Oaxaca is famous for its cuisine. Therefore, I excitedly accepted the offer to join a cooking class together with a couple of my colleagues one day before the conference started. The classes are run by a woman whose in-laws run a bed and breakfast where my colleagues were staying, and are held in the outdoor kitchen in the family’s garden on the mountain slope overlooking downtown Oaxaca. I cannot imagine a more beautiful spot for cooking.
We started the class by going to the market to buy our ingredients. Vegetables, spices, chicken – the variety and color a joy to behold. Many things I could recognize (although the diversity of chilies or tomatoes was fascinating), while others felt quite odd.
The moldy maize, for example. It is called huitlacoche and is actually maize infested with a fungus that makes it get a rich umami flavor, a little bit like mushrooms or black garlic. And the deep-fried crickets – that are actually delicious, if spiced properly with chili and salt and sprinkled with lime juice.
We were going to make a three-course meal: Enchiladas with huitlacoche and cheese, mole colorado and caramelized guava for dessert. The enchiladas were quite easy, we just needed to roll the dough, flatten it, bake it on the tortilla plate and then fill it with the huitlacoche and cheese that we had prepared. And the guavas needed to be cut and put in the melted brown sugar to simmer. It all took time to make, but it was not complicated.
With the mole, though, it was enough to make your head spin. There were peppers, tomatoes and plantains that needed to be fried separately, several different types of dried chilies roasted, broth made with the chicken and then the chicken separated from its bones, onions and apples boiled in the broth with spices, and then everything (except the chicken) combined in the right order while simmering and mixed to make a smooth, sweet, savory and hot sauce with a flavor as nuanced and deep as its shade of red. It was served on top of black tortillas with the chicken, parsley and some local, feta-like cheese sprinkled on top. And a generous sip of mezcal, of course.
In the end, it took us half a day to prepare this meal of appetizer enchiladas, mole colorado and dessert guavas. Not a meal you would prepare on a normal weekday after work. But for a special occasion. All that time and detail, the steps that go into preparing the sauce and the tortillas, the planning behind it. That is love. Forget buying fancy presents and going for luxurious vacations. Make a meal like this. Delicious, nutritious, something to savour and then remember. A building block of true intimacy.
Oaxaca truly has amazing food.
Katja Malmborg 
inspirerande!!