Talk:New Mexican cuisine

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Tex-Mex, New Mexican, and Sonoran

"New Mexican food is similar to but not quite the same as Mexican and Tex-Mex" foods preferred in Texas and Arizona.[2]

I find this confusing. In Mexico, Sonoran cuisine is distinguished from other Mexican cuisine because of the Sonoran preference for wheat and beef, as opposed to corn and chicken to the south and east of Sonora. Arizona and New Mexico share this border and much of the origin of the cuisine. Texas does not. The origin of Santa Fe and Tucson recipes share the Sonoran origin, while San Antonio would not. However, I do agree that Tucson and Arizona recipes do not share the "chile" emphasis that New Mexican has. I suggest something like this:

"New Mexican food is similar to but not quite the same as Mexican and Tex-Mex" foods preferred in Texas, and is a variation of Sonoran cuisine preferred in Arizona. BTW, thanks for the informative article.

-Jim Harrigan

spelling

Unless I'm mistaking, "Chile" is a South American country and "chili" is a pepper. -Andrew

--Hi Andrew, you're not mistaken, but chile is the correct term for New Mexican green chile. I am amazed at all the controversy on this page from everyone! I see a lot of comments from people who probably never spent any time in the state. I spent 8 years living there and I can say for certain that the food is its own unique cuisine. It does blend from other familiar styles but it has its own place. Also, its own spellings. Posole is absolutely spelled with an 's' in New Mexico.

Green chile and the composition of what would be considered Mexican cuisine often differs drastically. Seasonings are done differently. My hope is to see residents of New Mexico correct this page - which is way off - and make it something really indicative of the culture and cuisine. Right now, the page is a real disappointment because it attempts to suggest the food is just like Mexican food, which is really inaccurate. Geekgirl13 (talk) 18:07, 27 July 2009 (UTC)geekgirl13

Hi all, If you are interested in more details about correct spelling: Bizcochito rather than "biscochito", pozole rather than "posole" and carne adobada rather than "adovada". The argument that it is fine if the spelling is different because people in various English-speaking countries spell things differently does not hold water. Here's why: the Spanish language has a single linguistic authority, the Real Academia Española, which determines how things are spelled. To do so, it relies upon experts from 22 countries, including Spanish speakers in the United States. Therefore, only those spellings accepted by the Real Academia are official. As a New Mexican, I must say that I have a soft spot for our time-tested traditional spellings and I wouldn't want to see them go. I was always taught that you couldn't say "chile pepper" (much less chili pepper) without sounding silly, because a chile and a pepper are two different things. Has anyone else heard this? Care to confirm/refute?

Bias

could this article be made a little less biased? Chris

Well, we don't HAVE to say that it's delicious, filling, and a cultural tradition... but that would just be a lie. ;) --BlueNight (talk) 02:36, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

What is wrong with having pride for your herritage???? And yes, I call New Mexican cusine a big part of my herritage. -Danielle

Stubbed

I don't think a single template could cover everything that was wrong with it, so I excised most of the article and made it a stub again. You can see the old version here. Maybe that's overreacting, but I'm hoping an expert on the subject can see if ANY of it was accurate and worth saving. You might get a laugh out of it, at least. It was a mess of contradictory point-of-view statements, unencyclopedic banter (including restaurant recommendations) etc. I do know that the Anaheim, Serrano, and New Mexico Chile peppers are three different things (there's no such thing as an "anaheim serrano"), but that's the limit of my knowledge on the subject. Indium 02:41, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

no, I think it needed a lot of help.

Darthjavaljs 05:10, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Definitely needs a lot of expansion and help. Tex-Mex is linked from the Southwestern United States page, and I'd love to get this article to point where it's of similar length and informational content. I'm gonna spend some time on it in the next few weeks here... --ABQCat 06:36, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Read the old article and the new article, I affirm the position of removing much of the old information. The bias seems to try and make New Mexican cuisine very unique and almost non-Mexican. The food, from personal experience, has more in common with that of northern Mexico. Yes there are some dishes that are prepared differently, but this happens everywhere.

I got a laugh form the restaurant recommendations. Many of those restaurants identify themselves as "Mexican" and not "New Mexican", which further exemplifies the blurring of the two. For example, the restaurant "Garduño's" has the word Mexican (with the "new" omitted) in its name.

I did a little research on my own with some friends from different Spanish-speaking countries about the dish commonly known was "Spanish Rice" in New Mexico. It's rice prepared with tomato sauce, peas and some onion and sometimes other minor ingredients like garlic. The results were interesting. The Spanaird said he had never seen that type of rice before; the Mexican from Sonora called it "Arroz a la mexicana" (Rice Mexican style), the Uruguyan simply called it "arroz con tomate" (rice with tomato) and the Salvadoran called it "arroz guisano" (pead rice).

Perhaps a list of common dishes with proper Spanish spelling could be added? I say prfjkfoper Spanish spelling because some foods are written as "posole" and "biscochito" when in actuality their correct Spanish spellings are "pozole" and "bizcochitos", respectively. Ironically, you find those in northern Mexico, too.

[— anon]

Mr. Anon certainly has an opinion regarding the "blurring" of Mexican and New Mexican cuisine, but it is woefully wrong...

New Mexican food is specifically regional to the state - as well as southern Colorado. Spanish rice in New Mexico is NOT prepared with tomato sauce, peas and some onion, but with a blend of fresh tomato, onion, chile and assorted spices. Apparently the "experts" who were asked about the Spanish rice were simply acquaintances of Latin origin who had no knowledge of New Mexican cuisine. The spelling of the dish posole has been spelled this way in New Mexico for generations, as well as spelling of biscochito. It is a cultural change in spelling and to say it is misspelled because that's not how they spell it in Spain or Mexico is akin to saying "donut" or "fiber" is misspelled in America because they spell it "doughnut" or "fibre" in England. Not intending this to become a rant... and I apologise if it reads as such. But there were misstatements in the above diatribe that needed correction. I am a life-long resident of New Mexico. Kaos agent1 (talk) 21:18, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

What does "pead" mean? Never encountered that word before. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 21:53, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I know they spell "posole" with a "z" in Mexico, but in New Mexico I've always seen it spelled with an "s", e.g., in cookbooks and restaurant menus. It seems it should be spelled the New Mexican way in this article. The same goes for "biscochito" (which incidentally is a different thing in Spain).

--ESimpson 10:42, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

These sounds like very good edits to me. Just be bold and go for it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 03:47, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Are those of you that think this article has problems from New Mexico??? I am and I have to say that It is 100% accurate according to all of my 29 years of New Mexcican food experience! I don't need a scholar to tell me what I have experienced all of my life.

Move

All the other articles in the Cuisine series are titled "(insert country here) cuisine". So maybe we should move this article to New Mexican cuisine?--Rockero 18:26, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

A week without objections. I'm executing the move.--Rockero 21:53, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Good move. Frankly, I wouldn't have even waited the week, since the move was clearly indicated by the extisting naming convention. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 21:53, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Kaileen loves Ryan

What?

And New Mexican cuisine is different from *real* Mexican cuisine, how??? Deepstratagem 16:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I mean, besides the fact that it's not Mexican. Deepstratagem 16:48, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Um, actually read the article. :-) Unless it's been wiped again, the question is self-answering by reading the article. There are numerous differences between Mexico Mexican (not to mention internal northern, southern and coastal differences south of the border, which are sometimes quite considerable), California Mexican, Tex-Mex, and New Mexican cuisine. Even things as simple as the definition, ingredients and preparation of a taco vary widely. I would concur with the idea that the article needs to explain this better, and would go further and say that entries in the list should be replaced with cross-references to the same entries in a list of Mexican food terms, where the New Mexican usage cannot be reliably sourced as being consistently different. Keeping the list clean in this way would require some dedicated regular watching of this list, as noobs will certainly come in an add all kinds of junk (which happens with all articles of this sort.) Anyway, if any one thing can be said to be defining of New Mexican cuisine vs. Mexican, Tex-Mex, etc., it is the use of a specific cultivar of chile pepper, exemplified by those grown in Hatch, New Mexico. While they are closely related to Anaheim peppers, they are very different in character, and are prepared and used differently in many cases. But there are other differences, in the spicing specifics, how tortillas are used, typical ingredients in posole, etc. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 21:53, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

The same can be said of food in Mexico City and Cuernavaca, or between two adjacent villages anywhere in Mexico. If someone made chilaquiles with tomato sauce, chipotle sauce, Indian curry, or Thai peppers, it is still inherently Mexican food. This page pretends New Mexican food is some novel concept, while in content it presents nothing of the sort. Deepstratagem 01:35, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Improve the article then. NB: There is no particular reason that documentable stylistic differences between the cuisine of Mexico City and Cuernavaca could not be enclopedized at Mexican cuisine or even in separate articles, so your initial point seems off-base. As I've already said, I would agree with the criticism that the article needs to better explain the differences between New Mexican and Mexican food, and to be better sourced, so I don't see that there's anything we're actually debating about other than your personal belief that there is no difference, despite already having had some of the differences explained to you. That's a conversation I doubt anyone here is interested in continuing with you. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 02:10, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

What I mean by different is original. I'm sure there are some differences in style and ingredients, but the article gives the impression that tamales, for example, are very different and original because a different sauce is used. Well, a different sauce might be used in two taco stands a block apart, but that doesn't mean the tamales from one of those blocks are some sort of new invention. In Mexico there are 300 different types of chiles, and hundreds of ways to prepare them, so I find it unlikely that New Mexican food is profoundly original. A hybridized subset of Mexican food, maybe, but the article makes it sound as if Mexican food originated in New Mexico with a quasi-elitist tone. Deepstratagem 09:51, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

There's no policy/guideline basis for this article needing to go away on the basis of "originality". If you can gain enough consensus that the material is not "different" enough to propose a merge, you could try that, though I think you'll meet well-backed resistance (but cf. my other proposal, to merge the non-different entries into Mexican cuisine and watch the article to prevent re-additions of redundant material. Re: your across-the-street example - Apples and oranges; the article posits (and yes, does need to be better sourced in this regard) that the differences are definitional of a widespread identifiable sub-national cuisine, which would not apply to two variant versions of tacos prepared across the street from each other. Re: loads of chile variants in Mexico - again, they are not definitional of Mexican food in the way that NM chile is definition of NM food. By way of analogy, if it were the case that the vast majority of chiles used in Oaxaca were of one particular distinctive cultivar, then it would be entirely appropriate for an article on Oaxacan cuisine to go into that. Re: "makes it sound as if Mexican food originated in New Mexico" - I don't detect that in the article myself; can you explain more clearly? NB: New Mexican food did originate in New Mexico. Many people living here have families that pre-date the Spanish conquest, and the contribution of the Navajo, Zuñi, etc., native cultures are different from those of the Mayan, Aztec, etc., cultures from south of the border. NM food is not imported Mexican food locally Americanized, which I think may be the misapprehension you are laboring under; it is a native cuisine closely related to that of modern-day Mexico, but distinguishable from it in may ways (and crosspolinated with it modernly in other ways, of course). Re: "quasi-elitist" - that sounds like a WP:NPOV issue that should be definitely addressed. be bold and fix it. PS: I apologize for any apparent incivility above; I was in a hurry and I think I came off as more "short" with you that was actually intended! The point was that the issues raised here need to be something cognizable under WP policy/guidelines somewhere, not just personal feelings about an article or its ultimate value, or they won't really go anywhere. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 03:47, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

PS: Your recent deletion edits do nothing to improve the article, and just weaken it, while also doing nothing to support your claim that there are no salient differences between Mexican and New Mexican cuisine. I'm liable to revert all of them, though with source citations this time. Stripping the article of differencing information without justifying the content deletions does not demonstrate that there aren't differences, it is simply borderline vandalism. This time I am not engaging in any civility lapses, but mean what I am saying precisely. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 03:55, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

In particular, I removed redundant descriptions, cleaned up the spelling and anything that sounded *exactly* like the original Mexican version of a particular food item, unless the description included notable differences. Deepstratagem 05:58, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I was speaking of your removal of what may well be the majority of the material about the background of NM cuisine and its differencing from Mexican, i.e. a sizeable portion of the red text in the left-hand column here. The minor twiddles weren't of concern. If you have issues with some of those sections you should have flagged them with {{citation needed}} and/or discussed them here in detail rather than deleted them as if they were patent nonsense. To be clear, I'm in support of removing redundant descriptions, and think that that sort of edit could go even further; in most cases, the link to the food item is actually sufficient where there isn't anything consistently different about the NM vs. MX version. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 06:44, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

I probably went overboard there, but the paragraph was a little speculative. Deepstratagem 11:36, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

There's a diff. between speculative and unsourced, and it was multiple paragraphs, throughout the article. I'm too busy dealing with a massive spamlink attack in the billiards & snooker related articlespace to deal with this sourcing and restoring stuff here right now, but will come back to it eventually. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 02:09, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

It's like saying China-town Chinese food is just like food in China. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.126.75.181 (talk) 00:53, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm intrigued/shocked by the level of emotion in this debate. New Mexico cuisine developed contemporaneously with cuisines of Sonora and Chihuahua, incorporating very different ingredients due to very different climates and influences. That's it, basically. In Mexico there are regional cuisines as there are in Italy (Cuisine of Sicily), India (Cuisine of Chennai) or China (Szechuan cuisine), and so it for the Southwestern United States. What's the problem? DaveDixon (talk) 23:34, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that you could have titled this article "Mexican Cuisine" and it would have been entirely accurate. I'm sure the sawdust in New Mexico is different than the sawdust in Texas, but do we really need an article about the both of them? Some of these assertions are just silly. New Mexican cuisine is different than the Mexican cuisine you find in California, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, Texas and Nevada because New Mexican restaurants use green and red chilis? So does Mexican cooking! Its the same thing. Using less frijoles y arroz and mas papas doesn't mean its an entirely different cuisine. Using a few different spices in a few different ways doesn't mean its an entirely different cuisine. My father and I use different amounts of spices in our marinara sauce and its still Italian cuisine.

Furthermore, why is there no mention of the many other types of New Mexican cuisine? Both times I was in Albequrque I didn't eat anything on your list! I spotted dozens of McDonalds and Burger Kings as well as a lot of KFCs. Why is there no mention of this in the article? This article is obviously the pet project of someone on here and it needs to be removed. If you really find the need to have your little list posted on the internet somewhere, you should put it on your own webpage. Then you could at least have something to reference this to because nothing exists online so far. —Preceding unsigned comment added by FreddyPickle (talk • contribs) 05:47, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm sure there are many people that would commonly attack New Mexican Cuisine as not being sufficiently different from Mexican food to warrant a distinct difference. First, that you ate at fast food places all over Albuquerque is a matter of American culture, and in fact western culture as a whole. While I was in Munich, Germany I ate as much, if not more fast food (McDonald's and Burger King) than I typically do in the United States. The existence of Fast Food in an area does not diminish the existence of foods originally from that area. That Munich has more restaurants where you can order a Big Mac than Schweinshaxen doesn't mean that Schweinshaxen isn't Bavarian food, or that the Big Mac is somehow Bavarian food.

Speaking as a person who grew up in New Mexico until the age of 25, I had no idea that there was any significant difference between New Mexican, and Mexican food. However, after leaving New Mexico and coming to Seattle, I've learned that there are a lot of differences. New Mexico food is on the whole hotter than Mexican food, as well there is a significant lack of sea food, focusing primarily upon on trout and dried shrimp as the only forms of seafood during lent (since most of New Mexico Hispanic culture has heavy Catholic influences). When preparing Enchiladas for my boyfriend, he's always confused initially because I make flat enchiladas. The idea of rolling enchiladas (unless you're making a casserole) just seems totally weird and foreign to me. Other Americanized Mexican foods mostly focus on red chiles and jalapeños, while New Mexican food focuses on the Anaheim or New Mexico pepper almost exclusively (at least to the point that moving outside of New Mexico, I was all "wth? What is all this stuff? and where are the 'just chiles'?" In New Mexico there are simply "chiles", needing no other disambiguation, as the only other chile pepper ever used are jalapeños and then so rarely as to be almost never) The size of tortillas is another thing. In New Mexico, tortillas are sold simply as "tortillas", while in other Americanized Mexican foods there are "burrito-sized" and "soft taco-sized" the former being much larger, and the latter being a bit smaller.

You talk about how variation in cooking and such doesn't make a cooking form distinct, as you say, both you and your Father cook "Italian food"... however, with New Mexican cuisine vs "old" Mexican cuisine, there are numerous differences that make it so that both sides feel that the other just isn't quite right. After moving away from New Mexico, I must cook my own New Mexican food to have it feel "normal", at any Mexican restaurant or Mexican grill, or whatever, it's like a curious arrangement of stuff that doesn't quite look right, or doesn't quite taste right. Going from the heavy-spicy chile-flavored foods of New Mexico, to the heavily-spiced with cilantro foods outside of New Mexico, it just tastes wrong.

There are a number of articles on Wikipedia that deal with very subtle differences, such that if you're not familiar with them, then you won't quite understand the difference between them. If you need to, think about this article this way. But have no doubt in your mind, that Mexicans in New Mexico find the cuisine as an unusual and non-normal variation, and New Mexicans eating "authentic" Mexican food find it unusual and non-normal as well. When the fundamental ingredient of a recipe changes from rice to potatoes, that's a significant difference in cuisine, and if you can't recognize that... I'm sorry. --Puellanivis (talk) 09:20, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Its not that do not think there's a difference between "Mexican" and "New Mexican" food. Its that there is no difference between New Mexican food and the American-Mexican food you get in the other 49 states. Why is making beans and rice to the east of Arizona and west of Texas so different than making beans and rice in, say, Vermont? There is no difference and you can get authentic variations on Mexican and Mexican-American food all over the country. You need to subjectively prove that there is something different in "New Mexican" cooking than in Mexican or Mexican-American cooking to justify this article. You have not.

This article is very obviously the pet project of someone from New Mexico who's mother told him how much different her cooking was from Mexicans. It should be removed immediately until proper sources can be obtained. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.144.73.92 (talk) 00:05, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

How Dare you make this assertion that the article is a pet project. I am personally insulted as a New Mexico resident. By the way, as far as a proper source, what can be better than gathering information from a culture in order to define it?

While I have not done a study of "Mexican" food found in all 50 states and all the regions of Mexico and beyond, I certainly have not found New Mexican style chile served commonly outside of New Mexico in Mexican restaurants. IIRC, New Mexican style food features tomatoes less frequently than Tex-Mex or food commonly found in Mexican restaurants outside the southwest especially. To say New Mexican food, Tex-Mex food, and "Mexican" food found in the other 49 states is identical is as foolish as it would be to say Chicago-style pizza and New York-style pizza are identical or to say that Persian khoresht and Indian curry are identical. They may use the same or similar ingredients, but the final result is certainly easily distinguishable by anyone who has sampled both varieties. 4.157.77.155 (talk) 20:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

http://www.albuquerque-tortilla.com/catalog/

This proves that Mexican and New Mexican food is the same. The above posters assert that in New Mexico, they simply have tortillas. No one ever names the tortillas by size, as they do in the other 49 states and Mexico. But since New Mexican cooking is so much different, they don't differentiate their tortillas on size.

What a load of it. This, like every other cockmaimie idea in this article is 100% fabricated nonsense. In 1000s of words, it fails to even shed light on WHY its so much different from the Mexican cooking found in the other 49 states and Mexico, let alone HOW. Remove this article immediately.

Instead of fabricating lies and nonsense to keep this article afloat, why not add substantive truthful posts to already existing articles on Mexican food? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.144.73.92 (talk) 00:19, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Oye jesus... do I need to go down to the local supermarket here and take a picture for you of all the different types of tortillas they have. They're all pretty much the same size and just say "flour tortillas", on the sides (read: out of the way), they still make "burrito sized" for those making Californian-style burritos. In Washington, then, when I get to Washington, I can photograph the various styles of tortillas sold there, they're all either slightly smaller than New Mexican tortillas and labeled "soft taco" or huge and labeled "burrito".

As a native-New Mexican living abroad in the rest of the United States, I can't possibly seem to come to grips with comments here that New Mexican cuisine isn't sufficiently notably different from other Americanized Mexican cuisines, like California, Arizona, and Texas. If you do not think that New Mexico cuisine is different from other Mexican food, go up to a native-New Mexican in the northern states and ask them, "Where is the closest place you can get Mexican food which is done just like its made back home?" and they'll tell you "back home." New Mexico cultivar chiles are nearly as hot as jalapeños, (reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoville_scale) in the range of about 4,500-5,000 Scoville heat units. Anaheim peppers available that are not from New Mexico cultivars are in the 500-2,500 Scoville heat unit range. If it isn't clear to you by now that New Mexico food is 2-10 times hotter than other Mexican foods, then you're absolutely lost, and this is the single most defining characteristic of New Mexican food over Mexican food. Next, I'm giving you a particular food item cooked solidly in New Mexico, and fundamentally nowhere else in Mexican food cuisines: biscochitos. Talk even to other Hispanics, they stare at me and ask "What are biscochitos?" or even outright say "You mean biscochos right?" The answer is, "No, I mean biscochitos, which are a distinctly New Mexican thing." Now quiet down now before I have to cook you a flat blue-corn enchilada with a fried egg on top. --Puellanivis (talk) 05:38, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Puellanivis is absolutely right. The difference between authentic New Mexican Cuisine and what you get at a "Mexican" restaurant anywhere else in the country is night and day. The defining menu difference is the choice of red or green chile with New Mexican dishes. Only the uninitiated and the ignorant can not see this difference and these people need to stay out of this discussion. Their arguing this point is like me arguing over what makes good Boston or New England Chowder. I've never lived there and my xperience with those dishes came from a can or a restaurant kitchen at a downtown hotel in some forgotten inland city. I lived in Northern NM for 43 years and the only way I currently get New Mexican food in Oklahoma is have family members ship roasted Hatch green chile and ristras of Hatch red to me in the mail. Then I cook my very own stacked enchiladas and yes, an egg. over easy does go on top... chased down with a Sopaipilla drenched in honey.

Kaos agent1 (talk) 21:35, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

To Those regarding the need for an entry on NM food: stop. It's simple, it is different and worthy of disambiguation from "Mexican food" (which itself should be several entries). Perhaps it's something that you would need to experience. As a chef, and someone who lived in New Mexico for 15+ years, Texas for 10+ years, Colorado, California, and the Midwest: food that is prepared and served as "Mexican food" in NM is much different than food prepared and served in restaurants denoted as "Mexican restaraunts" in other parts of the US. Deal with it. This is not at all any form of pretension or claim that it is wholly unique or superior. In fact, you may well find *less* variety in New Mexican dishes than you would in other parts of the country, and most certainly than in Mexico. That shouldn't even be part of the issue. By branding or labelling the food "mexican" or "new mexican" it automatically implies a niche. Of course it won't be as varied as the entire list of dishes eaten in Mexico. So, let's confine the comparison to "Mexican" food served the US and referred to as such. Yes, you will find many more types of cuisines and variety of ingredients, spices, and dishes if you go to Mexico, just as you will if you tour Italy and then eat "Italian food" in Queens. If one is living in Mexico, one would be eating "food" on a daily basis, not some specific subset or specialty. This would likely tend to encompass more things. Mexico is a very large and populous country which spans a large latitudinal range and has seen many cultural influences (native, german, spanish, etc.), has oceans and jungles and mountains, etc. NM is a big high desert with a population less than one tenth of the DF alone, and has the Rockies, some volcanoes, precious little surface water, and very little arable land. The food IS different, and for those who prefer to split hairs and argue semantics, stop eating at KFC on your vacation and delve a bit deeper into the culture. You are obviously not foodies. For those that are, perhaps I can provide some insight into the heart of NM eating:

The real nature of "New Mexican' food is the ubiquitous presence of the roasted and peeled "Anaheim/Chimayo/Hatch/Big Jim/Green" chile (and to a lesser extent, its dried and crimson counterpart). The food itself is simple, inexpensive, traditional, and delicious. It may be of interest to find what you will NOT see in typical New Mexican cuisine: taco stands with a variety of meats (asada, picadillo, barbacoa, etc.) and salsas (tomatillo, pico de gallo, pickled onions, etc), seafood, ceviche, mole, chile "colorado", tex-mex "chilley" that one might place on a hot dog, queso fresco, quesadillo, de oaxaca, or really anything other than cheddar...the list goes on. To me, NM food is really a very honest and time-proven combination of pork, beef, corn and flour tortillas, pinto beans, rice, sopaipillas, and roasted "green chile". If that's not good enough for you, go directly to Las Vegas, Albuquerque, San Antonio, Valencia County, or anywhere in the state and see if it reminds you of either your local "super burrito taco palace" in the midwest, Pancho's buffet in TX, a taco stand in LA, a family restaurant in Chicago, or any regionally specific (Northern, Interior, Yucatan, whatever) restaurant. It won't. And unforunately you won't find that little 4 am taco stand on the corner in NM, or that seafood stuffed poblano with walnut sauce, or ceviche or a banana leaf wrapped tamal there. But you can have an amazing bowl of pork and green that will light up your pallette (and possibly your GI tract), any crazy thing you can imagine with green chile (chile relleno maki roll anyone?), some fantastic sopaipillas with honey to mop up your plate with, and that classic NM restaurant desert: the candy bar in a glass case at the cash register :) Buen Provecho, go eat in the 505! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.227.93.162 (talk) 08:15, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

I didn't read everybody's comments in detail, but... I grew up as a Mexican-American in Texas. We used all of the "terms" that you list in your "List of New Mexican culinary terms," section. I fthey are going to be seperate, at least ad them to the Tex-Mex section. That way, those that don't raly know, will. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.185.234.62 (talk) 07:05, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I read most of the above comments and as a New Mexican (who has lived all over the state), I can say w/o a doubt that New Mexican cuisine is NOT Mexican, nor is it tex-mex, etc. Quite frankly, I am amazed at the controversy this has stirred up. I know this is Wikipedia; but, have any of you non-New Mexicans bothered to use Google? Search for "New Mexican" cuisine and read some of the articles about the food found in NM. While it is true that there is a heavy Mexican influence, the cuisine was also influenced by the local Native American pueblos, etc. For instance - visit this link: New Mexican cuisine. One notable quotation is, "Over time, a specific New Mexico style diverged increasingly from similar styles in California and Texas. This divergence has accelerated in the last few decades, perhaps as a protective response to the invasion of heavily Americanized "Mexican" food products and fast food." Then, pay attention to the next paragraph: "Today, New Mexican cuisine differs from Mexican, Tex-Mex and Mexican-Californian cooking in numerous ways. Red and green chiles are a major factor, but also the balance of spices and other ingredients, and general definitions of what certain dishes are and how to prepare them differ. For example, on average New Mexican food uses more beef than Mexican cooking, usually uses a different kind of oregano, and often handles tortillas differently; it does not make use of Tex-Mex style chili con carne and uses less cumin and fewer jalapeños than the Texas style; and it does not make nearly as much use of rice and mixed vegetables as the California style, nor as much avocado, a food not native to the semi-arid New Mexico region."

In Northern NM, if you try to serve a native New Mexican refried beans, he'll give you a dirty look. Whole pintos are used in Northern NM cuisine; refried beans are NOT common. Our food is based mostly on the variants of chiles grown in the state. They are completely different (in taste as in usage) from other, non-New Mexican chiles, like serranos, jalapenos, etc. To compare NM chiles to the likes of serranos and others would be akin to comparing oranges to grapefruit. In this analogy, both fruits are citrus but have completely different tastes and are often prepared differently (oranges are eaten as is, while grapefruit are often prepared with sugar to get rid of the tartness). No one would confuse oranges and grapefruit as being one and the same! Just as with these citrus fruits, no one should confuse NM cuisine with Mexican cuisine. Lebongirl (talk) 20:22, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

I am not from New Mexico, but have had the good fortune to travel to the Land of Enchantment (a perfect description, BTW), and to various parts of Mexico. I cannot believe that there are arguments in here attempting to refute that New Mexican cuisine is unique. The link to foodmuseum is a good example, plus the arguments written in here by people who have been in the food business. A few other irksome statements I want to point out: #1- the spelling variations (i.e., "chile" vs. "chili") are accurate. To paraphrase another contributor, that is as illogical as going over to England and telling them that they spell "parlour" and "tyre" incorrectly. #2- The fact that many of the dishes listed have the same names as dishes from Mexican or Tex-Mex is not a substantial plank for arguing that New Mexican cuisine is non-unique. Look at the differences between the Spanish and Mexican cuisines. Hint: travel to Spain and order a tortilla, and prepare to be very surprised! Hal Wing (talk) 05:03, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

If you've never been to New Mexico and sampled New Mexico cuisine how can you compare it to Mexican food? (Especially if you've never been to Mexico?) New Mexico is a State like any other and has nothing to do with Mexico. People are just making assumptions and you know that happens when you assume… —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.173.224.31 (talk) 19:00, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

By the Way Deepstratagem you are an idiot. Truly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.173.224.31 (talk) 19:05, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

You will almost never get a decent chile relleno outside of New Mexico. Not even in Texas (not counting El Paso) or Arizona, where you'd think they would know better. No one should admit to this on the cuisine page, but I'm pretty sure there's no other place where they sell you little 5-cent plastic bacs of pickle juice to suck on during basketball games... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.2.114.241 (talk) 23:14, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Sopapillas into which honey is added moments before eating is not unique to New Mexico. El Chico and Monterrey House were doing that in East Texas back in the 1970s. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.230.233.52 (talk) 16:42, 28 December 2010 (UTC)

Beans

With regard to the the beans that are used being primarily of the kidney or black variety, nothing could be further from the truth! New Mexican food uses PINTO beans. Period. [The previous unsigned comment was posted by 129.82.213.141 (talk · contribs), 16:28, 1 April 2007 (UTC)]

I agree with the above statement. Visit any authentic New Mexican restaurant and you will find only pintos - no kidney beans. While not as prevalent, black beans do pop up at some New Mexican restaurants. It should also be noted that in Northern New Mexico, only whole pintos are considered authentic. Refried beans are rarely found here. As one travels farther south, refried beans become more prevalent. This is one difference between Northern NM cuisine and Southern NM cuisine. Lebongirl (talk) 20:25, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Cleanup

To reiterate something that I think Deepstratagem first brought up, this article needs to be cleaned up, and I think doing so should be one of WP:WPNM's first major article tasks. The things to do from my perspective 1) introduce and explain the nature of NM cuisine, its history, and its differences from other related styles, and do so with sources"; 2) Eliminate any prose from the list that is redunant with the list at Mexican cuisine or which doesn't expand in any way on what is at articles like taco and enchilada, just wikilink to those entries; 3) sourcedly explain how the NM food items in question differ from the equivalents in other styles where they do traditionally differ. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 04:46, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Edit Reversion, and the redundancy of this article.

[[1]] My edit just got reverted.

Honestly, what is the point of plagiarizing the Mexican cuisine page, and pretending this food is "New Mexican"? That is, half of the food here comes from Mexico and is intended to be just like Mexico's. So why do we repeat this stuff over and over? What's so notable about Chalupa's in New Mexico, that just needs to be mentioned here? In my opinion this entire article could be reduced to half as of the aforementioned edit if we remove redundancies.

Not to say there aren't differences worth noting. But if we don't note the real differences this article is misleading and hard to read. Deepstratagem 10:54, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Seeing your reversion is what made me bring this up again. I agreed with your version more, but I think the editwarring (slow moving as it has been, it has still been editwarring for many months) needs to stop and some consensus discussion started in its stead. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:40, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Moving forward

Anyone else here have some input? Consensus is kind of hard to be sure of when only two or three parties are involved... — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 11:40, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

As an old New Mexican, I would like to see the article focus on features unique to the cuisine of New Mexico. I just added some notes on some unique dishes that were missing (caldillo/green chile stew, and blue-corn enchiladas, for example) and deleted fajitas, which were invented in Texas in the 1970s and got to California before they came to New Mexico a decade later. I disagree with a few points about the unique features of New Mexican cuisine (when I was a child, for example, cilantro was common in California but I never saw/tasted it in New Mexico) but we should be debating that, not whether variations in the size of a burrito constitutes a novel cuisine. DaveDixon (talk) 23:19, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

I deleted the whole reference to how New Mexican food contains heavy use of cilantro, that is just flat out WRONG. I too love NM food and never saw cilantro until the last few years when it seems to have come into fad particulary with more yuppie like, fashionable Mexican food. People use WAY to much cilantro in those dishes and its definitely NOT a staple of NM cooking. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.90.101.27 (talk) 04:20, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Cilantro is not heavily used in New Mexican cuisine. Lebongirl (talk) 20:27, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Cheese?

What cheeses are authentic to Mexican food? I've heard that cheddar is not authentic, for example, and that feta is a close approximation. 72.74.204.205 19:36, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

New Mexican food usually uses Asadero cheese, but the best varieties of this cheese are made by the Mennonites south of the border. It's crumbly like Feta but tastes like Muenster. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.180.185.10 (talk) 23:18, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

At most New Mexican restaurants I've been to, cheddar is used; however, better, more authentic establishments do seem to use asadero. I have also seen monterrey jack cheese used (especially in chile rellenos). Lebongirl (talk) 20:29, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

North Vs. South

Does anyone see reason to have a discussion of the difference between northern and southern cuisines? It's a hot topic when you actually live here, but I don't know if it warrants wiki-discussion. Gtorell 18:02, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

As an non-resident, treat the following as a hypothesis and not gospel. My sense was that the "southern" cuisine started showing up as you approached Las Cruces, which developed more in concert with western Texas and the lower Rio Grande. I could be wrong, but I know that today I think of it having more in common with El Paso than Santa Fe, Taos, etc. Does the southern cuisine spread any further west than the SE corner of the state? Hal Wing (talk) 05:10, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Pozole de Nixtamal

The article says that "using red chile is not traditional New Mexican" however, in "The Good Life: New Mexico Traditions and Food" by Fabiola Cabeza de Baca Gilbert, the recipe specifically calls for "4 dried red chile pods", and no mention of green chile. As this is something that would likely stir up an edit-war, I'm looking to talk about this first before I run in and change it under the auspice of "Hey! How can it not be traditional? That's how my mom made it and her mom before her!" --Puellanivis (talk) 10:21, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

As I've received no input on this, I will be making the change to the mainspace article, as red chile is just as common a part of authentic New Mexican posole/pozole as green chile. (And in some parts, possibly even more "standard" than green chile) --Puellanivis (talk) 09:22, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Proposal for deletion

How do we set in motion the process to remove this article? You've had years of posts to prove that New Mexican cuisine is different than the Mexican cuisine found in the other 49 states and you cannot. We need to get this removed so we can focus on the main Mexican food article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by FreddyPickle (talk • contribs) 01:35, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Sigh... What is bothering you so bad about the very existence of this article? Do me a favor, take any random native-New Mexican, take them to a Mexican restaurant in any other state and sit them down and ask them what they think of the food. The answer? "It's mild, it's tasteless, and it's nothing like back home." That's not to say that there are similarities, and this article should focus on the differences, not the similarities. If you want to know some differences, Fish Tacos, common in other Mexican cuisines, entirely absent from New Mexican cuisine. The very idea of Fish Tacos are unusual, and odd. Frankly, I'm hardly concerned at all about if you believe that there is a difference or not, fact is, that every single expatriate New Mexican will tell you that they can't get good Mexican food outside of New Mexico (depending on where you were raised, it's even more tightly bound to the Rio Grande river). You want the biggest difference? It's primarily in spiciness. When I walk into any Mexican restaurant outside of New Mexico and order salsa, I could literally drink the stuff. Come to New Mexico, and I dip the corners of my chip in the salsa, because it's that hot. New Mexico cultivars of the Anaheim pepper are some 2-10 times hotter than other cultivars of the same chile elsewhere (ref: Scoville Scale). If this doesn't give you some sort of indication as to something being quite notably different, then... *shrug* I don't know what to tell you. --Puellanivis (talk) 05:47, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I do not support deletion. New Mexican cuisine is quite distinct from most Mexican cuisine, though parts of Sonora eat similarly. I eat at Anita's New Mexican Style Mexican Restaurant here in the DC area often. The New Mexican food is quite distinct from the various Mexican restaurants in the region, all owned and operated by people from Mexico, including Anita's, as she is from New Mexico. The New Mexican food is spicier, uses very different sauces, including their salsa picante. I'm sorry you don't see a difference between Mexican regional cooking and New Mexican, but i firmly belive there is a difference. Indian and Mexican use similar spices and herbs to radically different end results, just as New Mexican gets a very different end result from other Mexican and Mexican-derived cuisines. séain (talk) 13:34, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

The only thing the TC has said convincingly to support his/her argument is that New Mexicans like a special kind of butter cookie. Thats it. One little cookie does not define a cuisine.

What are the different spices? What are the different herbs and vegetables? Simply using these ingrediants in varying degrees to make the type of food does not define a cuisine. Puellnivis, have you no perspective? You're arguing ad nauseum for your pet project. Except for the butter cookies there is absolutely nothing significantly different about this supposed "New Mexican" cuisine. You're just describing Mexican cuisine like any Mexican or Mexican-American would describe it.

What is so different about the Mexican food in New Mexico thats different from the Mexican food found in the other 49 states and in Mexico? Why are Mainer tacos and California tacos the same thing, but they're so fundamentally and drastically different in New Mexico? Until you can take a step back and ground yourself and answer these questions honestly, we need to remove this ridiculously childish article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.144.73.92 (talk) 18:03, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Tacos are a bad example... those are the same all over... it's not that New Mexican cuisine doesn't have the same stuff as Tex-Mex, or Californian mexican food. In some ways it does. Here's the only really big thing for tacos: in New Mexico, they don't EVER come with fish in them. As to doing things actually different, enchiladas are the most important difference I can think of. Primarily, because they are done ENTIRELY different from every other Americanized Mexican food. They are served flat, and when I make enchiladas for someone, typically the first thing they do when I start preparing them is freak out and go "what are you doing? I thought you were making enchiladas." Now, New Mexican food, is more like the Cuisine of Sicily as a variation from a popular style, but it's distinctly different.

“ It's so funny to me (and sad) how close minded people in SEATTLE are! Seriously! First off, it's NOT Mexican food- no where does it claim to be Mexican food. It is NEW MEXICAN food. There is a difference, people. Do your homework. If you go to New Mexico you will find the same sort of fare that makes the state so famous for it's cuisine. To the people who were complaining about the spice of the food- that's what makes it so unique! The chilis! Again, it is NOT your run of the mill, we cater to Americans who can't take the heat, Mexican restaurant. Also, for the people who were complaining that the green chilis were not from Hatch...keep in mind that you can't even get fresh green chilis from Hatch in New Mexico this time of year, therefor they are most likely canned but are still HATCH green chilis. I have been to many New Mexican restaurants, and am married to a New Mexican, and this restaurant is very authentic, The drinks, food, atmosphere, and service are excellent. If you're open mided, like chilis, and realize that this is not a mexican restaurant but an authentic new mexican restaurant...you will be in for a treat! Delicious![2] ”

If New Mexican cuisine is so much different than other Mexican-American and Mexican cuisine, how come there's no information on the internet to explain this? What are the different dishes? What are the different sauces and/or ingredients? A spade is a spade, people, no matter if the handle is red or green. Until the TC can come up with ANYTHING that makes "New Mexican" food different from Mexican or other Mexican-America food, this article should obviously be deleted. The fact that two different types of Mexican cuisine are have more differences than "New Mexican" cuisine does with Mexican cuisine painfully reminds us all of this. This article needs to be merged with American cuisine (as New Mexico is part of America) or merged with Mexican cuisine (as everything in the article is already defined by Mexican cuisine). —Preceding unsigned comment added by FreddyPickle (talk • contribs) 04:44, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Well this has to be the problem with Wikipedia. You have people who Have actually experienced New Mexican food explaining exactly what sets New Mexican cooking apart and people who have no experience of New Mexican food trying make out that they know better. You might as well try and tell me you know what good English Fish and Chips are because you went and tried them at Long John Silvers one time. If you haven't lived in New Mexico and experienced their food you aren't qualified to pass judgment on it. All2humanuk (talk) 04:48, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

New Mexican cuisine IS distinct and this article should NOT be deleted! Mr. Pickle, you have failed to prove that NM cuisine is NOT different to Mexican. If Do a bit of research. Simply google the term "New Mexican" cuisine. There are plenty of articles written which point out the difference between New Mexican and Mexican. See my edits and links (above) elsewhere in this discussion. Lebongirl (talk) 20:34, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Mr. Pickle, spend a month or more eating in New Mexico, especially in the area around Santa Fe, Espaňola, Taos, etc. After that, if you are still unconvinced that New Mexico has a unique cuisine after that, then maybe your comments may be worth considering. And, in response to the snide anonymous poster who tries to trivialize NM cuisine as a "butter cookie", the choice to remain anonymous in the wake of your illogic was probably a good decision. Pardon my bluntness but, as it stands, these two theses display considerable ignorance. My preference would be that this proposal for deletion should itself be deleted from the talk page. If Mr. Pickle thinks we are wasting time defending the uniqueness of NM cuisine, how much time is being wasted responding to such ignorant suggestions? Hal Wing (talk) 05:28, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

I was previously a resident of NM for about 20 years. In the process of buying/researching some grren chile fact, I came upon this article. The bottom line is that there is nothing outside the region that compares with NEW MEXICAN cuisine. I have lived in California, Arizona, Texas, and otherp places that I think qualify me for this statement. If the word mexican wasn't in the title, this arguement probably wouldn't be happening. It is different, and better IMHO, enough so that a small corner of cyberspace dedicated to it does not seem like overkill. Nuff said from me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mshilko (talk • contribs) 20:53, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Cleaning up "List of New Mexican culinary terms"

I'd like to suggest that we work on cleaning up the list on this page about culinary terms. We should really focus on what is different between New Mexican and Mexican food, or their variations. If there's something that New Mexican and Mexican cuisine do almost entirely similar, then that should be noted in the text. Anything that's entirely the same, should be dropped. Maybe change the title to "List of unique New Mexico culinary terms" or "Variation of New Mexico culinary terms", something that gives a better idea of the variation of New Mexican food, rather than focusing on it as a singular stand-alone sort of cuisine. --Puellanivis (talk) 08:21, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Clarity needed, re: "new Mexican cuisine" and "New Mexican cuisine"

The opening of this article does not sufficiently clarify that it is about cuisine from New Mexico, the state in the U.S.A. To outsiders in this debate, like me, it's easy to think it is about "new" Mexican cuisine, particularly since it talks only about the country Mexico initially, and about influences from American cuisine, which could easily mean that it's about new developments _in Mexico_ in the cuisine native to that country.

I have no axe to grind about whether there is such a thing as "New Mexico cuisine" (which is perhaps a better name for the article?) but simply found the article confusing. Indeed it was only by looking at this discussion page that I convinced myself it was about cuisine from the U.S. state. Strangelights (talk) 18:11, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Cleaning up "List of New Mexican culinary terms"

I didn't read everybody's comments in detail, but... I grew up as a Mexican-American in Texas. We used practically all of the terms that you list in your "List of New Mexican culinary terms," section. If they are going to be separate, at least ad the proper ones to the Tex-Mex section. That way, those that don't really know, will. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.185.234.62 (talk) 07:11, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Tangenting this header. I intend to trim the "List of New Mexican culinary terms" to terms that are unique to New Mexican cuisine, or distinct from Mexican cuisine. So, as an example, "Albóndigas" will go, as it's a generic term covered in Mexican cuisine, but "Caldillo" will stay. "Burrito" and "Enchilada" will be trimmed to indicate what is different between it and the rest of Mexican/Tex-Mex cuisine. --Puellanivis (talk) 03:03, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

I expect this will cause minor feuding among disputed concepts of New Mexican cuisine, but in the end will lead toward a great deal more clarity. In searching for authoritative online references of the cuisine of New Mexico, I've experienced the difficulty of oral tradition—you can hear all about it from thousands of New Mexicans (and New Mexican expatriates who miss the distinct flavors) who can talk for hours of the differences between the cuisines of New Mexico and Mexico, but few have written about them comprehensively. Spril4 (talk) 14:29, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Agreeing with the first unsigned comment in this section, i.e., most of that list applies to any Mexican-derived cuisine, Spanish cuisine, even Italian. I mean, come on, oregano??? The list is way too long and nowhere near focused on New Mexican cuisine. What is unique to New Mexican cuisine? That's it. Zlama (talk) 07:34, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Wait so ...

... what exactly is the neutrality dispute here?Synchronism (talk) 03:00, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

A lot of people don't understand the difference between New Mexican cuisine and tex-mex, or mexican cuisine. They use a lot of the same terms, but New Mexicans make them different enough to be significant. This homophony however leads many people to equivocate the terms, and become confused as to the neutrality of "wtf do you have enchilada listed here? they're the same as any other enchilada right?" Of course, the proper response is, "every time I start making NM enchiladas the people around me freak out wondering what the hell I'm doing." It's basically some people refusing to recognize a minority cuisine... --Puellanivis (talk) 05:11, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

What you're describing is not a neutrality dispute, so I will remove that tag. There was a "criticism" section that was unsourced and POV, and I removed. --JohnnyB256 (talk) 19:29, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I took off the neutrality tag and then put it back, after I read the article carefully and realized that it is not neutral. The neutrality issue stems from the fact that this article is not encyclopedic and consists in large measure of editor opinions. In addition to that, this is not sourced. The latter is the main problem with the article and is the source of the lack of neutrality. In addition to neutrality and lack of sourcing, most of the article is a list of New Mexican food terminology. New Mexican cuisine is an important and distinctive cuisine, and it certainly deserves a better article than this one. --JohnnyB256 (talk) 19:38, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Well there are two different accounts given above. I think the main problem is that it is basically unsourced. A scholar.google search shows some possible sources, I'm sure there are books that treat the subject without too much enthusiasm.

Are there other regional cuisine articles that are considered well written, because I don't think this article should be rated B-class? Are there any egregiously non-neutral passages in this article, because it's composed of just a short intro and a list? Or is there really no useful text in the article or the list part?Synchronism (talk) 20:18, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Tex-Mex cuisine is considered a start class article and it does have sources. I think the article should be trimmed back to a stub.Synchronism (talk) 20:37, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree about the stubbing and the class. I'm going to change to start. --JohnnyB256 (talk) 16:39, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Enough: Fusion and Peace. Think Christmas!!

What a heated talk. I cannot believe the string of discussion about New Mexican food... most of which I do not have time to read nor patience to read in detail. All make good points and all show the love of a cuisine that is often missed by those who have a hard time getting it every day. Bottom line is that article is fairly correct but the discussion is extreme. New Mexican food is by its own nature of invention the coming together of a blend/fusion of it's influences... from the white man to the native American to the Mexican. Over time, there have also been outside influences which have spilled over and cannot not always be defined as New Mexican (ie, fajitas, fish tacos, cilantro.. and BTW New Mexican food if not tex-mex).

The staple, we can all agree is the chile, red or green, and it better be spicy. Growing up, the "joke" when describing our version of (New) Mexican food is "pain is a flavor". If you put the egg on top on your enchiladas then you know your are having a New Mexican dish, as other types of Mexican food would find that quite odd. I am particularly fond of my Heuvos Rancheros served with Navajo Fry Bread and the spiciest red chile as this is the fusion of the cultures that defines New Mexican food and its fusion of 3 cultures (I will not go into detail on how fry bread came about but it has the influence of the white man in its development).

Staple foods are always staple foods: Chile (red or green or both, but with good hot spice and flavor), enchiladas with a fried egg on top, sopaipillas that look like little pillows, rice and beans (type tends to vary and has many influences since these are staples with many cultures. There are many Mexican dishes (enchiladas, tacos, tostadas, salsa etc), but what makes NEW Mexican CUISINE is the spicy and flavorful red or green chile. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dastormy (talk • contribs) 04:37, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Authentic?

To call one chef’s interpretation of one cooking style ‘authentic’ is absurd beyond belief. Anyone who would do so is not a very accomplished chef. To change a certain style slightly and then call it some other authentic style is even more absurd. To say one chef’s interpretation of a region is ‘authentic’ would be implying that every chef in that region prepares the dish exactly the same. See the absurdity yet? Bermudacat (talk) 05:29, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Biased is justified

As a native of New Mexico, I'm in a good position to offer perspective on this topic. There are distinctions that set New Mexico cuisine apart from any other. New Mexico is a "melting pot" of divergent cultural influences. Mexican, Spanish, Native American, Navajo, Pueblo, Anasazi, Apache, Hopi, Zuni, French, and New World American have contributed to a unique mix of creativity not found anywhere else in the world. Defining characteristics of local culinary art are varied, but specific. New Mexico chile is as highly prized as the wines of the California Wine Country. Similarly based on decades of indigenous horticulture and secretive agriculture, the accepted regional spelling of this cultivated poblano pepper/chili is "chile". Another is the functional re-assignment of a fried bread dessert, known in Mexico as "biscochito" and "buñuelo". Labeled "sopaipilla", it is also a fried bread, and duplicates the popularity of Navajo fried bread. It is traditionally served in restaurants before the main entree with a generous dispenser of honey. As a new restaurant visitor, the best way to embarrass parents was to rip off a corner of a sopaipilla and load it up with honey so that it exploded when eaten. Sopaipillas are often mistaken for their Mexican counterparts by those not familiar with local cuisine, who cause confusion by attempting to order them after, not before, the meal, or the other way around. Yet another is the simple blue corn enchilada, outrageously good, and endlessly popular at the forever touristy Shed Restaurant in Santa Fe. It is actually an original recipe from Josie, who ran a small and wildly popular locals restaurant. She's long forgotten, but aggressively copied. Josie also broke the rules and added Baba au Rhum for dessert. French in origin, it was influenced by local French business owners of the early 1950's. It is currently labeled "mocha cake" at the Shed, which indicates the level of nouveau creativity New Mexico will go to re-inventing regional creations, as well as everyone else's. The most unglamorous invention is the beyond-tasty green-chile-and-cheese grilled-cheese sandwich, an over-the-top favorite among University of New Mexico students, who can't find anything else to eat within walking distance at any hour of the night. New Mexico State University Agricultural Extension Division published a classic and very authentic cookbook on New Mexico Cuisine decades ago (currently out of print), which stands as a written testament to New Mexico's ability to create its cuisine, as well as its license plates, which rightfully clarify "New Mexico, USA". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sandiapeak (talk • contribs) 07:25, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

I would agree that identifying the melting pot, and asserting that the resulting cuisine is "unique," hardly represents bias. "Unique" is an adjective that can be applied non-prejudicially to all manner of cuisines; on one level, any cuisine is "unique," in ways that allow one to define the cuisine. It's only when one begins to assert that a cuisine is "better" (or more interesting, more famous, etc.) than other cuisines that the NPOV issue arises. So can we get rid of the NPOV banner? I think it's time. -- Bill-on-the-Hill (talk) 20:47, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Gazpacho

As an Andaluz living in New Mexico, it's hilarious that gazpacho is listed in this list of food. Gazpacho is from Arabic origin in Andalucía. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.123.242.201 (talk) 18:33, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

New Mexico Chile

This is just a chile grown within the state of New Mexico. Yes, they are a few specific varieties, but those seeds/plants are available to be elsewhere. They are not uniquely grown in New Mexico. Yes, they were developed in New Mexico, but how about naming the varieties, where they were developed and saying how their use might be different in New Mexican cuisine.

I've seen many folks confused by this term -- New Mexico chile -- thinking it was a special chili powder blend, i.e., herbs and spices, not just ground chiles, unique to New Mexico. In the interest of imparting information, please clarify these aspect of the article. Zlama (talk) 07:43, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

while true, we also basically idolize Chile to the point where some people would have withdrawal if they had no Chile. It's more of a cultural phenomenon then anything, plus there is just something... Different about Hatch. I think they have magicians or something down there, but it sure doesn't taste like regular chile. 24.116.90.157 (talk) 01:22, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

New Mexico Chili = Guajillo chili

This chili is called guajillo chili in Mexican cuisine. In fact, it is one of many pasilla chilies that are used in Mexican gastronomy. If New Mexican cuisine is anything, it is a different variety of Mexican food. In Tamaulipas and part of Veracruz, for example, the deep fried visceral parts of a cow are sold as "chicharrón de res." In northern Mexico, "barbacoa" is made of beef. In central Mexico, it is made of slow cooked goat. I do get how "New Mexican" cuisine is different from "Tex-Mex," though; however, as a Mexican, I would say that New Mexican cuisine is actually a lot closer to real Mexican than Tex-Mex is. I think this deliberate demarcation stems from the myths created after the Mexican-American war by New Mexicans who suffered the anti-Mexican sentiments first handedly and decided to create a new mythology where they were Spanish-American, rather than Mexican. But, if historiography is ever going to set the record straight, then it should start by rectifying these fallacies. Just like New Mexico’s westernized founding stems from the Spanish colonial period, so does that of all of Latin America, and Latin Americans are not referred to as Spanish. New Mexico stopped being a territory of Mexico, after Mexico declared its independence from Spain; so, technically, irrespective of Juan de Oñate’s provenance, New Mexico, like other states of Mexico with a colonial past, was still a Mexican territory. And it’s ancestors, like the ancestors of many people who inhabit Latin America, may have been of Spanish ancestry, but those who settled there, were Mexican citizens before they became U.S. citizens. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 140.147.236.194 (talk) 19:06, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually, no. New Mexico has been here for over one hundred years before Mexico even had one white village. The Spanish passed THROUGH Mexico, not stopping, and settled in new mexico. Years later they went back to Mexico. By that extent you could say that Mexican food is a spin off of new Mexican food. While it might not have been called New Mexico at the time, we were here first. As I ask everyone I correct, please do research before you state false facts on a respectable website. 24.116.90.157 (talk) 01:19, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

New Mexican cuisine?

Shouldn't it be Cuinise of New Mexico? The title is weird and confusing. Someone might think it is an article about a new form of Mexican cuisine. It is Cuisine of Kentucky not Kentuckian cuisine. --KAVEBEAR (talk) 04:26, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Just no

This article is a total bastardization, for lack of a better word, of any kind of definition of cultural cuisine. It seems to pretend that the use of a different kind of chile (A chile that, by the way, is used in most of Mexico for the same purposes.) from the one used in Mexico city makes it a whole different type of cuisine and blatantly ignores that the exact same food has been always eaten in the whole Aridoamercia side of Mexico, that is Sonora, Sinaloa, Chihuahua, Durango,Tamaulipas, Las Bajas Californias, etc.

If anything it should be named Arido-American Cuisine, this article tries to tie the customs of a really big and politically/culturally complex region to the pride of a state. that is just wrong. There were Native Americans this side of the river too and there is heritage from them in Mexico too for god's sake, this article seems to pretend there is a unique mix in that state and attributes a lot of Mexican customs to it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.149.168.194 (talk) 08:23, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Chill out man. There are very distinct differences in new Mexican food. First off, we came from the Spanish, who passed through America before Mexicans were even invented. Plus, we were so isolated because of the mountians, that our food sort of did evolve differently. And, we got hatch green chile. That might be the biggest factor 24.116.90.157 (talk) 01:11, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

Dubious claim needs to be cited or removed

I encountered the statement "Within New Mexico, green chile is a popular ingredient in everything from enchiladas and burritos to cheeseburgers, french fries, bagels, and pizzas, and is added to the standard menu of many national American food chains", which begs for a citation from a reliable source. National food chains (whether fast food like McDonald's or KFC, or traditional restaurants such as The Olive Garden or TGI Friday's work to ensure a uniform menu exists everywhere, so that it doesn't matter whether you are in Seattle, Miami, Boston, San Diego, Chicago, or Albuquerque, the choices are uniform and the food will taste the same in all locations. If a cite can be found to substantiate the claim that New Mexican locations of national restaurants add chiles to their regular menu, please supply it. Otherwise, I will remove this portion of the statement in a week or so. Horologium (talk) 12:59, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't know where you got this notion, but it's very easily proven incorrect. McDonald's offers a green chile cheeseburger and hamburger in most of New Mexico (though it does not in Texas), and Sonic sells green chile cheese tots (where the New Mexican green chile replaces the typical Texas Chili offering). Another example would be Domino's providing green chile as a topping on their pizza, easily verifiable by ordering online with a New Mexican zipcode. I do not understand those of you that obviously have not spent any appreciable amount of time in the state representing yourself as regional food authorities. For that matter, regional items making an appearance on national chain menus are a common occurrence. 173.185.94.187 (talk) 09:50, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

green chili avaliable outside New Mexico

"In the early twenty-first century, green chile also become increasingly available outside of New Mexico."

Please, oh, please! A green chile is just one that hasn't ripened. Green chiles, the pods, have been available all over the world for as long as the plants have been cultivated. Green chile, the sauce and meat/beans stuff, has been available in Mexico and the Southwest of the United States, AT LEAST, for a very long time. So, anyway you interpret it, the above quoted statement is erroneous. I removed it as, not only is it wrong, but it is of no significance (even were it true). Zlama (talk) 11:14, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

It is true. Green Chile is a specific variant of chile. While other chiles do change green before ripening, green Chile is a very different BIOLOGICAL variant, thanks to our higher elevation. I would expect you to do some research before you start blabbing your mouth off on a respectable website. 24.116.90.157 (talk) 01:15, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

Chile and other ingredients

The "Chile and other ingredients" section of the article has been expanded with what appears to be original research and also includes material better suited for a cookbook, which Wikipedia is not. The section needs citations to support its statements and also editing to remove the cookbook/recipe portions. Feel free to edit and/or discuss here. Geoff | ^{Who, me?} 15:20, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

I did a bit of an overhauling pass. Still needs more and better sourcing, but the OR, PoV, and how-to material has been removed. I also clarified various entries, did {{lang|es}} markup, moved content to more logical places in the article, compressed out redundancy, normalized the citations and dates to a single style, made various markup and style corrections, did a bunch of copyediting and link cleanup, and added a few notes (e.g. there weren't entries on basics like corn (maize) and cumin, FFS!). This is about 10% of the cleanup this needs, but most of the material is now sourceable even if not yet sourced, and that's good enough for WP:V purposes for the short term.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:35, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Terrific. I've started adding cites, replacing dead links with fresh, etc. I'll work on tightening the language, as well. Cheers! Geoff | ^{Who, me?} 15:35, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Shellfish?

The "fish" statement in the New_Mexican_cuisine#Popular_foods_and_dishes section refers to the use by Native Americans of shellfish. Historically, that is clearly recorded for the peoples living near the ocean and large bodies of freshwater from which freshwater shellfish were harvested, but for New Mexico? Not so much, I think. But I'm interested in sources which support this statement, if there are any to be found. Geoff | ^{Who, me?} 17:31, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

Links to related cuisines

I can see how some of the links that were removed in this edit, such as the link to cuisine, weren't necessary, but I think it's helpful to keep links to all related cuisines mentioned in the article. Are there links to all of them elsewhere in the article, and if not, should the links be restored? If not, why not? I thought Wikipedia's bias was toward linking almost everything. What constitutes overlinking in an encyclopedia article, other than linking every instance of an already-linked term? Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:05, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

Added images and a little clean up

Hello all, I have added a few images to the article, swapped out two images (the one of ristras, and the horno image), and have begun doing some clean up. I mostly intend to work on the "Foods & dishes" section to alphabetize and add citations. If anyone objects to the new images just let me know. I would also like to add a new image of NM dried red chiles if that is ok, I think I will be able to find something a bit more exciting. Netherzone (talk) 23:09, 8 November 2020 (UTC)