The Art of Taco Diapering (a.k.a How to annoy a Mexican fiancé)

How to annoy a Mexican fiancé?

Let's start with a better question, which is, of course, why would you want to annoy anyone? The answer is, obviously you wouldn't. (Seriously, people! Don't be mean, that's not nice!) But maybe if you know how to do it, you'll know how not to do it (if that makes sense). For instance, let's say you're at a party and you meet a Chilean guy and a Peruvian guy. Now, if you are lucky enough to have Peruvian and Chilean friends, you know better than to go to them and say, "Hey guys! Can you settle this argument for me? Is the drink pisco sour from Peru or Chile?" and run away as fast as you can. I mean, obviously you wouldn't want to make waves like that but at least you know that those are the kind of waves that you would not want to make.

So. For the sake of this post (and for the good of humankind), let's make some waves.

The How. Now that we've gotten the 'why' out of the way, let's focus on the 'how.' From experience, I can tell you that annoying a Mexican fiancé is no easy task. Let's take my fiancé, for example. Born and raised in Mexico. To say he’s not easily offended is an understatement. We watch South Park and Family Guy and he not so much as flinches at the Mexican jokes. Somebody makes fun of him for being late (the only reason he’s ever late is because of me, by the way) and attribute it to him being Mexican – the man doesn’t care. At a Halloween party in the US he dresses as an American dressed as a Mexican with a sombrero and a fake mustache and the whole enchilada, pun intended. (Now, is that cultural appropriation and if so, whose culture? No, I’m really asking. Really.)

So. He endures South Park, he endures Family Guy, he endures the 'Latin time' stereotype, he endures all the "Hey, man! How do you feel about the Wall?" inquiries, he endures it all. Or does he? I’ve noticed that in order to piss him off, you need to hit him where it hurts the most: 

Mexican food!

Now, you might think, Kata, a culture’s food is the most sacred thing in the world. Surely you wouldn’t be idiotic enough to attack it. Well, clearly, you thought wrong 😊.

So, let’s begin.

Mexican food insults

The first rule of Mexican food insults is that they are not all created equal. You could, for example, mock Mexican candy, and oh, is there plenty to mock! To demonstrate this, let me present to you… (drumroll, please) a Mexican gummy bear:

A Mexican gummy bear covered with chili powder - because you cannot eat anything in Mexico without flames coming out of your mouth!

Have you ever been to Mexico? All Mexican candy seems to have one common denominator - chili. Seriously. Even the most innocently named candy looks like it's been tarred and feathered with the feathers of a chili fairy. (My fiancé says that there's plenty of candy in Mexico that's not spicy. Oh, really? Where? I haven't seen any.) As said, Mexican candy is highly ridiculable, but truthfully, as a food insult, it's a pretty softball one. Mexicans know their candy is weird. They’re even proud of it.

The next thing that you could do is recount a bad experience you had with tequila when you were 18 and your cousins got you drunk and you swore never to drink tequila again. The problem is that a Mexican fiancé has heard this story many a times before and has already assumed a calm, measured voice when he explains that the only true tequila comes from a town called Tequila and probably any bad experience you had is not due to the real deal, but some cheap-ass version of it.

So. If you really want to annoy a Mexican fiancé, you have to aim high, the most precious of them all, the national treasure – the tacos. Now, if you for one reason or another have a death wish, you might want to praise the hard-shelled taco, but if you, like me, value your life, I suggest the following approach:

Taco diapering and declaring it as the superior way of eating tacos.

Taco dia... what now?

So, what is this genius of taco diapering? Just to be clear, taco diapering is no new thing and definitely not my invention (even though I'm not sure anybody else other than me calls it taco diapering). It is basically when you fold the bottom half of the taco up and the sides in so as not to let the filling spill out. Below I have doodled a diagram which demonstrates how to keep that filling snug as a bug in a rug.

I believe many of us Europeans know and love this practice, but surprisingly, Mexicans don’t tend to use it. Instead, they just fold the taco in half. The reason for this is simple: The type of tortillas they primarily use are the so-called mini tortillas, which my fiancé simply calls ‘tortillas.’ Interestingly enough, the normal-sized tortillas he calls ‘that’s not a tortilla.’

Tortillas bought at a supermarket here in Belgium - on the left some normal-sized tortillas a.k.a 'not tortillas,' and on the right mini tortillas a.k.a 'tortillas'

Mini tortillas a.k.a tortillas are, I admit, sometimes difficult to diaper. Difficult but not impossible! Many have failed diapering these tacos, but not me. Just look at the picture below of my successfully diapered taco compared to my fiancé's undiapered taco.

Mini tacos a.k.a tacos

An undiapered taco in my fiancé's stubborn anti-diapering hand

A successfully diapered taco in my Master Diaperer hand

Now, I do accept that if you’re a novice diaperer, diapering a taco like this might be difficult. However, when it comes to normal-sized tortillas (a.k.a 'not tortillas'), there’s just no excuse. My rule of thumb is, diaper a taco or die trying! (Well, no. That’s a little too dramatic. But the point is you should at least try.) The advantages of diapering are obvious. Just look at the difference between these two plates after eating tacos (mine above, my fiancé's below):

Exhibit A: My plate after eating diapered tacos

Exhibit B: Fiancé's place after eating undiapered tacos

I mean, I would go so far as to say that it's your downright duty as a food-loving human being not to waste food! Taco diapering will lessen your food wasting by a lot(ish). Sure, wasted food such as in the picture (Exhibit B) doesn't look that bad but imagine the same amount on ten different plates. You could even make one taco out of that amount of food!

Now, there is, as it happens, one exception to the rule of taco diapering: The mini mini tortillas, which my fiancé calls... well... tortillas (I know, the logic stopped working at this point).

Mini mini tacos

So, if you happen to be in the presence of a mini mini tortilla that has a lot of stuff inside (as in the picture above), then - and only then - should you, in my opinion, disregard the rules of taco diapering. I mean, just look at the tacos on that green plate. All the laws of physics are against taco diapering here. So, go with your common sense when faced with mini mini tacos.

Closing words

That's it, folks! Let me know what you think about taco diapering!

Also, my fiancé didn't seem that annoyed by me writing this post (except he did announce that he would diaper a taco over his dead body), so maybe it's not possible to annoy a Mexican fiancé after all. At least not this particular Mexican fiancé.