50 INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY—PUBLICATION NO. 7 
house lot. Droves of pigs are never mast-fed in 
the forest. Hogs are fattened on corn and sold; 
as pork is well liked, they are often killed for food 
and for lard, now indispensable in European- 
modified Indian cookery. 
Other animal domesticates include fowls and 
bees. The turkey (kuaika),"! the only native 
domesticated fowl in the area, is mote common in 
mestizo towns than in Tarascan villages. The 
European chicken (¢ikata,)"? however, is ubiqui- 
tous; practically every Indian household has a 
flock of five or six. A single breed, probably 
descendent from the Spanish fowls introduced 
early in the 16th century, predominates.!% Im- 
proved breeds have penetrated only into large 
mestizo towns on the edge of the indigenous area. 
Several families in every Tarascan pueblo keep a 
few hives of European bees in the house lot. 
Hives consist of rows of small wooden rectangular 
boxes placed on benches (pl. 7). In some Sierra 
villages (e. g. Capacuaro) native bees hive in 
sections of logs hung on the outside wall of the 
house. Both honey (for sweetening) and wax 
(for religious candles) are extracted from the hives 
in November or December. 
Animal foods in Tarascan diet.—Tarascans eat 
meat whenever it is available and can be afforded. 
Chunks of boiled beef are one of the chief ingre- 
dients of ¢uaipu. This dish is also made of the 
heart, liver, intestines, and lungs. Other beef 
dishes prepared in most Tarascan pueblos are: 
a stew, or ataépakua, thickened with mole; uirikata, 
or meat broiled over charcoal or on the comal; 
various cuts fried in the casuela; menudo, or 
stomach lining boiled and served with ground 
chile; dried salted meat (cecina); steamed beef 
heads (including tongue and brains), called virria 
or babaqua.™ 
Neither cow nor goat milk is popular among 
Tarascans. Some milk cows are kept in the larger 
villages to supply the pregnant and the sick. 
Little cheese is made locally, most being brought 
in‘from the tierra caliente. 
Although well liked by most Tarascans, mutton 
11 The word kuyaku is apparently onomatopoeic; ¢ikata-ambAs or ‘good 
chicken,” is also used as a name for turkey. 
12 The word ‘‘¢fkata” is Tarascan for a wild grouse, and was evidently 
applied to the chicken soon after its introduction. 
3 Hens are small, dull brown, often speckled with yellow and black; 
cocks are reddish brown with highly colored tail, wing, and neck feathers. 
14 Some of the above Tarascan words are also applied to stews and roasts 
of deer meat. With the possible exception of éudipu, uirfkata, and atapakua, 
all meat dishes prepared by modern Tarascans are of Spanish origin. 
is eaten only on Sundays or on fiesta days by those 
who can afford it. On festive occasions, such as 
weddings, a whole mutton is stuffed with cleaned 
entrails and head and roasted in a large oven. 
(The roast is called tatemado, or uirikata.) On 
less prominent occasions pieces of mutton are 
often cooked with vegetables to make a kind of 
éuipu. 
Pork is always eaten fresh; cured pork, such as 
ham, bacon, and sausage—all old Spanish meats—, 
has no place in modern Tarascan diet. Pieces of 
fresh pork are fried on the comal, or boiled with 
vegetables. A popular pork dish, especially in 
the Sierra, is chicharrones (cracklings), which 
consist of pieces of fresh pig skin well-cooked in a 
large copper caldron."° Carnitas, pieces of meat 
and fat, including spareribs, side meat, leg, ete., 
are also cooked in the caldron in many pueblos, 
and are commonly served in the markets of the 
large mestizo towns nearby. 
FOOD-GATHERING ACTIVITIES 
Tarascan women and children gather various 
wild herbs, fungi, and fruit to supplement agri- 
cultural products. Among these the most impor- 
tant are the annual greens, or Saku4,'® collected 
during the rains from June through September. 
They are usually found in disturbed ground, e. g. 
within and on the edges of wheat or maize fields. 
The women in some Sierra pueblos recognize 
more than 15 varieties of Sakua that are habitu- 
ally gathered.” These are boiled with chile and 
salt to make atapakua. Although eaten in all 
modern Tarascan villages, such greens are of 
greater importance in the Sierra, where the garden 
vegetables common in the Lake and La Cafiada 
areas are infrequently cultivated. 
Mushrooms (terékueéa) are collected in all Taras- 
can towns, and, like the annual greens, appear 
only in the rainy season. They are found in the 
fields, in the forest growing under decaying logs, 
115 In the spring of 1946 a chicharrén cooking was observed in PamatAcuaro. 
After killing a hog the local butchers or others set up a caldron in the plaza to 
cook the skin. By the time the cracklings were well done, a large group of 
villagers had gathered to buy them at a few centavos each. The lard so 
rendered was sold to one of the local stores. The cooking of chicharrones is 
also common in many mestizo towns in central and northern Mexico. 
16 Saku is the Tarascan equivalent of the Nahuatl ‘‘quelitl,’’ which has 
been hispanicized to quelite, the general term now used in Mexico for any 
kind of wild annual used for greens. 
117 Unfortunately, the Sierra was visited during the dry season, and con- 
sequently specimens of gaku4 plants could not be collected for botanical classi- 
fication. Verdolaga (Portulaca oleracea) and tender amaranth shoots, how- 
ever, are common sakué varieties. 
