Food, fruit, and water used in Lima.
As the degree of health, and vigour of constitution, enjoyed by
individuals, depend in a great measure upon the diet, as well as on
the air they breathe, climate, and caste, we shall offer a few general
observations on the dietetic habits of the Limenians.
Besides maize, which is more generally cultivated than wheat, the latter
being to a considerable extent an article of importation from Chili
and other foreign parts, the staple food of the poor on the coast is
derived from the camote and yuca, both of which roots are exceedingly
nutritive and wholesome; but, in Lima, animal food is consumed in very
large quantity. The quantity of poultry used here is incalculable; and a
good reason for this is, that the sick, infirm, and convalescent,—always
exceedingly numerous in this capital, as well in public hospitals as in
private houses,—think themselves neglected in their diet if they have
not, at least once a day, chicken or chicken soup. Geese and ducks are
in low reputation as articles of aliment; but of pigeons and turkeys
there is always a large supply in the daily market, held under sheds in
convenient parts of the town. Fish is usually good and plentiful,—the
fishermen, by the way, furnishing the best specimen we have seen of a
robust form in the Indian family.
The number of fat pigs killed in the town has been, in the year 1835,—on
occasion of imposing, for the support of the colleges, a duty of four
reals, or about two shillings a-head, on each pig,—estimated considerably
above twenty thousand yearly; and there is always so large a consumption
of lard and fried pork, (“chicharones,”) that the trade of the
“mantequero,” or lard and swine-dealer, is, after that of the baker and
lottery-man, “suertero,” one of the most lucrative in the capital.
From forty to fifty head of oxen, and from three to four hundred sheep,
are slaughtered daily for the Lima market: the beef is very good; the
mutton of inferior quality. We were told by one of the principal beef
contractors that, early in the year 1836, the slaughter of oxen in Lima
was reduced to thirty or thirty-five head daily; a decrease from the
usual number which he ascribed to the poverty peculiar to that particular
period of misrule, disabling many families from buying beef, and partly
also to a new military order relating to the soldiers’ rations.
Instead of his former allowance of meat, the soldier was now allowed two
reals daily to provide for himself what food he pleased;—an injudicious
alteration in his circumstances, for he either gave his ration-money
for drink, or indulged his appetite in eating some unwholesome trash
calculated to throw him too often on the sick-list.
Pastry and sweet-meat criers are seen everywhere in the Lima streets;
and a sort of cook-stand, abounding in fried pork and fish, is to be
found at the corner of every square. This practice gives some insight
into the dietetic habits of the vulgar; and such poor families of genteel
pretensions as from necessity hire out their slaves, are seldom at the
trouble or expense of cooking at home when they can more easily call in
from the street what little they may satisfy themselves with.
Masamorerias, or a sort of pap-shops, are very common in Lima. Of the
sweet pap in vulgar use there are as many varieties as there are of
meal and flour,—such as peas, beans, rice, maize flour, arrow-root,
starch,—of which they have many varieties. Any of these boiled in water
to a very soft consistence, with or without the addition of fruit or
some vegetable acid, and sweetened exceedingly with sugar, molasses,
or “chancaca,” (the latter, a coarse sort of brown sugar made up into
cakes,) is what constitutes the great Limenian dish “masamora,” to which
these sweet-mouthed people are as proverbially partial as the English are
to roast-beef.
However salutary in itself may be the quality of the more substantial
food of such Limenians as can afford to live well and generously, yet
most of their dishes are so sodden in lard, that the common fowl, the
pigeon, turkey, and that excellent family dish the “puchero,” consisting
of a variety of fruit and vegetables, with pieces of meat of different
kinds and quality, all boiled and presented in one great piece of
plate,—are among the comparatively few which a simple palate can relish.
Their soups, together with a great variety of vegetable dishes, are
so heated with agi-pepper, that the coats of the stomach would indeed
require to be well greased to protect them against the piquant effects of
this popular condiment. Useful and even necessary as this agi is found
to be by those Indians of the valleys who cultivate it around their
doors, and whose diet is nearly all vegetable, yet in a climate like that
of Lima, and in constitutions so delicate as those of its inhabitants
confessedly are, it must prove injurious to the organization of the
stomach, and to the health in general, when freely and daily taken with
a plentiful allowance of animal food, and a general mode of living sober
but not temperate; for though the better classes deal sparingly in wine,
yet, by partaking more or less of every dish at table, and these not a
few, they usually eat more than the powers of digestion can comfortably
apply to the support of the frame, not usually exposed by so indolent a
people to great waste from athletic exertion.
The native dark races are indeed much more robust in form, and hardier
in constitution, than strangers to their climate; and many of them
drink “aguardiente,” or uncoloured cane spirits, in great quantity, and
with less immediate ill effect than one would expect. Their constant
use of such excitants as ardent spirits and fermented beverages called
“chichas,” with animal food and agi, may possibly be a principal
reason why these persons, whenever they are seized with inflammatory
complaints, stand general bleeding better than others of their own caste
fed upon sango, a name applied to a sort of mash made with maize-meal
and sweet potatoes: but persons of European descent, with skin so much
more delicate than the darker races in Peru, and endowed with a more
susceptible nervous system, suffer much more readily from atmospherical
vicissitudes; and their digestive organs and powers of assimilation being
comparatively weak, those irregularities, borne by the negro and zambo
with comparative impunity, are to the white man, whose organization is
not so suitable as theirs for a warm and relaxing climate, the frequent
cause of various disorders of the bowels, as indigestion, cholera morbus,
or dysentery. The dietetics of the Limenians naturally induce frequent
examples of impaired digestion; and worms, too usually the inmates of
unhealthy bowels, are so remarkably common, and in acute febrile diseases
are so generally expelled either dead or alive, that their appearance
in such disorders is looked upon as a matter of course. What share the
water, as a vehicle for ova, may have in propagating these worms, it
may be difficult to assign; but as the aqueducts are much neglected,
and proper filtering-stones not in general use, it is likely that some
seeds of disease may thus enter the system; and it may be mentioned
that, during the warm weather, a host of animalcules show themselves to
the naked eye in the earthen jars, or “_botijas_,” which are kept in
the culinary apartments as receptacles for water intended for ordinary
domestic purposes; and even water, heated in hot baths to ninety or more
degrees of Fahrenheit, if again allowed to cool, and stand over a few
days, is seen crowded with myriads of playful animalcules.
Of water taken by the writer from the fountain of the great square in
Lima, just as the river began to rise in January from the effects of the
inland rains, he is happy to be able to furnish the following analysis by
Dr. Thomson of Glasgow.
Sp. gr. 1·00028; purer than Clyde water: 1000 grains contained
Grains.
Common salt 0·05
Sulphate of lime 0·19
Silica 0·06
Vegetable matter 0·04
----
0·34
----
Nature has supplied the Peruvians of the coast with fruits most suitable
to their wants; and these, though often injurious when eaten in a state
of immaturity, or when the stomach is not in a fit state to receive them,
are yet, when used in season, most grateful to the taste, and salutary to
the constitution, in the regions where they abound.
We shall, therefore, introduce in this place a list of the fruits
produced in the orchards in and about Lima, with a specification of
the months when they are in season. This we are happily able to do by
presenting our readers with a list, obligingly given to us by Mr.
Mathews, an English botanist, now making rich botanical collections in
the interior of Peru; but whose occupation, as an horticulturist at Lima,
afforded him the best opportunity for exact and practical information on
the subject.
_January._—Grapes begin to ripen; and also apricots, and a few pears.
_February._—Grapes, pears in abundance, apricots; peaches begin to ripen;
lucumas scarce; figs.
_March._—Grapes in abundance; pears scarce; peaches in abundance; apples
begin to ripen; lucumas in abundance; figs in abundance.
_April._—Apples in abundance; quinces, ceruela de frayle (_spondias
dulcis_), and cerasas (_malpighia glandulosa_), palillas (_psidium
lineatum_), and guavas; figs scarce.
_May._—The same as April; a few grapes are seen in the market, brought
from the southward; cherimollas.
_June._—Cherimollas and guanavanas; sweet and sour oranges; a few apples.
_July._—The same as June, with the exception of apples and limes; sweet
lemons and sour lemons begin to ripen.
_August._—The same as July; but slight demand for oranges this month.
_September._—Lucumas, paltas, and the fruits of the previous month.
_October._—Same as September; but a great demand for limes and sweet
lemons.
_November and December._—During these two months there is a great demand
for sweet and sour lemons, for “_frescos_” or cooling drinks. Sweet
oranges rarely remain good after the middle of November.
Plantains produce all the year, but the greatest abundance is during the
hot months. The pepino is also much eaten during December, January, and
February. In the months of April and May, the pulp surrounding the seeds
in the pod of the pacay are much eaten.
In addition to the above account by Mr. Mathews, we may notice that the
melon and sandia, or musk and water-melon, are much cultivated in the
neighbourhood of Lima; and are to be seen in large heaps by the bridge,
and at the corners of streets, where they are bought up, and consumed
with avidity, in the hot month of February. Olives too, and very good
ones, grow in the Vale of Rimac, and arrive at maturity in February and
March. During the late civil wars, several valuable olive plantations
were wantonly cut down. Strawberries, and likewise “tunas,” or Indian
figs, of inferior quality, grow in Lima; but the market is supplied with
these fruits, and of the best quality, from the neighbouring valley of
Sta. Ulaya. The pine-apple does not ripen spontaneously in Lima, though
attempts are now making near the Callao gate of the city to cultivate
it. The pine-apple eaten in Lima is usually brought from the eastern
side of Peru, from the Montaña of Tarma and Guancayo, &c. Sometimes,
also, a few pine-apples are carried from about Moro on the coast to the
northward; but these often decay before they arrive in Lima.