For authentic guacamole, keep it simple

Guacamole is, arguably, the creamy, green glue that best binds the modern Mexican-influenced food popular across South Texas to the native culinary traditions of the Americas. It’s also one of the foods most fraught with complexity when the term “authentic” is applied.

What we know as guacamole today is an amalgamation of hundreds of years of colonization, adaptation and evolution.

So what’s a truly authentic guacamole? Well, that starts in the 16th century or earlier in Central Mexico. Avocados were treasured for their incredible nutritional density by the Aztecs, who mashed them, sometimes on their own, or with salt and tomatoes, into a dish known by the Nahuatl word āhuacamolli.

If you want authenticity, that’s it.

The guacamole we order in restaurants or make at home today is often a result of Spanish conquest, which brought Persian limes, cilantro and garlic from Asia, and spices such as cumin from the Eastern Mediterranean to the so-called New World. More modern additions like sour cream — cows and their milk also came to the Americas with Spaniards — would have been equally unrecognizable to the Aztec originators of guacamole.

The historic record doesn’t help clarify the muddy waters surrounding guacamole.

The first English-language recipe for the dish — more of a description, really — is credited to British pirate and diarist William Dampier, who could be considered one of the world’s first hard-core foodies. In his 1697 tell-all book “A New Voyage Round the World,” Dampier describes a guacamolelike dish of mashed avocado made with sugar and lime juice served with roasted plantains in the Bay of Panama — a sweet variation on guacamole that modern tastes here would find difficult to accept.

Further bastardizations of guacamole, such as the use of calabacita squash, broccoli or peas in place of avocados that proliferated during avocado shortages in 2019 and gave rise to the term “mockamole,” left the definition of guacamole even more nebulous and diluted, even if the resulting product was satisfactory and acceptable to many palates.

Many guacamole myths have developed over the years. The

ones most useful to home cooks — whether you’re an avocado purist who adds little more than salt, or fans of cilantro, lime and more — have to do with preserving the stuff.

The most popular legend is that plopping an avocado pit into a batch of guacamole will help keep it fresh and green. This

simply isn’t true. The real culprit here is oxygen, which will cause avocados to turn brown over time. The pit merely protects the area it’s in contact with from oxidization.

A better solution is to place plastic wrap in direct contact with the guacamole if you have to store it for any amount of time. A

thin layer of oil or lime juice on the surface of your guacamole also can help preserve its bright green color, although guacamole is best enjoyed immediately after it’s made.

Express-News file photo Guacamole’s 500-plus year history starts in Central Mexico with avocados, salt and tomatoes.