What do New Mexico zombies eat? Brain tacos, of course.

• 2 lbs. brains
• 6–8 tortillas
• 1 fresh tomato, sliced
• 1 small onion, diced, shredded lettuce
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• salt and pepper to taste

Cover brains with water in saucepan, add salt and simmer 15 minutes. Drain well and mash with fork while adding seasonings. Cover and keep warm while preparing taco shells. Fill shells with brain mixture, onions, tomatoes, and shredded lettuce. Serve immediately.

The recipe is from Yolanda Ortiz y Pino’s Original Native New Mexican Cooking. Sure, she specifies “beef brains,” but we know better, don’t we.

Scholars have taken notice of the fact that “the zombie is ubiquitous in popular culture, as note Deborah Christie and Sarah Juliet Lauro, editors of Better Off Dead: The Evolution of the Zombie as Post-Human (2011), which I am just getting around to reading.

One of the contributors, Lynn Pifer, (English, Mansfield U.) notes that the George Romero-style zombie hordes have completely supplanted the old-style Haitian worker-zombie in popular culture.

Something I doubt that any of the contributors deal with is the popularity of the zombie-as-Other in the shooting sports.