from the small town of Tlacotalpeño in Veracruz. By subtle implication, Juan José’s indigestion is a sign that he has assimilated into city life. Foods with a rural tinge (and perhaps especially those with made with tortillas) are not as appealing and are inappropriate for city life. His hosts, by contrast, are newer immigrants to the city trying to make the impression of a good household, thus the lady of the house’s intent on flattering her guest.

Sopa de tortilla is said to be a “great dish for many,” but something goes wrong, and it is not the preparation, but the lack of rationalization of the menu that causes the dish to fail. The

116 Paco Pérez, “Por Paco Pérez,” La Opinión, March 2, 1912. “Un tlacotalpeño, amigo mío, fué invitado á comer por una familia paisana suya, que vive en esta ciudad. Mi amigo concurrió al convite en el cual le sirvieron, ‘de entrada’, sopa de tortilla. Esta sopa, que para muchos es un gran platillo, á mi amigo le hacía el efecto de un purgante de sulfato de sosa. El paisano de Juan José hizo, sin embargo de tripas corazón, y, con la sonrisa en los labios, engulló aquella comida que, por su abundancia se derramaba casi de un plato que parecía batea. Al terminar vió el cielo abierto y dió un larguísimo suspiro de satisfacción: mas como en seguida dijera, por compromiso, naturalmente que aquello estaba esquisito, quieres que no los anfitriones le reventaron un Segundo plato de la consabida sopa. De más está decir que mi amigo amaneció enfermó del estómago. Pues tres días después fué invitado nuevamente á comer con sus paisanos. Dirigíanse los comensales de la sala al comedor, cuando la señora de la casa, tratando de halagar al convidado, le dijo sonriente y cariños: --Como el otro día me fijé en lo que te gusto más del almuerzo, hoy te volví hacer la sopa de tortilla. Y mi amigo sintió vivísimos deseos de meterle una trompada á la interlocutora.” 71 quotation marks around the soup served “as a starter” convey the impression that the soup is out of order. As in previous examples of a proper menu, it should be served after a caldo to whet the appetite gradually. Also, the portions are too large, reflecting a lack of restraint and education. A batea, the word for tray, can in some instances be a trough as well, hinting that the hosts serve the guest as if he were a pig.

Time is also a key factor. These two stories, the former printed in 1870 and the latter in

1912, bracket the accelerated pace of modernization in the Porfiriato. While the first appears to idealize country life and the second to shun country people, these stories together form a poignant commentary on the way time, class, and food preparation and consumption are linked together. That is, those who do not resist the flow of modernization that is synonymous with the march of time, can occupy a higher rung in the social strata.

Authors distinguished between soups appropriate for the privileged and less fortunate in many ways: two I consider in this chapter are omission, inclusion, and place. Chilaquiles are all but absent from in my cookbook sample (Figure 18). This does not prove a food’s lower status, but in the aggregate, it makes a strong statement that chilaquiles did not merit inclusion in the eyes of cookbook authors. And the way chilaquiles were included in writing merits attention.

Chilaquiles were placed in a glossary in El Periquillo Sarniento in the 1840s—obviously, the publisher of the novel thought that Lizardi’s audience needed a translation. In the 1898 story about the Familia Peredo, chilaquiles are placed in italics, hinting that chilaquiles were considered an “other” food, drawing attention to themselves with their rarity.

My research indicates that in newspapers nearly equal mentions of both soups surfaced around the same time in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. One major difference between the two is the way in which they were treated in print; sopa de tortilla did not appear to 72 carry the same stigma as did chilaquiles. This is evident in the way authors talked about the meals as well as how they discussed the people who ate them. Additionally, editors included descriptions of sopa de tortilla eaten at official social functions and multiple recipes and menu suggestions on newspaper society pages.

Considering the similarities between chilaquiles and sopa de pan (Figure 19), an attempt to associate chilaquiles to the poor and elevate sopa de tortilla for the more respectable was in play. When an arbitrary distinction becomes fixed in a society and determines social outcomes, this is what Tilly referred to as bounded categories. More research is needed to show what everyday people thought of eating chilaquiles, but the evidence strongly suggests that chilaquiles held a stigmatized position in the eyes of newspaper editors and contributors.

In each of these cases, we are presented with an attempt to fuse the categories of working class and chilaquiles together. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century by all accounts this seems to have been effective. For example, Antonio Chilaquiles’ last name was a conscious attempt to match the name Chilaquiles to the negative attributes used to describe him.

Conversely, even when describing a relatively humble scene, descriptions of sopa de tortilla have a more endearing and softer tone.

While attempts to relegate chilaquiles to the realm of the working class appear to have been effective for this period, it is difficult to know how people treated it on a day-to-day basis.

Abarca touches on the kinds of informal knowledge passed on through families when she learns from her mother how to make chilaquiles and other dishes. The knowledge passed down through experience is revealing. Her mother, like many people who learned to cook in Mexico, does not cook using a recipe. Abarca says, “The majority of working-class women do not have a ‘room of their own’ in which to sit peacefully and quietly, privately writing out their lives. However, 73 many women do have a kitchen in which they often make their own food and inscribe their life experiences—through the seasoning of it, through sharing their recipes, and through the time spent in other women’s kitchens.”117 The writing down of recipes (or anything) in many ways is a privilege of people who have a place to write and the time to do it. Perhaps this explains why more has been written about people who ate chilaquiles than by the people who ate them.

117 Meredith E Abarca, “Los Chilaquiles de Mi ’Ama: The Language of Everyday Cooking,” in Pilaf, Pozole, an Pad Thai: American Women and Ethnic Food, ed. Sherrie A. Inness (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2001), 122. 74

CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSIONS

The evil is so old and so little is known about its origin, that even in the families where there are resources to procure a healthy, nutritive, and tasty meal, the cooks do not know how to season it, except in an indigestible form that was necessary in conditions of hunger to cover the bad flavors of altered or unpleasant broths with more pleasant ones. A lot of fat and chile constitute the national seasoning, even though the first is useless in our tropical climate, and second with intrinsically pleasant seasonings. Only foreigners and families that have introduced French or kept the Spanish traditions are sure not to feel in the late hours of the afternoon the disastrous consequences of absurd stews. The rest, to avoid the dangers of a daily indigestion, do without the pleasures of the table, and cut themselves down to a hygienic meal: carne asada (grilled beef), rice, eggs, fruit, and coffee.118

Guerrero’s comments in 1901 are a yet unexamined piece of the puzzle, how elites not only associated lower classes with eating poorly, but how their diet contributed to their delinquency. It is however, an excellent example of the kind of rhetoric that was available at the height of the Porfiriato. His comments are refuted by the newspaper biographers of Mariano

Arce Gálvez and his family—a portrait of a hardworking, industrious family that fell on hard times.

Like the star-bellied sneetches, Mexico City’s gente decente made every attempt to wall off access to their social sphere. How they dressed, ate, and entertained at the dinner table all reflect a set of embedded codes that helped them imagine themselves as innately separate from

118 Guerrero, La Génesis Del Crimen En México: Estudio de Pisquiatría Social, 149. “El mal es tan viejo y tan poco conocido su origen, que aun en las familias donde hay elementos para procurarse una alimentación sabrosa, sana y nutritiva, las cocineras no saben condimentarla, sino en la forma indigesta que fue necesaria en condiciones de hambre, para quitar el mal sabor á las sustancias alteradas ó desagradables con otras más sápidas. Mucha grasa y mucho chile, constituyen la sazón nacional; aunque la primera sea inútil en nuestro clima tropical, y el segundo con alimentos intrínsecamente sápidos. Sólo los extranjeros y las familias donde se ha introducido la cocina francesa ó conservado española, están seguros de no sentir en las altas horas de la tarde las consecuencias funestas de guisos absurdos. Los demás, para sustraerse á los peligros de una indigestión cotidiana, prescinden de los placeres de la mesa ; y se reducen á una alimentación higiénica : carne asada, arroz, huevos, fruta y café.” 75 the masses. However, the multitude of conspicuous and concealed ways they constructed their identities in contrast to the working class evinces a fragile collective ego. Sopa de pan is a curious dish because while the less fortunate class may have eaten it with fewer seasonings and less ceremony, fewer utensils and cheaper bread, a thinner broth made from poultry instead of mutton, they still ate sopa de pan. Bread, the ancient food, now a symbol of modernity; caldo, the healing broth that the proper chef knew not to have her guests dip bread into but rather to pour on top of delicately sliced toast. However, when the wealthy fell ill, and it may not have been quite as often as the poor, they took their sopa de pan with thin broth and little adornment, just like the rest.

Despite such commonalities, the wealthy could create tangible barriers. Despite the notion that social capital garnered through buying the right things and wearing the proper clothes could put one in a position of relative advantage, it came at a cost. Several of the articles, particularly the “Family Budget” in chapter four, show that not everyone could bear that cost.

Some of the distinctions were engineered, such as the way certain breads were meant for certain people, and other distinctions were thinly veiled, such as the arguably minor differences between chilaquiles and sopa de tortilla. Certain foods seemed to creep back and forth through the crevices of the porous fences of class distinction. This thesis peers into the evolution of hierarchies of taste as they are measured through print culture. Future research in this area would examine the case of soup to include more commonly “national” soups such as puchero, pozole and mole. I leave that to a future version of this work.

76

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84

APPENDIX A.

Figure 5: Ingredients in Five Cookbooks: Ranked by Frequency of Mention119

Proteins Cereals Fats Vegetables Fruits

Novísimo - Diccionario Perfecto - Poblana Recetas 1831 1845 1883 1890 1898 1 eggs eggs water water eggs 2 lard water lard lard sugar 3 water salt eggs salt water 4 sugar sugar caldo eggs milk 5 cinammon lard salt pimienta lard 6 almonds caldo chicken garlic butter 7 salt pimienta garlic onions cinammon 8 milk salsa onions caldo salt 9 garlic butter wine carne flour 10 syrup garlic cinammon oil pimienta 11 clove cinammon clove parsley masa 12 chicken bread vinegar chiles almonds 13 pimienta onions chiles bread onions 14 wine oil pimienta salsa vinegar 15 caldo milk oil vinegar loin 16 carne almonds carne sugar carne 17 bread vinegar sugar milk garlic 18 vinegar masa almonds flour salsa 19 onions syrup bread cinammon syrup 20 masa flour masa tomatoes caldo 21 flour vino fish wine oil 22 chiles carne caldillo fish oregano 23 jamón caldillo syrup almonds postres 24 raisins jamón flour jamón wine 25 pasta clove tomatoes butter chiles 26 parsley fish butter clove soup 27 oil parsley parsley masa beef 28 pork pasta salsa lemon chorizo 29 sesame cow soup veal tomatoes 30 butter lemon jamon syrup cheese

85

31 spices pork milk rice bread 32 tomatoes rice raisins chicken pineapple 33 salsa chiles spices olives rice 34 saffron cheese oregano Bay leaf pork 35 fish nuts carp thyme olives 36 olives soup cow mutton salad 37 rice raisins head bacon icing 38 mutton chicken pork potatoes caldillo 39 papaya mutton olives pork clove 40 pine nuts veal Bay leaf spices cream 41 loin Bay leaf thyme oregano fish 42 oregano olives veal cheese aguardiente 43 chorizos cream fritters loin Bay leaf 44 lemon spices tongue pasta nuts 45 nuts ox cheese adobo potatoes 46 fritters head rice herbs tongue 47 honey tomatoes mutton orange honey 48 birds potatoes guisado soup lettuce 49 cumin loin pastel puchero raisins 50 bizcochos mushrooms bones cow parsley 51 pastel herbs pine nuts turkey adobo 52 veal saffron bacon zumo starch 53 cheese sesame oysters peas lemon 54 starch birds saffron head pasta 55 sweet potato cod raisins feet 56 cow fruit guisado tortilla 57 pumpkin lemon birds nutmeg 58 cream loin caldillo orange 59 pineapple brains aguardiente pastel 60 thyme carrots cumin chicken 61 meatballs sesame picadillo postre 62 apples birds ribs bolillo 63 adobo cumin tongue empanadas 64 dessert beans pig legumes 65 cilantro turkey

86

APPENDIX B.

Figure 6: Ingredients in Five Cookbooks: Organized by Ranking and Type

Proteins Cereals Fats Vegetables Fruits

Novísimo - Diccionario Perfecto - Poblana Recetas 1831 1845 1883 1890 1898 eggs eggs eggs eggs eggs almonds milk chicken carne milk milk almonds almonds milk almonds chicken carne fish fish loin carne jamón jamón almonds carne jamón fish milk jamón beef pork cow carp veal chorizo sesame pork cow chicken cheese fish cheese head mutton pork mutton nuts pork bacon cream pine nuts chicken veal pork fish loin mutton tongue cheese nuts chorizos veal cheese loin tongue nuts cream mutton cow feet birds ox bones turkey chicken veal head pine nuts head legumes cheese loin bacon birds flour cow sesame oysters ribs masa meatballs birds cod tongue postres bread bread loin pig bread masa masa brains bread rice flour flour sesame flour starch pasta pasta birds masa pasta rice rice beans rice tortilla fritters lard turkey potatoes pastel bizcochos butter bread pasta postre pastel oil masa lard bolillo starch garlic flour oil empanadas pasta onions fritters butter lard lard parsley rice garlic butter oil chiles pastel onions oil butter olives lard parsley onions cream potatoes oil chiles garlic 87 garlic mushrooms butter thyme oregano onions herbs garlic oregano chiles chiles lemon onions herbs salad parsley raisins chiles peas potatoes oregano tomatoes parsley tomatoes lettuce sweet potato water oregano lemon parsley pumpkin salt thyme olives tomatoes thyme sugar carrots orange pineapple cilantro caldo tomatoes raisins olives raisins pimienta raisins water raisins tomatoes salsa olives salt lemon olives cinammon fruit pimienta orange papaya vinegar lemon caldo sugar lemon syrup water salsa water pineapple vino caldo vinegar cinammon apples caldillo salt sugar salt water clove wine cinammon pimienta sugar soup cinammon wine vinegar cinammon Bay leaf clove clove salsa salt spices vinegar syrup syrup syrup saffron pimienta Bay leaf caldo clove carne spices wine pimienta sugar vinegar soup wine caldillo adobo icing caldo syrup soup caldillo vinegar salsa puchero clove spices soup zumo aguardiente salsa spices guisado Bay leaf saffron Bay leaf caldillo honey honey guisado aguardiente adobo cumin saffron cumin nutmeg adobo cumin picadillo dessert

88

APPENDIX C.

Figure 11: Newspapers: “Sopa de Pan” Mentions, 1800-1920 1 July 28, 1833 El Fenix de la Treatment for cholera. Libertad 2 August 6, 1833 El Fenix de la Cure for illness. Libertad 3 January 25, El Cosmopolita Treatment for chickenpox. 1840 4 June 24, 1843 El Siglo Diez y How women can gain weight for better appearance. Nueve 5 July 5, 1847 El Monitor Description of sopa de pan in a hospital. Republicano 6 July 15,1849 El Siglo Diez y Recovery from cholera. Nueve 7 August 16, El Monitor Preventing cholera. 1849 Republicano 8 April 20, 1851 El Monitor Semana Santa (Holy Week). Republicano 9 January 8, El Universal Fonda (Restaurant) Advertisement. 1853 10 March 25, El Siglo Diez y List of products in the Universal Exhibition of 1855. 1856 Nueve 11 December 12, El Boletín Complaints of bad treatment at Hospital de San Pablo. 1867 Republicano 12 January 1, La Fraternidad Food regimen for person at hospital (2 records). 1874 13 January 14, El Siglo Diez y Fiction - la manzana de oro - josé selgas (see El País - 1876 Nueve 2/20/1912). 14 September 15, La Gaceta Helping treat illness (Erysipelas - skin rash). 1876 Médica 15 August 8, 1878 La Patria A rhyme to punctuate a report of a 500-peso robbery. 16 August La Gacetilla Same. 15,1878 17 January 20, El Diario del Menú with recipes. 1882 Hogar 18 April 6, 1882 El Diario del Same. Hogar 19 July 15, 1884 El Nacional Description of "El Hospital de los Capuchinos." 20 October 18, El Diario del Sopa de pan á la francesa (French Bread Soup). 1884 Hogar 21 May 30, 1886 El Diario del Sopa de pan recipe with how to use onions if desired. Hogar 89

22 August 6, 1886 La Patria Sopa de pan is eaten once a day in a hermitage in San Sebastian, Spain. 23 December 21, El Diario del Repeated sopa de pan recipe from May 30, 1886. 1886 Hogar 24 January 1, La Naturaleza Experiments testing strength of powder made from 1887 pokeweed on a dog to induce vomiting. Experimenters give the dog sopa de pan and other foods to fill up on. 25 March 3, 1888 El Diario del Sopa de pan á la Española (Spanish bread soup). Hogar 26 June 30,1889 El Tiempo Describes visit to La Trapa, a convent for friars who eat one bowl of sopa de pan and a plate of vegetables and legumes with no oil each day. 27 May 24, 1890 La Familia Short, translated story. Includes “Right away they called their daughter, a young girl of twelve years, who was always dressed in the latest style, spoke French, learned music, but who had never been able to make sopa de pan as it should be.” 28 January 1, La Gaceta Sopa de pan and café con leche given to sick military 1891 Militar personnel. 29 March 3, 1892 El Diario del Sopa de pan with frog broth. Hogar 30 March 15, El Diario del Sopa de pan with vegetables. 1892 Hogar 31 October 1, El Siglo XIX A shorty story entitled, “A Good Example,” in which a 1892 man feeds his parrot sopa de pan and chocolate. 32 October 5, El Partido Same story as October 1, reprint. 1892 Liberal 33 October 15, El Abogado Same story as October 1, reprint. 1892 Cristiano Ilustrado 34 May 19, 1892 El Nacional Description of homeless shelters in Paris, where people can stay for up to three nights, are given a shower and their clothes are washed. They also receive “a liter of Sopa de pan and legumes.” 35 June 5, 1892 México Gráfico In a section that appears to be short, humorous quips, it reads, “Zúñiga y Miranda Is convalescing. The doctor prescribed him sopa de pan.” 36 January 14, La Enseñanza Same story as October 1, 1892 reprint. 1893 Objectiva 37 March 9, 1894 La patria Under the heading “A Million Recipes,” a sopa de pan recipe. 38 April 23, 1895 El Correo Description of a banquet given to prisoners in Puebla Español during holy week. It included a glass of chocolate, milk, bread, tortillas, caldo, rice soup, Sopa de pan, cod, other 90

whitefish, salad, salmon, sardines, a shrimp cake, beans, sweets, and wine. 39 February 12, El Siglo XIX A short story entitled, “A Good Example,” in which a 1896 man feeds his parrot sopa de pan and chocolate. 40 February 15, La Farmacia Advice for old people during the winter: “The old 1896 person’s breakfast should consist of milk, in Winter above all, and he can drink it solo, with toasted bread, and better yet, Sopa de pan prepared with milk makes a good and easy to digest meal.”120 41 March 28, The Mexican Entertaining story about a father who brings a melon 1897 Herald home and thinks about eating it before the sopa de pan and beans. 42 April 20, 1897 El Diario del Sopa de pan adornada (adorned) recipe. Hogar 43 February 2, El Chisme Article about a shelter for the homeless in England that 1900 feeds and seeks employment for their patrons. Article takes a humorous approach that belies a negative attitude toward people out of work. Those who drink alcohol are confined to bread and water for 15 days. “Breakfast of café con leche and two pieces of bread. Main meal: caldo, sopa de pan; two dishes of legumes, roast chicken, when available, beans and water.”121 44 July 25, 1900 El Diario del Same recipe as April 20, 1897. Hogar 45 March 10, El Diario del Sopa de pan with brains recipe. Right above Sopa de maíz 1901 Hogar cacahuatzintli (Corn soup made with an indigenous variety of corn). 46 November 21, El Diario del Article on the many uses of corn—it can be used in sopa 1901 Hogar de pan. 47 November 27, La Gaceta Same as November 21, 1901. 1901 Comercial 48 December 3, El Popular Same as November 21, 1901. 1901 49 October 4, El Correo Meatball soup recipe that has the cook integrate the 1902 Español ingredients into a sopa de pan. 50 December 15, El Seminario Part of a novel by Rafael Delgado published the same 1902 Literario year entitled, Los paríentes ricos (The Rich Family

120 La leche debe consistuir el desayuno del viejo, en invierno sobretodo, y la puede tomar sola, con pan tostado, y mejor aún, la sopa de pan preparada con leche constituye un buen alimento y de fácil digestión. 121 “Desayuno de café con leche y dos piezas de pan. Comida: caldo, sopa de pan; dos platillos de legumbres, asado de pollo, cuando se proporcione, frijoles y agua. Cena lo que sobre de la comida.” 91

Ilustrado Members). In the scene, Dr. Fernández eats five traditional dishes: caldo, sopa de pan (sometimes rice soup), chicken, vegetables, beans, and dessert.122 51 June 26, 1903 El Correo Fish soup recipe with caldo reserved for sopa de pan. Español 52 October 25, El Diario del Sopa de pan para vigilia (Bread soup for vigil) recipe. 1904 Hogar 53 November 11, El Diario del Sopa de pan rellena (stuffed) recipe. 1904 Hogar 54 February 11, La Patria Sopa de pan frito (fried) recipe. 1905 55 March 18, La Patria Sopa de pan y arroz (with rice) recipe. 1905 56 December 5, El Diario del Sopa de pan y coles (with cabbage) recipe. 1905 Hogar 57 December 23, El Diario del Sopa de pan para vigilia recipe. 1905 Hogar 58 October 21, El Diario Sopa de yerbas a la italiana recipe (which is an inverted 1906 variation of sopa de pan). 59 November 12, El Diario Sopa de pan recipe. 1906 60 January 25, El Diario Sopa de pepinos (cucumber soup) with sopa de pan as the 1907 base. Part of a suggested menu with recipes for eggs, ribs, chicken, sorrel, rice fritters, mamey taffy, accompanied with fruit, cheese, wines (red, Jerez, Vermouth), and mineral water. 61 January 27, El Diario Sopa de pan con lechugas (with lettuce). Part of a 1907 suggested menu with this as the second course with a thin caldo, puréed potatoes, leg of mutton, fried brains, pastry, a milk made from starch, cheeses, fruits, tea, wines (red, Jerez oro, Rioja), and mineral water. 62 February 5, El Diario Sopa de pan recipe. Part of a suggested menu with recipes 1907 for eggs and asparagus, carrot purée, jamón, rabbit, chard, spinach, and endive dish, cream cake, curdled milk, cheeses, fruits, coffee, wines (red, Jerez Seco, Madera) and mineral water. 63 Feburary 13, El Diario Sopa de pan recipe. Part of a suggested menu with recipes 1907 for eggs with chile, veal, sausage, cauliflower, cheese fritters, and a jicama dish. It ends with a recipe for making dough for different purposes.

122 For an analysis of Los paríentes ricos in the context of the Porfiriato, María Gracia Castillo, “La sociedad porfiriana: una lectura de ‘los parientes ricos,’ de Rafael Delgado,” Historias, no. 38 (1997): 83–91. 92

64 March 3, 1907 El Diario Sopa de pan y arroz (with rice). Part of a suggested menu with recipes for eggs and jitomate, veal stuff with meat, rabbit, white beans, bean and almond taffy, Spanish wine, coffee, and mineral water. 65 March 9, 1907 El Diario Scallion soup recipe, which is a sopa de pan recipe with scallions in it. Part of a suggested menu with marinated catfish, a chicken dish, artichoke stew with bacon, and macaroons for dessert. 66 April 1, 1907 El Diario Sopa de pan con queso y chile (bread soup with cheese and chile) recipe. Part of a suggested menu with recipes for catfish and olives, beef croquettes, pigeon with peas, salted green beans, a type of apple crumble for dessert with bread filling. 67 April 15, 1907 El Diario Sopa de pan y vino (bread soup and wine). Part of a suggested menu with recipes for eggs and salsa, grilled beef loin, chicken with beet sauce, green beans, and a coconut and pineapple dessert. 68 August 16, El País Sopa de pan recipe next to recipes for garlic soup, rice 1907 with fish, stuffed onion, and roast beef recipes. 69 July 24, 1908 La Patria A description of the diet of French kings, King Louis- Philippe is mentioned for having eaten sopa de pan. 70 November 11, El Diario Sopa de pan y pechuga (bread soup with chicken breast) 1908 recipe. 71 March 28, El Mundo Sopa de pan recipe. Right above a soup made with 1909 Ilustrado semolina. 72 April 12, 1910 El Imparcial: Triple suicide with sopa de pan as the last meal. Diario Ilustrado de la Mañana 73 June 30, 1910 El Diario Sopa de pan con chorizo (. Part of a suggested menu with recipes for egg soup, beaf steaks with sweet potato, peas, refried beans and tortillas, lettuce salad, mangos, and chocolate pudding. Only includes the chocolate pudding recipe. 74 January 1, El Diario Sopa de pan is part of a suggested menu, but it only offers 1911 the recipe for a chicken dish. 75 December 29, El Tiempo Thirty-six people died from food poisoning after a man 1912 distributed smoked herring found in a garbage can to augment their sopa de pan. 76 January 19, La Opinión Sopa de pan receives mention in a short story. 1913 77 May 17, 1913 El Diario Sopa de pan de lechuga (bread soup with lettuce) recipe. 78 June 20, 1913 El Diario Sopa de yerbas a la Italiana recipe. Part of a suggested menu, but it does not offer the other recipes. 93

79 March 30, El Imparcial: Gran sopa de pan aderezada (great seasoned bread soup) 1914 Diario Ilustrado recipe. de la mañana 80 May 12, 1918 El Informador Sopa de pan a la francesa (French bread soup) recipe. Part of a suggested menu including “English” soup, a fish dish, foie gras, bird with truffles, fish fillets, and apricot ice cream. 81 July 17, 1920 El Informador Sopa de pan mentioned in context of a bread maker strike.