Gastronomic diversity of wild edible mushrooms in the Mexican cuisine

Abstract

Traditional Mexican cuisine involves a vast variety of foods that result in an endless number of dishes, where wild products have an important role. Among them, wild edible mushrooms (WEM). Research that has documented the use of mushrooms have emphasised their contribution to forest communities, with few works that address urban consumers. The objective was to analyse and document the gastronomic diversity of the use of wild edible mushroom in the Mexican gastronomy of the urban population. Information was collected through a questionnaire distributed via social networks. The method was free word association requesting the mention of dishes associated to the stimulus phrase ‘wild edible mushrooms’. The sample was 493 questionnaires. Results showed the versatility in the use of WEM, which are incorporated into a large number of foods, standing out autochthonous foods that form part of the Mexican food triad; also incorporating some introduced ingredients where from diverse forms of preparation both traditional and introduced, result in a large variety of dishes. The work shows the large culinary diversity of WEM, which must be considered for future actions aimed at the valorisation of the Mexican food heritage and foods originated in forests.