Mexican Food Trivia
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This Mexican food trivia quiz has 109 free questions with answers and covers the whole table: mole poblano and its 20-odd ingredients, pozole and tamales that predate the Aztecs, chiles en nogada in the colours of the flag, cochinita pibil from the south, carnitas from Michoacán, and desserts like tres leches, flan and pan de muerto. Drinks get their due too, with tequila, mezcal, pulque, horchata, aguas frescas and the michelada. It is built for anyone who loves eating Mexican food and wants to know where it comes from: the Nahuatl words behind guacamole and tortilla, why corn is soaked in limewater, which chile becomes a chipotle, and how nachos and the Caesar salad were both invented on Mexican soil. Difficulty runs from easy warm-ups to a handful of questions that will test a serious food nerd. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia and primary references before publishing, and each question carries a source citation, so you can settle arguments as well as start them.
30 of 109 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Roughly how many ingredients does an average mole poblano contain?
20
Mole poblano typically calls for around 20 ingredients, among them several dried chiles, chocolate, nuts, seeds, bread and spices; some Oaxacan moles run to 30 or more.
Q 02Pozole is a hearty Mexican soup built around which key ingredient?
Hominy
Hominy, maize kernels nixtamalized until they shed their hulls and soften, is the base of every pozole; the stew is celebration food, a fixture of Mexico's Independence Day tables.
Q 03Menudo, the red-chile soup eaten as a weekend hangover cure, is built around which cut?
Tripe
Tripe, the lining of a cow's stomach, needs hours of simmering to turn tender, so menudo is made in big batches for family gatherings and weekend mornings.
Q 04In tropical parts of Mexico such as Oaxaca, tamales are commonly wrapped in what instead of corn husks?
Banana leaves
Banana leaves replace corn husks in Oaxaca and across Mexico's tropical south, where cooks also wrap pork in the same leaves before burying it to roast underground.
Q 05The green chile, white sauce and red pomegranate of chiles en nogada are meant to represent what?
The Mexican flag
The colours echo the Mexican flag: green poblano chile, white nogada sauce and red pomegranate seeds, which is why the dish is a fixture of September's Independence Day season.
Q 06The creamy nogada sauce on chiles en nogada is made from which nut?
Walnuts
Walnuts give nogada its name, from nogal, the Spanish for walnut tree; ground with milk, cream and fresh cheese, they make the pale sauce poured over the stuffed chiles.
Q 07Legend says chiles en nogada were first served in 1821 to which general, soon crowned Mexico's first emperor?
Agustín de Iturbide
Agustín de Iturbide, crowned emperor the following year, is said to have been fêted with the dish just after signing the Treaty of Córdoba, which sealed Mexico's independence; tradition credits convent nuns with the recipe.
Q 08The word guacamole comes from Classical Nahuatl and literally translates to what?
Avocado sauce
Guacamole is Nahuatl āhuacamōlli, literally 'avocado sauce': āhuacatl (avocado) plus mōlli (sauce), the same mōlli behind the word mole.
Q 09Guacamole is traditionally mashed with salt in which stone tool?
A molcajete
A molcajete is carved by hand from a single block of volcanic basalt, three stubby legs included; its pestle, the tejolote, is cut from the same stone.
Q 10In the early 1900s, avocados in the United States often went by what name?
Alligator pear
Alligator pear was the common name, above all in Florida, until California growers founded an association in 1915 and promoted 'avocado', from Nahuatl āhuacatl, instead.
Q 11In nixtamalization, corn is soaked and cooked in what kind of solution before grinding?
Limewater
Limewater, a solution of slaked lime (calcium hydroxide), provides the alkaline bath that loosens the hulls, improves the flavour and makes the grain's nutrients far more available.
Q 12Nixtamalizing corn makes tryptophan available and helps prevent which deficiency disease?
Pellagra
Pellagra, the niacin-deficiency disease, struck people who adopted maize without the process, from southern Europe to the US South, where it turned epidemic in the early 1900s.
Q 13What is the name of the dough formed from nixtamalized cornmeal that becomes tortillas and tamales?
Masa
Masa exists thanks to nixtamalization: plain ground corn won't bind when wetted, but nixtamalized corn forms a pliable dough, which can also be dried into the pantry flour masa harina.
Q 21Carnitas are most closely associated with which Mexican state?
Michoacán
Michoacán is carnitas country: the dish is said to come from the state, and the town of Quiroga is renowned for stalls where pork simmers slowly in lard until tender.
Q 22A churrera pipes churro dough into hot oil through a nozzle of what shape?
Star
Star nozzles give churros their ridges as the dough is squeezed into the hot oil; Mexican churros are then often filled with cajeta or chocolate.
Q 23Cajeta, the caramel famously made in Celaya, is a dulce de leche made from which animal's milk?
Goat
Goat's milk sets cajeta apart from cow's-milk dulce de leche; the sweet from Celaya, in Guanajuato, takes its name from the small wooden boxes it was once packed in.
Q 14The Aztecs and other Nahuatl speakers called tortillas by what name?
Tlaxcalli
Tlaxcalli, literally 'something baked', was the Nahuatl name for the flatbread; the Spanish later applied their own word tortilla, and one reading of the state name Tlaxcala is 'place of tortillas'.
Q 15The Spanish word tortilla, from torta plus a diminutive ending, literally means what?
Little cake
Little cake is the literal sense: Spanish torta (cake) plus the diminutive ending -illa. Spaniards applied the word to the corn flatbread they met in Mexico in the 16th century.
Q 16Elote, Mexican street corn on the cob, is classically dusted with which crumbly grated cheese?
Cotija
Cotija, named after the town of Cotija, is traditionally made only in the rainy season, then aged until salty and crumbly enough to grate over the mayonnaise-coated cob with chile powder.
Q 17Chilaquiles, fried tortilla pieces simmered in salsa, are usually eaten at which meal?
Breakfast
Breakfast is the hour for chilaquiles: the dish is a classic way to use up the previous day's tortillas and salsa, typically topped with onion, crumbled cheese and a fried egg.
Q 18Which spice gives the Mexican pork dish cochinita pibil its burnt-orange colour?
Annatto
Annatto, the seed of the achiote tree, is ground into a paste with bitter orange juice for the marinade; the pork is then roasted in a píib, a pit oven dug into the ground.
Q 19The word barbacoa, the root of the English word barbecue, is generally traced to which language?
Taíno
Taíno, the Arawakan language of the Caribbean, most likely gave Spanish barbacoa, a framework of sticks for cooking over fire; in Mexico the word came to mean meat slow-cooked in a pit lined with maguey leaves.
Q 20What does the word carnitas literally mean?
Little meats
Little meats is the literal sense of carnitas, carne plus a diminutive ending; the pork is braised in lard over low heat until tender inside and crisp at the edges.
Q 24Flan napolitano, made in parts of Mexico, enriches caramel custard with which added ingredient?
Cream cheese
Cream cheese, beaten into the base of eggs, condensed milk and evaporated milk, gives flan napolitano a creamier body; the plain version is what the French call crème caramel.
Q 25Mexican horchata is typically made from which grain?
Rice
Rice, soaked, ground and strained with cinnamon and sugar, makes Mexican horchata; the Spanish original, Valencia's horchata de chufa, is made from tiger nuts instead.
Q 26Agua de jamaica, one of the most common aguas frescas, is brewed from which flower?
Hibiscus
Hibiscus gives agua de jamaica its deep red and tart edge, though not from the petals: the drink is steeped from the dried calyces, the same infusion the Caribbean calls sorrel.
Q 27Tequila must be distilled from which specific plant?
Blue agave
Blue agave is the only agave tequila may use; jimadores strip its leaves with a long-handled blade, the coa, to reach the piña, the core that is cooked and crushed for its juice.
Q 28In which year was the Agave Landscape around the town of Tequila declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site?
2006
The Agave Landscape and Ancient Industrial Facilities of Tequila joined the World Heritage List in 2006; the site covers the agave fields, historic distilleries and the towns of Tequila, El Arenal and Amatitán.
Q 29The red 'worm' dropped into some bottles of mezcal is actually the larva of what?
A moth
A moth: the red gusano is the caterpillar of Comadia redtenbacheri, which infests agave plants; producers only began dropping it into bottles in the mid-20th century.
Q 30The vertical spit of meat for tacos al pastor is called a trompo, after which toy?
A spinning top
A spinning top is what trompo means: the stacked, marinated pork turns on its spit beside the flame, and thin slices are shaved straight into small corn tortillas.