Paula E. Morton

This is the story of the versatile tortilla, an unleavened flatbread made from either corn or wheat. It is a story that opens the window of the past--of Aztec street vendors selling one of their most essential foods, thin, white, hot corn tlaxcalli, layered in a basket and covered with a white cloth, and Spanish conquistadors introducing wood burning ovens to bake loaves of wheat bread, in their eyes as superior to the ubiquitous tortilla as the entirety of European culture.