Latin American cuisine begins in the Halls of Montezuma, when Hernando Cortez met the Aztec chieftain. Cortez's brigands may have marched away with the gold, but they left behind sufficient seeds of Old World cuisine to mix with the culinary patterns of the native land. The pattern was similar throughout Central and South America.
“Like all cuisines, Mexican cooking is constantly evolving,” notes restaurateur and food author Rick Bayless, one of North America's preeminent authorities on Mexican cuisine.