The Setup

This summer the family and I travelled to Oaxaca, Mexico where my big kids took Spanish immersion classes in a kids summer camp, and I worked remotely for the month of July (there are amazing coworking spaces and cafes with great internet). My youngest shared a babysitter with a friend doing the same with her older kids. We stayed 4 minutes walk from the school, a huge public park with activities galore, and a few minutes walk from the hip neighborhood Jalatlaco.

Rather than take a week of vacation straight, I split it out over the month to spend a few hours each work day (while I had childcare) taking Oaxacan cooking classes at the Spanish immersion school (dusting off my rusty high school Spanish and leaning into my cooking hobby). Classes ran 4 days a week, and the 5th day I took myself on a date to a Michelin rated restaurant. Being one of the food capitals of Mexico, Oaxaca has several.

The Spanish Immersion Cooking Classes

The teacher was careful to offer vegan and vegetarian modifications, and I found that I could easily understand the Spanish and gradually gained confidence in speaking. Much more useful and multipurpose than sitting in a dry classroom conjugating verbs.

What I found was that the homecooking instructed by a local, imprecise as it was, was tastier than the Michelin rated restaurants. Not hugely surprising, but extra motivating to continue to learn to cook well.

I also went on a local food tour with Etnofood traveling to a local’s market and later took a vegetarian cooking class with them!

The Michelin Rated Restaurants

Fine dining in the US is often inspired by French cooking and has too much butter, cream, and meat for a vegan. I’ve had to turn down invitations to the French Laundry and others because there’s no sense in going to watch other people eat. What’s great about cuisine outside of that mold, is that there are often naturally a wider variety of vegan and vegetarian options. I took full advantage of this to sample fine dining in Oaxaca that was rooting in Oaxacan cooking traditions.

Restaurant 1 – La Olla

La Olla probably had the most Michelin like atmosphere. The Squash blossom soup was incredible as was the service. There were plenty of vegan things on the menu. Still I left feeling like home cooking was the way to go

Restaurant 2 – Los Danzantes

Los Danzantes also had very impressive service and food. I found their dishes creative, and the mocktails were fantastic.

Restaurant 3 – Casa Oaxaca

This restaurant wasn’t Michelin starred but just Michelin mentioned, however it was the best in my book of the ones I dined at. The salsa was prepared fresh at the table, and I had four courses (bean soup, fried lettuce, cauliflower mole and dessert). The dessert was an incredible reconstruction of the Black Sapote fruit, which has a puddinglike interior. This was surrounded by chocolate and a gel to make it look like the original fruit and be a delightful puzzle to unpack. It was truly unique and really felt fine dining quality – don’t try this at home!

Returning home – but not leaving what I learned behind

When I returned home I wanted to stock up on some cooking equipment that I missed. After perusing Amazon for quite awhile looking for a molcajete (volcanic mortar and pestle great for salsas), a tortilla press, and a comal (large griddle for cooking tortillas and charring vegetables), the reviews were always mixed and it was unclear whether things were real volcanic stone, the tortilla press would hold up, or the comal would be the right fit. I splurged on buying them from Masienda (molcajete, tortilla press, carbon steel comal) where price and quality seemed to go hand in hand. I’ve been delighted that I’ve been using all three pieces of equipment frequently, both in Mexican inspired cooking and going beyond. I ended up cooking a Oaxacan dinner for 20, which will be the subject of another post, to cap off my month of culinary adventures. Cooking remains a solid hobby of mine, which I go in and out of focus on. The month of travel, language, exploration, and cooking studies was a great combination to level up!