"THE impact of the Manila Galleon in the Philippines is overrated. What influence could a yearly boat [could possibly have] in the Philippines?" a Filipino friend told me a few years ago. The Manila Galleon traded all kinds of products; many of which are common in Filipino life until today. Tomatoes, potatoes, chocolate, mani (peanuts), avocado or papayas arrived in the Philippines via the Manila Galleon, changing the gastronomic landscape of the archipelago. One of those products was chili: basically, there was no spicy food in Asia, not even the kimchi in Korea — or not, at least, in the way it is commonly eaten today — until the arrival of chili from Mexico. All the Asian species of chili are modern adaptations of the original Mexican chili. Curiously, chili was not well accepted in the Philippines as in other Asian territories with the notable exception of Bicol, where many dishes have a slightly hot taste. Chicken tinola (ginger stew), in its Ilocano version, also carries some chili.
People commonly tend to identify the Galleon Trade with silver, which was the most valuable product. But it also carried many other products such as ivory, pearls, textiles, etc. One of those products was slaves. The issue has been very well studied by professor Tatiana Seijas in his book Asian Slaves in Colonial Mexico: From Chinos to Indians (Cambridge University Press, 2014). Now, a genetical research study published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society just two months ago shows that Mexicans from the state of Guerrero, where the Acapulco port is, carry a comparatively high percentage of genes from Asia although it can be found also in other neighboring states of Mexico. The title of the article is "The genetic legacy of the Manila Galleon Trade in Mexico," and it was carried out by seven researchers working in Mexican and US universities.
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