Puebla (Mexico), Apr 12 (EFE).- Inhabitants of the central Mexican state of Puebla celebrated this Wednesday the Memela Fair, in which this dish worthy of the rulers was highlighted, but which over the years has become into a popular people food.
The organizers served close to 150,000 memelas to the diners who arrived at the auxiliary board of La Resurrección, a destination that sustains itself financially from the sale of this product, which has corn with green, red or combined sauce, and can have pork rinds, meat, nopales or potatoes.
The memela, which comes from a reduction of the Nahuatl word tlaxcalmimilli, was a dish that was destined for the ruling class during the time of the Spanish conquest.
It is prepared with white, blue, red or yellow corn dough, with which a ball is formed and inside it is put paste-like beans to later crush it and transform it into an oval shape about 20 centimeters long that is cooked in a comal.
Once the tortilla is ready, it is moistened with lard and red or green sauce, chopped onion and crumbled cheese are added.
Some diners add potatoes, chorizo, nopales, pork rinds, and mushrooms.
For the Memela Fair, about 300 cooks arrived at the main square of the Parroquia de La Resurrección to set up 60 stalls, where they gave two memelas to each diner at 8:00 a.m. (2:00 p.m. GMT).
To be ready two days before, they prepared five tons of corn dough, five tons of beans, one ton of butter, four tons of cheese, and 4,000 liters of sauce to give away 150,000 memelas.
Leobardo Rodríguez Juárez, president of the Puebla Municipal Council’s Art and Culture Commission, assured EFE that these traditions are essential to highlight the uses and customs of the different localities.
He stressed that this dish has become the daily diet of the inhabitants of Puebla.
“This event is important because in La Resurrección hundreds of families have the sale of memela as their main source of income,” he said. “So it is a tradition that is lived, that is felt.”
He said that as every April 12 for the last 13 years, this dish product has been highlighted, which has become an attraction for tourists and visitors to the state.
Eugenia Santabarbara, cook, said that her family has been preparing memelas for sale for 40 years, since her grandmother started the business to cover family expenses, so it became part of her livelihood and family tradition, which is why since she was a child supports her mother and grandmother.
She emphasized that she is proud to make this dish, but above all she likes that it is free on this day as a thank you to her customers.
