Mexican Name Finder
Main dishSpanishnationwide

Calabacitas

"little squashes"

Say it

kah·lah·bah·SEE·tas

Built from

Spanish calabazasquash, gourd+-itasdiminutive plural

What Calabacitas means

Calabacitas is a Mexican main dish name of Spanish origin meaning "little squashes". It is built from Spanish calabaza (squash, gourd) and -itas (diminutive plural). It is pronounced kah-lah-bah-SEE-tas, and it is most associated with the whole country.

Calabaza covers the whole squash family, a group of plants domesticated in Mexico thousands of years before the Spanish word for them arrived.

This is a site about what Mexican words mean, so there is no recipe here. For the name itself: The plated dishes, most named for a cooking method or a place. Cochinita pibil is pork cooked in a píib, the Maya earth oven. Barbacoa gave English the word barbecue. Chiles en nogada is named for the walnut sauce that covers it.

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Calabacitas means little squashes

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