the.com/nixtamal

means Dried corn kernels that have been cooked and steeped in an alkaline solution (traditionally lime, calcium hydroxide) to loosen their hulls and unlock nutrients, making masa for tortillas and tamales possible.

from From Nahuatl nixtamalli, itself a blend of nextli ('ashes' or 'lime') and tamalli ('unformed corn dough,' the same root that gives us 'tamale'). The process — nixtamalization — is an Mesoamerican innovation, predating European contact: soaking maize in an alkaline bath makes niacin and amino acids bioavailable, which is why corn-dependent diets built on this technique thrived where untreated-corn diets elsewhere led to nutritional deficiency. The word traveled into Spanish as nixtamal and from there into English food-science vocabulary largely intact.