The Massacre of the Goats
Every October the city of Huajuapan prepares itself for the biggest culinary feast of the year as locals and visitors alike crowd in to feast on an orgy of all things goat. Seven thousand of the unfortunate animals will die for the festival in which restaurants and cultural centres around Huajuapan all vie to offer the best dinner party in town. Recipes handed down through the generations are dusted off by local chefs who have been preparing the main dishes for years and the town dons its Sunday best to turn out and try the delicacies.
This is the festival of "The massacre of the goats" for which preparation will have begun in May of the year before, when local families of shepherds lead the chosen goats into the hills around the city. There they will stay for the next year and a half. It is of the upmost importance that they don't drink any water during this period, only consuming moisture from the grass and herbs they eat, thus giving their flesh its leanness and unique flavour. In October of the following year, the goats are led down from the hills to the local haciendas on the outskirts of Huajuapan.
Big crowds turn out to see the first goat meet its fate, helped on its way by a community leader before the professionals get down to the grisly business, which is quite a specialized art. First the animal is rendered insensible before the "Picador" punctures its throat with his spear like apparatus. The dead animal is then swiftly skinned with great care not to damage the valuable hide, before the carcass is taken apart, with the hooves, bones, kidneys, ribs and all of the other parts finding their way to separate areas of the hacienda to be processed accordingly.
The meat then finds its way to the restaurants for the local chefs to practise their art. The most popular dish is "Calde de Caderas", a soup made from the bones of the goat. Legend has it that it was originally prepared by workers at the haciendas who were given the bones after the more prized parts of the goat had been eaten by the upper classes. One day the hacienda owner decided to try the workers soup, and he liked it so much he ordered it to be prepared for all his friends. From this point on it became the main festival dish, sold at every restaurant in town and commanding a prestigious price.
However, no part of the goat goes to waste. Of the edible parts the "chicharron" (fried skin), the spine and the cured, salted flesh are the most sought after, together with the teats of the animal which are fried in fat and then sold as a delicacy in the hacienda shop. The fat is used for the production of soap, the skin for shoes and even the horns are taken by local factories to produce buttons. Vast quantities of goats will be killed every day for a month but the first weekend is when the celebration reaches its climax.
The story of the festival begins in May 1812, when the battle for independence was in full swing and Spanish forces were surrounding the rebel town of Huajuapan. The local Commander Valerio Trujano, in a last ditch attempt to feed the starving population, ordered a great massacre of all the town's goats. The trick worked and the city lasted out the siege. However it wasn’t until the beginning of the twentieth century that it became an annual occurrence as Spanish landowners began to hanker for the meat on a grand scale. Local haciendas turned into killing factories with huge ovens and spacious courtyards in which to facilitate the demand.
Nowadays, the fame of the festival has spread and orders for the meat are placed from all the surrounding towns and also throughout the neighbouring state of Puebla. The massacre generates employment for hundreds of people and feeds many more as the town celebrates its unique gastronomic event in a blast of tequila, mariachi music and seemingly endless plates of goat meat.
By John Holman
A special thanks to L.C. David Sanjuan Zamora for information from his pamphlet "Mixteca Nuestra: Edicion especial October 2008, La Matanza Huajuapan"