Restaurants Part 2: Love letter to De-temporada

When I was a teen, I dreamed of having a coffee shop. For some reason, I thought that it was so romantic. It was one of those businesses I visualized myself having, working, and enjoying. It was a place to meet new people that would keep me on my feet, and I would live comfortably.

"San Miguel's most-buzzed-about new restaurant, De Temporada (Camino a San Miguel Viejo 8), brings new meaning to the farm-to-table concept. The table is literally at the farm, 10 minutes from Centro, overlooking fields of organic produce. The humble, colorful shed built by the young owners (he's American; she's Mexican) from wood pallets gives the air of a picnic, but this is not your ordinary picnic food. Dishes like the spicy papaya, octopus salad, and quail eggs on mustard butter with arugula purée indicate a mature but playful hand in the kitchen. A fine afternoon in the country is finished with a divine pear and vanilla bean panna cotta; 300 pesos for two" 36 hours in San Miguel by the New York Times.

Hello, Welcome to my personal food blog, "Kitchen and Letters,"

Maybe this story is still a bit hard to tell, but in a way is one of the many reasons I'm here writing about my experience with food. In the last 4 years, I have experienced many significant growing things in my life, one of which Im highly responsible for: closing my own restaurant.

I am trying to remember who took this photo. The girl next to me was my cook, right hand, teammate, and friend. Her name is Juana. The day she came for her interview, I have so tired and annoyed that I rudely told her: Look, I need a cook. Do you know how to cook? She said no, but I needed the job. I asked her: If you are willing to learn, I will teach you; Im a good teacher. She said yes! Juana was terrific. She could control the kitchen in a month, clean, and lead; she was SO good, never came late, and always worked her best. OH, if I miss her.

I remember what we were trying to do as publicity, and we needed some photos. I'm so glad we did it! This was taken on a winter day; Juana was the BEST. One of the things that hurt me the most was losing Juana when I closed. I had not heard back from her when I returned from a needed trip. If I would dream of we were of open the restaurant with two pots and pans! I know that for sure.

De temporada was born sometime in 2009. I always wanted a small, seasonal cafe with zero waste. I wanted a place with a strong sense of belonging that represented who I was. I thought about it in so many ways. Years passed, and the idea kept growing; I kept imagining it, I honestly never thought I was going to make it happen, but I did; in a way, it happened like life happens; you get tired of doing the same thing over and over when you know you can do better when you know you have a dream that you strongly believe in. So, the day came, and I built it with a chef that became a partner; it took us 10 weeks to set the whole thing from nothing. I had the land, and the farm was my parents; it was already a busy and known place out of town where people knew to buy fresh vegetables. I had the name; we both built it and created a menu, the kitchen, furniture, garden, and compostable toilets. It was my dream come true. I knew the hard work was just starting. We built it barefoot and did most of the work, from pallets to bricks to menu and social media. We did it all. We knew what it truly costs to build, choose every detail, paint, and put all those pallets together! For me was THE most beautiful place on earth, it was the place! And the food is simple, fresh, and versatile! Ten weeks and we had a fully functioning kitchen with all the bins possible to reduce waste; we created a menu with locally sourced food with little food miles, if possible organic, and all trash was reused; for me, it was the DREAM.

Soon after we opened, we appeared in the 36 hrs from the New York Times in San Miguel. After that, we just kept climbing. My business partner left in the summer of 2013, and I continued to run the restaurant the best I could. The restaurant's reputation grew, and I worked as hard as possible. It was my baby, my dream. It was me in it, everything I stand for; I imagined it from the beginning, every single little step, all the romantics and none. I wanted to be perfect, so what happened? I was alone working in this remarkable place. I was in debt, working all week plus volunteering and kayaking, and guess what? I got burned out! Yeap, that sort of thing does happen. I was tired of all the daily troubles, mistakes, and drama that kept me from growing, and I gave up! I did not know how to sit back for a moment. I thought I could do it, and I ran a restaurant primarily by myself for over 3 years. I gave my heart and soul to make it happen.

For some time, I have had this post on draft. Today I want to share something about what De Temporada has and keeps meaning in my life, but every time I start writing about it, I get writer's block! I have so many feelings about this "shack chic" that I do not know where to start. Last week, I took time off while I was away, and De temporada appeared in the conversation several times. I need help keeping the past in the past, especially concerning De temporada.

"I do not remember when I first went to a restaurant; I might have been young and did not think it was an important moment of my life, but I remember spending a lot of time in restaurants. Many family celebrations happened in restaurants, which is unsurprising to many of us. I remember my parents closing businesses in fancy restaurants, and before the "deal" was written on paper, it was a known code of trust to invite the person or company you were dealing with to a nice fancy meal. As a teenager, I accompanied my parents to many of those meals; I remember once asking my mother why they had to pay for such an expensive meal to close a deal and how they knew it was set. She told me: because we were sharing a meal in a fancy restaurant, part of the business. I remember wanting to grow up and have someone to invite me to a fancy restaurant.

After that, many personal and impersonal moments happened in restaurants, from dates to marriage proposals. We have our favorite ones, even those we will travel long distances to visit. We choose our restaurants according to emotions and food choices.

In 2007, I was bored with my life and unhappy. So I took the organic vegetable crop inspector course in Sonoma, California. The food I had for a week was unique, like my good old times in London. That was not what I wanted. I wanted to learn about food habits and am close relationship with. I did not persist with becoming an organic inspector. Then the following year, 2009, De temporada was born as an idea; I was again not happy, I had to do something, so I started planning this great restaurant idea with a friend. I wanted to apply everything I had learned about food in restaurants, books, organic and non-organic fields, markets, and every thought about the food that had ever gone through my mind. I wanted to apply it to De-Temporada. It had to be sustainable, seasonal, fun, and different. I had to have all."

As I'm writing this, many years after De Temporada closed and many months after I started writing this post, and I kept putting it off, I realized that I was not ready to talk about this baby until I had another dream, sometimes I want to call it De temporada II, but I will not, or maybe I will. After I closed, I felt so guilty, mainly because my life felt apart. I thought I couldn't dream about any other dream like that again because I felt that I had let that dream down, and that dream was great! It had everything; when I say everything, I mean everything that is meant to me and keeps meaning to me. So, I wanted to reinvent myself, which I have been doing for the past few years. I took on photography( obviously food photography and recently documenting behind the scenes of food vendors and food creators), but I needed more. While having De temporada, I got a little piece of land that is my pride and joy. Sometimes when time permitted, I wondered what to do there. I always wanted to transfer to the restaurant there and build an alternative cooking school where I could teach cooking, sociology, and all the cool things that can be learned in a kitchen( basically, you can know anything, don't test me on this. You will lose!) So, after years of procrastinating and torturing myself for not sitting down for a bit, instead of closing down De temporada, after many jobs and new business failers, I have decided that somehow I'm going to make my new dream come true, with more success of what De temporada had. I will mix food, photography, writing, and workshops together. I will make it happen, and it is going to be amazing. Now the modality is online, so I will do it that way and in person.

In a way, this blog was the beginning of this. I wanted to find my roots again, return to food, write to experimental cooking, teach, and learn, but I would not and will not say goodbye to photography and return it to a box, keeping it as a hobby. I will put all those fantastic things together and play with them.

Restaurants and food are my life. I love to eat, write, cook and have the freedom to cook and understand our world. I love all the kitchenware, the cookbooks! OMG, the cookbooks- the photography in them is superb- I can talk about food for days with no end, and how we relate to food is even more unique and full of magic. Food is food; nothing can come close to it, but then again, photography is that medium where food, experiences, and life is captured and kept forever!

I have to keep writing to find the spark again; I'm ready to create something extraordinary with a big soul and purpose. In the past few weeks, I have been working a lot on my goal, in what I have lost and need to find again; becoming an entrepreneur and having a new business is what I want, and I'm ready again! I'm prepared to bring all the good things that De temporada gave me and continue to give to my new" baby" I like complicated, unique, and special items and this new project will be a challenge. I hope to find Juana; if not, someone I can connect with as I did with her.

I will keep you posted,

With love for food

Iliana

xoxo

Links:

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/travel/36-hours-in-san-miguel-de-allende-mexico.html