Popo de Tuxtepec

Popo is from the Papaloapan basin. Specifically Tuxtepec, in the northern lowlands of Oaxaca, where the river runs flat, the cacao grows, and the Chinantec and Mazatec communities have been making this drink for celebration days as long as anyone remembers. It travels north into southern Veracruz too, into Otatitlán and Cosamaloapan, but the heart of popo is Oaxacan.

This is not chocolate caliente. This is not champurrado. Popo is cold, foamed, ceremonial, and served in a jícara, the dried calabash gourd that holds the drink without warming it. The crown of foam standing above the rim is what tells you it is popo. That foam comes from cocolmeca, a vine root that grows wild in the lowland forests of the Papaloapan, and it is what separates this drink from anything else in Mexico. No cocolmeca, no popo. Asi se hace y punto.

The technique is patience. The cocolmeca is simmered for an hour and a half until its saponins release into the water. The cacao is toasted on a comal and ground to a paste. The rice is toasted, soaked with cinnamon, and ground until it strains clean. Then everything is combined cold and whipped with a molinillo. Whipped. Not stirred. Not blended. In Tuxtepec the women whip in shifts at weddings and quinceañeras, talking and switching arms, until the foam rises like a meringue above the olla. No me vengas con atajos. The whipping is the recipe.

I traveled to Tuxtepec for the first time in 2009 and watched a woman named Doña Felipa make popo for her granddaughter's wedding. She whipped for forty minutes without stopping. When she lifted the molinillo out, the foam stood in stiff peaks. She filled fifty jícaras from one olla and there was foam to spare. My mother had nothing about popo in her notebook. Jalisco does not make this drink. But I sat with Doña Felipa for an afternoon and she gave me her version, written on the back of an envelope, and that is the version I am giving you. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.