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Private Notes
Meet your new instructor: internationally acclaimed chef and restaurateur Gabriela Cámara. Gabriela shares how she became a chef, the origin story of her famed restaurant Contramar in Mexico City, and her philosophy on food and hospitality.
It’s hard to overstate the historical, cultural, and nutritional importance of corn in Mexico. Gabriela gives an overview of this staple ingredient, its heirloom varietals, and the processes for nixtamalization and grinding to produce masa.
Using the masa she made in the previous lesson, Gabriela shows you how to make fresh tortillas while explaining her own personal history with tortilla making. Learn how to best store and reheat your tortillas.
Gabriela demonstrates how to prepare the two raw salsas found on every table at Contramar: salsa verde cruda, a vibrant tomatillo and avocado salsa, and salsa brava, a spicy mix of onions and habanero peppers.
Tacos al pastor are the signature street food of Mexico City. Gabriela teaches you how to prepare an at-home version, which includes how to make an adobo rub, marinate the meat, cook pineapple, and assemble (and eat) the tacos.
A favorite at Contramar, pescado a la talla is a whole, butterflied fish with an Italian-driven green sauce on one side and a spicier Mexican red sauce on the other. Learn how to re-create this dish, select fresh fish, and make refried beans.
Gabriela makes her favorite breakfast: huevos rancheros divorciados, with a red salsa on one side and a green salsa on the other. She incorporates fresh tortillas and refried beans from previous lessons.
Using a traditional Mexican molcajete (a mortar and pestle), Gabriela creates a rich, charred, red tomato–based salsa. She also discusses the concept of la milpa, the centuries-old symbiotic crop-growing system.
Often imitated, tostadas de atún is one of Contramar’s most popular dishes. While showing you how to make it, Gabriela tells you how she developed the tuna tostada and its fusion of Mexican, Italian, and Japanese influences.
Mexico City’s take on the quesadilla is usually cheeseless, masa-based, and fried. Gabriela demonstrates how to make quesadillas doradas and introduces you to huitlacoche, a kind of corn fungus that is sometimes referred to as the Mexican truffle.
Aguachile is an acidic, spicy appetizer of seafood cured in lime juice. This aguachile is made of shrimp, lime, quick-pickled red onions, and a chile-based sauce.
Using the masa made earlier in the class, Gabriela teaches you how to make dessert tamales with a guava filling.
Gabriela offers parting thoughts on the importance of hospitality in Mexican culture, how caring about every detail of a dish yields the best results, and why you should never compromise on quality ingredients.
