communion in the mountains

Writers are a strange lot.

They tell you something is nondescript. Then, they spend paragraphs describing the very thing they claimed could not be described.

So, let me jump right to the paragraphs without the feint.

Last evening our bus pulled into Zamora. I have been through the town several times over the years driving to and from Pátzcuaro. Nothing has ever made me stop other than once when I needed some mineral water and took a detour to see the cathedral.

When I first visited Uruapan, another city in Michoacán, a fellow blogger asked me which city it reminded me of. I thought for a moment, and replied: "Athens." She said it reminded her of Istanbul.

I think we were both correct. And Zamora has that same feel. A modern city replete with architecture from the 1970s and 1980s, and just a little funky.

The building at the top is an example. Something akin to Bauhaus redux. But someone had a delicious sense of humor -- superimposing that "for sale" banner over the attorney sign.

But we were not in town to be architecture critics. We were here to take a closer look at the Purépecha culture. A very specific part of it.

Salvador Diaz Espinoza is a man with a dream. His goal is to get UNESCO to designate the pre-Hispanic cuisine of the Purépecha as a protected cuisine.

Toward that end, he has coordinated events similar to the one we attended today just outside the village of Chilchota. The focus was on making the honored guests (us) feel welcome -- and, my favorite, tasting some of the food Salvador is attempting to preserve and to honor.

Food can be one of the most fragile social commodities. Trying to determine what is authentic and then developing a plan to protect what can be an evolving entity can present preservationists with very difficult problems.

When we arrived, we were greeted by the honored elder women of the Purépecha -- the nanas.

Most of the group was showered with hugs and confetti, and were led by the hand up a path to the assembly area. Plenty of simple dance steps were tossed in to welcome us to their circle -- at least, to the extent that any outsider can truly be admitted to an ancient culture.

We were welcomed by a shaman, who blessed our proceedings with a prayer that, for its length and repetition, would put the most verbose Pentacostal preacher to shame.

And, of course, there was plenty of burning copal to add to the patina of ritual.

Near the end of the ceremony, several members of our group were handed pigeons. They then gave the pigeons to the nanas, who released the birds.

I will confess that I lost interest in the greeting ceremony early on. So, I wandered over to the food preparation area.

The food was a joint effort. The Purépecha women were preparing two different types of pozole. My favorite, and it should be no surprise to anyone, was the spicy version.

By the time it ended up in my bowl, it was accompanied by a freshly-smashed avocado. It was one of the best pozoles I have ever tasted.

The women were joined by young culinary arts students from Zamora. Remember, Salvador's mission is  not only to preserve, but to perpetuate, this cuisine. He works closely with the school/

Some of the students were busy crushing chilies.

Others were preparing a squash soup -- that was not as good as he pozole.

But the combination of both the traditional and the student hands produced a successful meal.

That was not the end of our food adventure. Salvador took us to a bakery in the village. The baked goods in that bakery were recognized by UNESCO as a protected cuisine in 2010.

The operation is the same as it has been for decades. The dough is baked in a wood-fired clay oven relying on only the expertise of the bakers. Thermometers are not used. This is not your papa's Bimbo.

We were then invited to partake of an old Michoacán traditional combination -- bread and strawberry atole.

It was a successful day. But I am really looking forward to tomorrow. A master chef, now going blind, will show us how to prepare, amongst other foods, huitlacoche -- the corn smut that is often compared to the taste of truffles and that is an important ingredient in the cuisine of Michoacán.
I am looking forward to finding another path in my no-dish-eaten-twice regimen.