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Mexican X-plainer: Quesadilla
I grew up on the border between Texas and Tamaulipas, and in my Mexican American family, a quesadilla was a tortilla (more often flour than corn) folded in half, with cheese inside, usually grilled so the cheese melted (but as a teen I often microwaved them).
Like many folks living outside of Mexico City, I was surprised to learn that quesadilla doesn’t necessarily mean “a folded tortilla full of cheese” in the Mexican capital (and a few other southern spots), but just “a large folded tortilla with anything inside, grilled or fried so that tortilla and filling are heated simultaneously.”
Surprised, but not scandalized.
I mean, just think about the word’s origins. Where did the word “queso” come from?
Some five thousand years or so ago, Proto-Indo-European (the language that gave rise to Latin, German, Sanskrit, Greek, etc.) had a root, *kwat-, which meant “to ferment” or “become sour.” There was a suffixed variant form, ‘kwāt-so- (“fermented thing”) that evolved into the Classical Latin “cāseum,” cheese.
In Vulgar Latin, this became “caseu.” Metathesis gave caesu, then caisu, then queisu and finally “queso.” There are…
