Afro-Mexican Cuisine: Black Eyed Peas in Guanajuato
In the market in Silao, Mexico, the very geographic center of Mexico, ten miles south of the the city of Guanajuato in the State of Guanajuato, the semilleros (seed shops) sell black eyed peas (Vigna unguicalata) along with all the usual Mexican beans. They call them veronicas.
You can see them in the sack at the back. When you ask the vendors how they cook them, they indicate that they “guisar” them, that is they put them in stews as they would habas or garbanzos. They do not eat them alone and simply boiled as they would the huge variety of Mexican beans. This makes sense because all three are Old World not New World legumes. It’s a boon to me because my husband loves black-eyed peas and I can nip down and get a supply from time to time.
But this leaves the bigger puzzle. To see black eyed peas in Mexico is, to put it mildly, odd. You simply don’t run across blackeyed peas in markets in Central Mexico.
But the hypothesis that I have to consider is that these are a legacy of the African heritage in Guanajuato. As I’m sure all readers know, blackeyed peas have been closely associated with African cooking.
And in the sixteenth century–yes, that early–Guanajuato had a substantial African population that was described as hailing being Angolan, Congan, Biafran, Biafaran, Baran and Araran, that is from the River Niger basin and Angola. They were mainly slaves though cross-marriage, particularly with indigenous, began almost immediately.
Guanajuato in the sixteenth century was an immigrant community with no large settled indigenous community. Apart from Africans, it consisted of Spaniards, particularly Basques and Castellanos, migrant indigenous particularly nahuas, michoacanos, otomis, and chichimecas, Portuguese (possibly crypto jews), and French.
According to a document that appears to date from the 1580s, in the mining area of Guanajuato there were 400 Spanish, 500 horses, 800 slaves (presumably African) and 800 mules.
Silao was where the runaway slaves took refuge, seeking out broken country to the south of the town.
If there’s anything to this, it suggests that looking for traces of African foods in Mexico is going to be a case of looking for tiny little clues.
in greek cooking, black-eyed beans (we dont call them peas) are used a lot – we have them about once a month as a main meal (stewed in tomato sauce)
Thanks so much for that information, Maria. I have to try this as a variant for my husband. I don’t have the impression they are used much in Spanish cooking but I may be wrong.
“If there’s anything to this, it suggests that looking for traces of African foods in Mexico is going to be a case of looking for tiny little clues.”
What about cooking foods in banana leaves? I recall there was a discussion on Book of Rai about making little parcels/packets of food wrapped in banana leaves. This technique was found in West Africa and the Carribean.
Well, tamales in the hot wet regions are certainly cooked in banana leaves. So perhaps a nice overlap there with the indigenous tradition. I’ll keep my eyes open.
My mother-in-law. from Sonora and Sinaloa, called them yorimunis which I believe is a local indigenous word. She really liked them cooked them often.
Interesting Alan. The northwest coast area. How did she cook them? I also had a note from someone reminding me that there was a second African, or rather African American migration to Mexico following Reconstruction, escaping conditions in the south.
Anyway when I get back to Guanajuato (and my library) I have to check to see if I have any cookbooks with yorimunis. It’s a new word to me.
Eating black eyed peas is pretty widespread in Spain now and they were obviously consumed a lot throughout Europe before the new world beans became eastablised. “The Bean Eater” by Annibale Carracci shows an example of this.
The bean that would scream “Africa” to me is the Pigeon Pea or gunga/congo/etc.
Yes, that’s true. I have never come across pigeon peas in Mexico. And the fact that in the US they have become, rightly or wrongly, associated with African Americans prompted me to think there might be a similar connection in Mexico. May be not. But it is funny that they are not generally eaten (see following comment on Alan Hicks).
She cooked the black eyed peas in a beef broth with bones and beef, plenty of onions with a little tomato and fresh cilantro sprinkled when served.
I believe yorimuni is a yaqui word. They are not common in Sinaloa but in Sonora they are common. Here is a link I found for a recipe for yorimuni tamales
http://www.sonora.gob.mx/portal/Runscript.asp?p=ASP\pg383.asp
Ah ha, sounds great. And I was interested by the reference to the tamales.
But here’s a question. Dodging references to the hip hop group called the Blackeyed Peas, I found this comment on Wikipedia.
“The black-eyed pea, also called black-eyed bean, is a subspecies of the cowpea, grown around the world for its medium-sized edible bean. The bean mutates easily, giving rise to a number of varieties. The common commercial one is called the California Blackeye; it is pale-colored with a prominent black spot. The currently accepted botanical name is Vigna unguiculata subsp. unguiculata, although previously it was classified in the genus Phaseolus. Vigna unguiculata subsp. dekindtiana is the wild relative and Vigna unguiculata subsp. sesquipedalis is the related asparagus bean. Other beans of somewhat similar appearance, such as the “frijol ojo de cabra” (“goat’s eye bean”) of Northern Mexico, are sometimes incorrectly called “black-eyed peas” and vice versa.”
So I wonder if these could be the pulses your mother in law uses.
I see the link didn’t work. If it still doesn’t work google yorimunis and it comes up
http://www.sonora.gob.mx/portal/Runscript.asp?p=ASP\pg383.asp
Thanks Alan. Googling is the way to go.
I can buy black-eyed peas in La Paz, Bolivia but they are completely absent from the Yungas region, which is the center of African settlement in Bolivia
Welcome to the blog and thanks for the comment, Brooke. I wonder where the La Paz black-eyed peas come from? Do you have any links to or comments on Afro-Bolivian food? There seems a good bit of interest in the topic of African food in Latin America, so little written about except for Brazil.
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I found this post by coincidence… I hope you don’t mind my interjection.
I think the Africa theory is off base in this region of Mexico. Both of my parents are from the highlands of Jalisco where Black Eye Peas are also consumed… but for various reasons.
The deeply rooted historical reason is that many “Spanish” families that settled the area in the 18th century are really Portugese from ancient Lusitania as well as Extremadura. You will find a proliferation of last names such as Reynoso & Fonseca etc., By the 18th century.. Black Eyed Peas would have very much been part of their culinary traditions in Iberia.
A more recent clue comes from my own family oral history. Prior to the Green Revolution in Mexico during the 1960’s… the typical Mexican rural family ate a much greater variety of beans… usually planting about 5 varieties of which Frijol Carita a Vulgaris which looks like Black Eyed Peas was a prominent bean in the area. However as Green Revolution farming took root the Mexican Pinto proved to be the highest yield / lowest cost bean and consumption became a little more monoculture.
Nonetheless.. most families still longingly idolize & occassional splurge for the special beans of the past… Flor de Mayo, Bayo, Pinquitos etc., As Mexican migrants from Jalisco first made their way to the Southeast U.S. in the 1980’s they encountered the Black Eye Pea, found that it was relatively cheap and started using it as Frijol Carita. Now with NAFTA, Mexico has been flooded with cheap, subsidized US beans and my guess is that the Black Eye Pea is considered a cheap substitute for Frijol Carita or in Guanajuato lingo.. Veronicas (on occassion also referred to as Judias)
In respnse to eatnopales,you should do even more research and you will realize who the spanish and the portugese had riding along with them (Africans).also i know that like every other part of the globe blacks are looked down on and around both verecruiz and costa chica there are afro mexicans who sadly lost their identity and are ashamed of the beautiful color of their skin.peace.
Eric wEst you are talking to a man who proudly promotes the celebration of Mexico’s 3ra Raiz / 3rd Root. In fact.. see this video I posted on You Tube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUlYCsEO2UY
Yes… Mexico has its Black African roots… but historically there has not been a significant cultural presence in the Central Highlands. The recent Mexican Genome project has confirmed this.. and has done a great job of tracking African genes in Mexico for example… you will find a good proportion of African genes in Uruapan, Michoacan and the coasts of Jalisco… and surprising to many even in Sinaloa.
However the highlands of Jalisco & the Bajio whether in Guanajuato or Queretaro… African genes have been notoriously absent.
What you WILL find in these areas is the proportion of “Spaniards” or “Criollos” who have Portugese last names and are likely of Crypto-Jewish ancestry is higher than in other parts of Mexico… and that is why I think Black Eye peas are more likely attributable to Portugese. Note, Black Eye Peas are interestingly sometimes referred to as Judias as well.
Hi Eat Nopales, It is still going to take me a while to get to these, issues that really fascinate me. But thanks for all the informed and provocative questions.
Just about any country in the west has it’s African influence. Mexico has one of the least African influence. I am Mexican and many white people probably have more black than I, if I have any. Black peas? big deal.
if you knew your history you would have that ignorant comment mexico wasn’t exempt from black people.and they’re still,not even you.when the americas was invaded there was no such thing as pure spanish or portugese.black people ruled over southern europe over 800 years.all this talk about jews and this and that type of spainard is psycho talk and folks living a lie.honey save yourself look up black-mexican google it please.blackeyed peas as well as coffee and hot peppers,chickens,beef,and so many other crops and spices came from no other than the Mother Land.now chew on that my dear.
Dear Sheala, since you are dearing me, civility prompts me to post your comment. It also means that I suggest that if you want to have your comment considered, you are also civil. OK?
Hi Rachel
I came to your site by accident and found the discussion both fascinating and disturbing.
Black eyed peas are found in Afro Caribbean, Southern United States “soul” food and West African cuisine.
Peas both black eyed and pigeon or gungo peas were according to some of the articles I have read on food served on slave ships, among the foods given to enslaved Africans.
In the English speaking Caribbean, pigeon or gungo peas are found in many ‘traditional ‘ dishes.
In Barbados black eyed peas are eaten with rice. The peas are boiled first and then the raw rice is added to the peas along with seasonings. The dish is done when the rice is finished. I am told that in the past, people ate a black eye peas cou cou or a blackeyed peas mash. I have never eaten or even seen it myself and it maybe one of the many dishes in our culture that have become extinct.
The Caribbean and New world is truly a melting pot and sometimes similar traditions come together and it is difficult to unravel origins.
Hi sunspotteacher, welcome to my site. Do I take it you are in Barbados? I would love to have contact with someone in that part of the world. Thanks for the thoughtful comments.
Hi Rachel!
Picking this up two years after the fact, I think I have some interesting info. The yorimuni bean of Sonora is Vigna unguicalata. Yorimuni is a Yaqui word roughly meaning “white man’s bean” (yori is often said to mean simply ‘foreigner’ or ‘white man’, but its meanings point closer to a conquering foreigner to whom money must be paid, as well as traitor…that is, NOT a foreigner of African origin). It likely came over on the Manila-Acapulco galleons. I would dispute calling it an “African” food, though it originated there so many centuries ago. It’s very common in India and found widely in the Philippines. It may have found popularity in Sonora (and to some degree Sinaloa) because it thrives in hot and dry weather, unlike many other beans. I’m guessing its presence in Guanajuato (and elsewhere in the Republic) is due to it being a good crop in other areas with similar climate, migrating populations that like it, and all the other reasons that crops wander. Thanks!
Thanks Nils. Fascinating about the Sonoran bean. And I agree Vigna unguiculata is much more widely distributed than just Africa. I assumed an African connection because in the southern US it is very strongly associated with African Americans, rightly or wrongly. But I’m not sure why you want to opt for an Asian origin. Why could it not have come via Europe (though I have to admit to being a bit vague as to when it got to Europe). It’s certainly widespread now in southern Europe and probably north Africa too.
It may be impossible to pin down the Guanajuato connection. It may be just accident that it is commonly grown and eaten in central Guanajuato, more so than in many other parts of Mexico. I am still struck, though, by the fact that this is an area where there were a lot of escaped slaves. The problem is to find any kind of hard evidence.
I appreciate the feedback Janet. This is all part of a larger project in which I am trying to make sense of which techniques, not just which plants, crossed the Atlantic in the 16th and 17th centuries. It’s really hard to get data so every little helps.
Hi again Rachel,
Advance apologies for the ramble…
I should have said I thought maybe it came via the galleons “first”. I’m sure they came to the Americas from both sides. But they were growing/eating cowpeas in the Philippines pre-Conquest, and from what I can find, the earliest mention of them on these shores is Jamaica in 1675, more than 100 years after the galleons started (a major purpose of the galleons, of course, being to bring countless food items from Asia to Europe via Mexico). (I have some resources that provide a bit of detail of what each galleon carried, I’ll look through it for a mention & date!)
With Sinaloa and Sonora being on the west coast and with close ties to the galleons, and the native people calling them, essentially, ‘white man’s bean’, i thought the connection would be to the galleons rather than people of African origin living there. But as I think about it, “yorimuni” likely just refers to ‘not ours’ – since all other beans (Phaseolus) were indigenous.
I was just in Chiapas, where they also have them, and call them (among other things) (and again with the ‘not ours’ concept) “frijol de Castilla” (also what they’re called in parts of South America, I believe), which suggests an Atlantic connection.
It turns out they’re also popular in Yucatán and Campeche, where they go by the Mayan word (or maybe a kinda Mayan/Spanish hybrid word?) “xpelón,” (they have two varieties, both cowpeas but not exactly what we know as black-eyed peas) and are favored by poorer people. I suppose them going by a Mayan(ish) word could suggest very early consumption.
With the African presence in Mexico so understudied & downplayed (by all involved cultures/countries!), and as you say, they were in Mex from the 16th century, I wouldn’t be surprised if cowpeas came with them quite early, and the fact that ‘official black-eyed pea documentation’ starts with late 17th-century Caribbean, we could just chalk up to a lack of research into the trade and practices of Africans in Mexico in the 16th century.
(Along those lines, there’s the broader issue of many of the servants/slaves brought on the galleons being ‘negritos’, a native population in the Philippines that, physically if not genetically, closely resemble African pygmies, and so we can assume that some part of the ‘African’ presence or bloodline in Mexico — as you highlight, it’s not just in Guerrero & Veracruz! — is actually negrito.
Interesting stuff! -Nils
Nils, I have to incorporate your comments in a longer post. Wait for it.
Update to my last ramble, based on some of my galleon research and some casual layperson assumptions!
An inventory from an Acapulco-bound Manila galleon in 1600 had large quantities of “beans and legumes” aboard.
Besides foods being exported, it’s documented that the Acapulco-bound galleons had foods to feed the Asian crew, who didn’t like Spanish foods.
Despite the galleons also being called “nao de china”, Filipinos referred to as “Chinese” (sometimes even to this day, in Mexico), etc. it’s important to note that the Asian crew (and some passengers/slaves) were Filipino, with different culinary practices. One of those being that, unlike elsewhere in Asia, soybeans (which one historian assumed were the ‘beans’ aboard the Mex-bound ships) were NOT commonly used for food/sauces in the Philippines, while cowpeas were.
So, as early as 1600, on Acapulco-bound ships from the Philippines, there would have been beans and legumes that were not garbanzos and favas (Spanish diet, documented as being the beans on Mex-bound ships from Spain), not Phaseolus (those were brought to the Philippines, not vice versa), and not soybeans (not in the Filipino diet, not of large exportation value). Cowpeas, perhaps?!
We also know that many of the Asian crew were recruited to remain in Mexico to cultivate coconut plantations, and also many simply escaped, so fair to assume they would have carried some of those foods with them (esp something so portable and easily propagated as beans/legumes).
Again, they certainly came on Atlantic slave ships as well, though I have to imagine that being a slower process of dissemination, since unlike free Asians on the Manila galleons, it’s not as if slaves got to bring anything, or were able to farm freely upon arrival.
Apologies for my layperson-ness & complete lack of a history background!
Nils
I came across your article while researching the bean traditionally eaten by the indigenous Yumano tribes of northern Baja California, who still call it “frijol silvestre”, the wild bean. It is sold in Tijuana street markets as “frijol sonorense”, the Sonoran bean. This is the tepary (Phaseolus acutifolius), which our tribes evidently brought with them in their migration from what is now southwestern Arizona.
It seems settled among botanists that the New World tepary is not the Old World black-eyed pea. The tepary appears to have originated in central Mexico some ten thousand years ago, but it quickly settled in to the Sonoran Desert because of its resistance to drought. The tepary is found in a range of colors that vary with the color of the soil it grows in; it is also found in spotted varieties like small versions of the black-eyed pea.
The tepary has many synonyms, owing to the linguistic variety in its region and to people like me who enjoy offering etymologies using languages we don’t understand. Andrés Lionnet does know a little about these languages: in his book “Un Idioma extinto de Sonora: el eudeve” (UNAM 1986), he shows the Yaqui term, “yorimuni”, as having derived from the Eudeve term “mún”. (The Eudeve were related to the Ópata and lived immediately northeast of the Yaqui.) “Tépari” is what the people on the border of Sonora and Arizona call the bean and so that name has entered into English; variants include “himustépar”, “pawi”, and “pavi”, all of which derive either from Pápago or Ópata. Farther south, it is known as “xmayum” (Campeche), “escomite” (Chiapas), “frijol piñuelero” (Costa Rica), and “garbancillo volando”. According to the FAO, French-speaking Africa knows the tepary as the “haricot riz” (rice bean) and the “haricot Sudan”.
The dispersal of the tepary poses questions similar to your study of the black-eyed pea: How did it get *there* of all places? In the case of Vigna unguicalata it would be interesting to compare the areas of the New World where African slavery was most concentrated to see which make use of black-eyed peas and which do not. In particular, coastal Veracruz and the Costa Chica near Acapulco; the Garifuna people of Costa Rica; the islands of Hispaniola, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and possibly Jamaica and Barbados; along the shoulders of South America, especially coastal Peru and coastal Venezuela; the state of Bahia in Brazil; and most interesting of all, Suriname, where the Maroon villages are some of the oldest continuous settlements in the entire continent.
One important difference between the dispersal of the tepary and the dispersal of the black-eyed pea is that the tepary travelled with nomads, people who habitually packed their bags, while the black-eyed pea managed to travel with people who were snatched up in slaver raids. You have an interesting story ahead of you … just imagine Kunta Kinte texting to his friends list “honkies landed taking us in boats grab all BEP and okra you can”.
It could be that Africans directly brought cowpeas to this region of Mexico – however…
I know that blackeyed peas (I will call them cowpeas as not all have black eyes) are commonly grown by native peoples in the Southwest US, and most likely these were introduced by the Spanish, not Africans. There are really old cultivars grown there that must have been selected for generations – likely before contact with US southerners. I also know they are used in Italian cuisine (as dry beans, but also as green beans like yard-long beans) – and so I imagine in Spanish cuisine. In these cases they could easily have been brought in by the Moors (via other trade with African peoples further south) – or back from travels by Portuguese (who were a big presence in Africa and spread many foods and spices around), Spanish, or other sailors.
Then, yes, the relatives of cowpeas – the yard long beans (same species, different subspecies) are used extensively in Asia. I’m not sure about origins here, but they are still thought to have originated in Africa… But some of the cultivars sort of bridge the gap between the yard longs and blackeyed peas – and can be used either as dried beans or as a green bean. So they could have moved this way as well.
These are just suppositions, and possibilities – actual research could be done!
Thanks so much for adding to this long-standing discussion. I couldn’t agree more that cowpeas could have arrived from several different directions. You might be interested in this second blog I did on cowpeas in Mexico with contributions from several readers.
And I am not sure why you think that their presence in the Southwest US means they must have come with Spanish, not Africans. Africans were arriving in Mexico and moving (or being moved) north contemporaneously with the Spanish. But definitely–actual research could be done. Wish I had the means to do it.
Rachel thanks for this…. I’m an African in Mexico City and can’t find black eyed beans anywhere…. I find it so odd because Before I came here I thought Mexico would have a huge variety of beans. There just HAS to be one store in enormous Mexico City that carries them…. Honestly I would travel to Guanajuato just to buy these… They are literally the only kind of beans I cook at home… They’re a staple… If you know any places in or near Mexico City that carries them let me know
Hi Mashie, I think your best bet is to go to the markets and ask for “veronicas.” That’s what they tend to be called in Mexico City. I have not seen them in stores in Mexico City, only in markets (tianguises). Where are you from in Africa? It’s a very big place.
Hi Rachel, very interesting article. I loved the photos. Thank you very much for publishing them.
About the black eyed peas, I can tell you that it arrived to the American continent with the Spaniards (the origin of the plant may be African but its cultivation was spread all over the Mediterranean Sea). This type of bean was the only one that existed in Europe before the discovery and was consumed by both Greeks and Romans. In the Iberian Peninsula, although they were consumed, they were not very appreciated as other types of legumes such as chickpeas or lentils were preferred.
It is curious that after the discovery of America, the black eyed peas was completely displaced by the American bean in Spain (nowadays the consumption of the black eyed peas is minimal), however it seems that in America it is a food that enjoys a certain prestige.
What we are absolutely certain was introduced by someone from Africa is wheat. Juan Garrido, a black conquistador who fought alongside Hernán Cortés, was the first person to grow wheat on the continent. He carried a few seeds that germinated.
So glad you enjoyed it. Did you also see this follow up link? It addresses some of the questions you raised.