Tacos Mexico

Tacos

The origins of the taco are not precisely known, and etymologies for the culinary usage of the word are theoretical.According to the Real Academia Española, publisher of Diccionario de la Lengua Española, the word taco describes a typical Mexican dish of a maize tortilla folded around food ("Tortilla de maíz enrollada con algún alimento dentro, típica de México").This meaning of the Spanish word "taco" is a Mexican innovation, but in other dialects "taco" is used to mean "wedge; wad, plug; billiard cue; blowpipe; ramrod; short, stocky person; short, thick piece of wood." As used in this non-culinary way, the word "taco" has cognates in other European languages, including the French word "tache" and the English word "tack (nail)."

According to one etymological theory, the culinary meaning of "taco" derives from its "plug" meaning as employed among Mexican silver miners, who used explosive charges in plug form consisting of a paper wrapper and gunpowder filling. However, indigenous origins for the culinary word "taco" are also proposed. One possibility is that the word derives from the Nahuatl word "tlahco", meaning "half" or "in the middle," in the sense that food would be placed in the middle of a tortilla. Also, the Náhuatl word for the corn tortilla (an indigenous Pre-Columbian invention) is "tlaxcalli