How-To Video: Cure a Molcajete with Melissa Guerra

Melissa Guerra, one of TLK’s featured chefs, is an 8^th generation Texan, and self-taught culinary expert and food historian living in San Antonio. Melissa will be sharing her recipe secrets with TLK in a series of how-to videos that recreate authentic Latin dishes. In this video, Melissa tackles how to cure a molcajete. Last week, Melissa introduced us to the molcajete, standbsy in Latin kitchens, used in making delicious and authentic salsas and guacamoles and helping in prep work of grinding spices. But they must be cured (to clean out grit and dirt from the natural stone) before they can be used.

Below, Melissa shows TLK viewers how to cure a molcajete.

Melissa Guerra, born and raised on a working cattle ranch in South Texas, specializes in the foods of the Americas, especially Texas regional, Mexican, and Latin American cuisine. A cooking course instructor and public speaker, Guerra owns andoperates a website and storefront, The Latin Kitchen Market, dedicated to providing top quality Latin American kitchenware and ingredients. Her newest store at the Pearl Brewery in San Antonio—also the location of the new Culinary Institute of America’s Center for Foods of the Americas—was designated as the #1 shopping destination in San Antonio, the #3 shopping destination in the United States by Lonely Planet Guidebook (2011).  Guerra’s cookbook Dishes from the Wild Horse Desert: Norteño Cuisine of South Texas (Wiley, 2006) was a finalist for a James Beard Award in the category of Foods of the Americas, and an International Association of Culinary Professionals award in the same category.

What cooking demos would you want to see next on The Latin Kitchen? Tell us on Twitter and our Facebook page!