Pib

The pib is the traditional Maya earth oven of the Yucatán Peninsula, a pit in which food is buried to cook. It gives its name to cochinita pibil and other dishes described as pibil.

Etymology

Larousse derives pib from the Maya píib. The Diario de Yucatán explains pibil as buried or under the ground. By extension the word refers both to the oven and to the foods cooked in it.

Description

Larousse describes the pib as an oven built below ground, used throughout the Yucatán Peninsula and resembling the pit used for barbacoa in central Mexico; the dictionary's barbacoa entry traces central Mexican barbacoa to the Maya pib. México Desconocido notes that pit-cooking of pork and chicken in Yucatán, in cochinita pibil and mucbipollo, is an exception to the central Mexican pattern of lamb barbacoa.

History

Anthropologist Indalecio Cardeña Vázquez, quoted by the Diario de Yucatán, argues that burying food to cook it probably predates the Spanish, given the Maya origin of the word, and that the Maya cooked game such as peccary, deer and wild turkey. Pork arrived with the Spanish in the first half of the sixteenth century, so cochinita pibil as a pork dish is colonial. Food & Pleasure associates cochinita with the Hanal Pixán days of the dead, from 31 October to 2 November, and notes that ordinary ovens and steamers have largely replaced the pib, which nonetheless remains in use in Yucatán.

Modern practice

Larousse notes that cochinita is now often baked in a conventional oven or steamed; home recipes such as one published by Excélsior wrap the marinated pork in banana leaf and bake it for several hours.

Reviews

See also

• Tacos de cochinita pibil
• Barbacoa pit
• Banana leaf
• Achiote
• Naranja agria

References

1. "Pib". Larousse Cocina (Diccionario enciclopédico de la Gastronomía Mexicana). Retrieved 2026-10-10.
2. "Barbacoa". Larousse Cocina (Diccionario enciclopédico de la Gastronomía Mexicana). Retrieved 2026-10-10.
3. "Cochinita pibil: cinco precisiones sobre su supuesto origen prehispánico". Diario de Yucatán. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
4. "Cochinita pibil". Food & Pleasure. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
5. "Cochinita pibil". Larousse Cocina (Diccionario enciclopédico de la Gastronomía Mexicana). Retrieved 2026-10-10.
6. "Los tacos (primera parte)". México Desconocido. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
7. "Prepara cochinita pibil desde cero: receta tradicional yucateca". Excélsior. Retrieved 2026-10-10.