MARILAU – Mexican Ancestry Cooking School
Sally’s Place Online Newsletter
by Arlene Krasner
MARILAU, Mexican Ancestry Cooking School, is based on her family’s recipes, which date over 200 years old and were handed down to her from her grandmother and mother.
Marilau has been teaching traditional Mexican cooking in San Miguel since 1989 and has been cooking even longer. She keeps her classes small, limiting them to a maximum of ten people. The class that I attended had five people and one eater who just came for lunch. Lucky man!
Marilau demonstrated a traditional sopa (soup) and a sauce that is excellent over pork or chicken. Since nothing was prepared in advance, we learned the techniques of how to clean and use dried chilies, cook rice by boiling in oil, and use nuts to thicken sauces.
According to Marilau, Mexicans do not use olive oil or wine in their cooking because the Spaniards did not allow them to grow olive trees or vineyards; Spain wanted to control the pricing of those items. Consequently, in Mexican cooking, you use pork lard or vegetable oil, never olive oil or butter. You use beer, but not wine. And sauces are thickened by ground nuts, never by flour.
In the class, Marilau deftly demonstrated the traditional techniques while we sipped on Hibiscus water (Aqua de Jamaica). As a treat, she heated up some frozen mole so we could sample the sauce. After tasting her mole, I’m looking forward to her three-hour mole class.
Marilau offers hands-on classes at $99 USD per person per class and are available all year long. Payment is in American dollars or its equivalent in Mexican pesos.
Marilau holds classes Monday through Friday, beginning at 10:00 a.m. She offers an assortment of classes and will design a class specifically for you. The minimum enrollment is 2 students for hands on. For more information, visit Marilau’s website (Mexican Cooking School) for class information and registration. You can contact Marilau by email at classinfo@marilau.com and you may watch her presentation video at: