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Truly Fine Dining While this spiritual meaning of food in Oaxaca is hard for outsiders to grasp, it can be glimpsed when one chances upon a heavenly meal. And these, we learned, were most often found in the simplest of restaurants. El Topil, a tiny, unassuming place wholly free of decoration, did not look particularly promising, but I had read of its moles, so we waited for nearly an hour, sipping bottled water and looking into the kitchen from time to time to make sure we hadn’t been forgotten. We stuck it out, and once our meals arrived – carried out on mismatched plates by the cook – they were rich and complex, perfectly spicy, perfectly sweet. At Comedor La Fonda, tucked away in the Etla market, we sat at a plastic table on wobbly chairs, while in the open kitchen enormous pots bubbled on an old stove, plates of fresh tortillas wrapped in tea towels kept warm on the counter, and three generations of family prepared our lunch. The result was one of the tastiest meals of our trip: a crunchy tlayuda smothered in black bean paste and topped with fresh cheese, then loosely rolled cheese enchiladas in mole negro and spicy, sautéed strips of steak. For dessert, we headed to a market ice-cream stand, and after sampling spoonfuls of everything from arroz con leche (rice pudding) to zapote, we settled on leche quemada (burnt milk pudding) and pecan. Best of all, however, was the market itself. Tiny tables overflowed with numerous varieties of mango, avocados, citrus fruits of all colors and sizes, chirimoyas, guayabanas, chayotes and zapotes. Sun-wizened women in long white braids and aprons scooped huitlacoche (corn mushrooms) and squash blossoms from overflowing pails into clear plastic bags. Burlap sacks bulging with a seemingly infinite variety of dried peppers made our noses itch. Vanilla beans, piloncillo cones, pots of local honey and blocks of chocolate were stacked on wooden shelves. Endless rows of bread came, we learned, from villages where half of the inhabitants are bakers. Heaping baskets of chili-sautéed grasshoppers were everywhere, and my fiancé finally succumbed to the pressure of a particularly aggressive and mostly toothless elderly woman. “Crispy on the outside, juicy in the middle and spicy, like a dried shrimp filled with paprika juice” was his verdict while I vowed not to kiss him for a week. Tall bags were stuffed with seeds, and dozens of herbs were displayed on benches with hand-scrawled signs listing the ailment each would cure. Arthritic pain? Drink uña de gato. Sty on your eye? Try hierba de la golondrina. And almost all of these ingredients – minus the herbs, but including shrimp, beer and tequila – also existed in the form of ice cream. We wondered why many of these products never appeared on a restaurant menu. Where were the mangos and the mameys? The zapotes and the unusual herbs? Were they only used at home? Luckily, by the end of our stay, we had stumbled upon Alejandro Ruiz. The first chef to truly receive international acclaim in Oaxaca, Ruiz takes advantage of local products and adapts the flavors he enjoyed as a child to create something new. So, on our final night, we dined in Ruiz’s upscale restaurant, Casa Oaxaca, located near the Santo Domingo cathedral. The modern courtyard setting was intimate and peaceful, with floor-level candles and a romantic roving musician named Napoleon. The menu was inspiring, to say the least. There were jicama “tacos” filled with grasshoppers, huitlacoche, stringy cheese and pomegranate seeds. Prawns stuffed with guajillo chili, served with baked plantain and chayote puré. Mamey tart with mango sauce and chocolate mousse with almond brittle, topped with black zapote. Here, finally, was the diversity we had seen in the market. Even after 9,000 years, Oaxacan food is still evolving for the better. We walked back under a full moon with purple petals falling from the jacaranda trees and passed the tortilla stand, its TV still blaring. The scent of crisping tortillas was tempting (and we would have loved to sit and watch that night’s episode of the soap opera), but we couldn’t eat a single epazote more.• >> Where to Sleep, Where to Eat, What to See LAN flights: To Mexico City every day from Santiago (Chile) and three times a week from Lima. Take the most convenient connection to Oaxaca with Aeroméxico or Mexicana. |
