Merida Market Tour

A Venture into a colorful market to learn about local foods.

Adventures Mexico, an inbound tour company in Merida who specializes in culinary tours and cantina tours was our host. Our guide, Thelma Osorio, guided us through a large market where you can get all foods Yucateco. We were on a mission to get ingredients for our cooking class at her colleague’s home.

Aztecan cuisine is heavy in corn, pumpkins, chilies (they love habanero chilies), tamales (their own variety- very different from the ones we see here in So Cal), fruits such as Mamay, Rambutan, Bananas, strawberries, Dragon fruit, Avocados. We went to the huge market in Merida on a mission to get ingredients for our cooking class at her colleague’s home.

Today’s menu Cheese Empanadas, Pork Achiote, Guacamole and Mango Mousse.

Thelma Osorio from Adventures Mexico
Thelma Osorio from Adventures Mexico

I was surprised to see the vendor and his Rambutan pyramid outside the market. I haven’t seen so many of these fruit since I was in Bali 20 years ago. The fruit is spiny outside and once opened it’s a white fruit. You just put the whole thing in your mouth. The fruit is very sweet.

Rambutan vendor outside of the market
Rambutan vendor outside of the market
Preparation of Recado Negro

I was intrigued by all the unique spices I tasted after our dinner at Ku’uk Restaurant. We had some foods spiced with recado negro and achiote. What are these? https://spicetrekkers.com/recipes/recado-negro—black-recado explains how to make this spice blend of charred chilies. I’m including this video on how to make a recado.

Spice stall
Spice stall
pumpkins are grown in the Yucatan
pumpkins that are grown in the Yucatan
Mamay
Mamay
ground pumpkin seeds

Ground pumpkin seed to make a pumpkinseed dip.

dried corn vendor
dried corn vendor
various locally grown chilies
various locally grown chilies
herb vendor
herb vendor
Sour orange, unique to the area
Sour orange, unique to the area
butcher at the market
butcher at the market
Making Masa. 100% corn
Making Masa. 100% corn
tortilla maker machine
tortilla maker machine
marzipan sweets
marzipan sweets

After touring throughout the market, we headed out to Mercedes’ house, to cook our meal.

Continue to the next story about the group cooking Cheese Empanadas and Pork Achiote.

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