This week we discussed the Mexican War of Independence in the early 19th century, which led to San Francisco becoming a part of the Mexican Empire. In the classroom, we learned that Indigenous people like the Mayans worshipped corn as a god. The Spanish, who ate wheat, though of corn as food fit only for livestock and the poor. They didn’t understand the Mesoamerican tradition of nixtamalization and ate corn raw, leading some scholars to link the resulting disease of malnutrition with the birth of vampires in the cultural imagination.
In the kitchen, the third graders made corn tortillas from a simple masa dough and with wooden tortilla presses. We paired the fresh tortillas with a simple Mexican salsa. The meal was beautiful and delicious, and it was wonderful to see how well both classes are working together as a team toward a common goal.
