So, going back to the original question, how the cumin get here, I propose
the case of one place in Latin America I've tasted a fair amount of cumin,
which is Peru. It's always in the marinade for anticuchos de corazon -- the
grilled skewers of beef heart sold in the street. And it also appears in the
recipe for pork adobo, similar to the Phillippine adobo and the Spanish
escabeche, except that in Peru cubes of pork are rubbed with spices and
achiote, then cooked in the pickle (vinegar would be part of the marinade
elsewhere). So both of these point to Iberia (via the technique of pickling
in vinegar, and the application to Eurasian meats) without ruling out the
Maghrebian influence. Peru has a small Afro-Peruvian community, mostly on
the coast, but no particular Morroccan or Arab presence until the 20th
century. It is certainly possible that these dishes have responded to a
recent influence, but more likely that their spicing goes back to the
Spanish colonial period.


--
-Mark H. Zanger
author, The American History Cookbook, The American Ethnic Cookbook for
Students
www.ethnicook.com
www.historycook.com