Achiote paste
A Yucatecan recado rojo is a brick-red seasoning paste built on annatto seed, garlic and sour orange. This measured home version shows one route into a much wider family of market and household recados.
Traditional method
Smooth avocado sauce
Salsa de guacamole · Avocado sauce · Smooth guacamole
A pourable sauce of ripe avocado, lime, chile, herbs and onion, blended or mashed to a smooth body. It is an avocado sauce, not every green taquería sauce.
Avocado sauce before it was a dip
The name guacamole comes from the Nahuatl āhuacamōlli, which combines āhuacatl, avocado, and mōlli, sauce. Wikipedia translates the name as avocado sauce, and that is the best way to read the dish: a sauce of avocado, not a dip that happens to be made of avocado. Ripe avocado and salt are mashed in a molcajete, and lime, onion, chile and cilantro are the usual additions.
A smooth version is a sauce to be poured or spooned rather than scooped, and the same base is used for that. The sources read describe the traditional mash, not the smooth finish, so the blending step below is a choice the cook makes rather than a documented form.
Sources for this section
What the avocado brings
Avocado supplies the body of the sauce. The salt and lime season its mild flavour. The sources read note that avocado cultivation is far older than the sauce: seeds found in the Tehuacán Valley are dated to roughly nine to ten thousand years ago, and Mesoamerican groups had domesticated the fruit by about 5000 BCE. These dates concern the fruit, not the sauce.
Lime juice is a common addition, and Wikipedia places it in the 1697 Dampier account, which records avocado with sugar and lime juice from Central America. The article also describes the browning of cut avocado as a pigment change, citing a source, and does not say that lime prevents it.
Sources for this section
Variations and neighbours
Tomato is not part of the traditional recipe, according to Wikipedia, which lists it among non-traditional additions along with sour cream, basil and peas. Guasacaca, a Venezuelan avocado sauce made with vinegar, is thinner and more acidic in some versions and thick and chunky in others. Mantequilla de pobre combines avocado, tomato, oil and citrus juice, and guacamole falso substitutes ingredients such as squash or green tomato for the avocado.
Green avocado sauces are not all the same. The sources read do not describe the texture of Mexican taquería sauces, so this page does not treat a green sauce as an avocado sauce without evidence.
Sources for this section
Open questions
The sources read do not describe a smooth, pourable avocado sauce as a distinct traditional form, and they do not say when the smooth version appeared. The spread of avocado to the United States in the early 1800s and its later popularity are noted in the sources but are not part of this page's account.
Sources for this section
History
Guacamole's name comes from Nahuatl āhuacamōlli, avocado sauce. Avocado domestication is dated to about 5000 BCE, and the first known guacamole-like recipe to 1697.
Ingredients
Method
- Mash ripe avocado with salt in a molcajete or bowl, as the traditional method has it.
- Add lime juice, and add onion, chile and cilantro if used.
- For a smooth, pourable sauce, blend the mixture and thin it with a little water or lime juice until it reaches the consistency wanted.
Places
Mexico
Traditional use · Country evidenceGuacamole is traced to pre-Hispanic Mexico. The sources do not describe a smooth sauce of this kind as a distinct regional form.
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Community
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Sources
WikipediaHistory · Method · Variants
GuacamoleNahuatl āhuacamōlli, avocado sauce
Avocado domesticated by about 5000 BCE; Dampier 1697 recipe with sugar and lime
Traditional mash in a molcajete with salt, lime, onion, chile, cilantro
Tomato among non-traditional additions
Guasacaca, mantequilla de pobre and guacamole falso as variants
Cited in: Avocado sauce before it was a dip; What the avocado brings; Variations and neighbours; Open questions