What to expect from our three-day Culinary Boot Camps?
Feb 9, 2026 | 6 min read
Guests kept saying “now what?”… Well, this is what!
Written by Jorge Fitz | Photos by Crysel Bravo
Atten-tion! On three intense days, you and your fellow participants will prepare almost forty recipes, each the perfect lesson for numerous essential techniques. A great maneuver that ups your kitchen’s dynamic and creative energies.
But… it is intense! If you're looking for a more breezy experience, our Raíces chef's table dinner is a memorable standalone experience. Otherwise, batten down the hatches: here we go!
What can you expect from a three-day culinary boot camp?
The Casa Jacaranda Boot Camp is three intense days of hands-on Mexican cooking in Mexico City, where you prepare close to forty recipes and learn the essential techniques behind them. Day one starts in the traditional markets, choosing ingredients by season and quality. Day two is fire and tradition, turning simple ingredients into deep-flavored dishes through techniques like tatemado, frying salsas, and nixtamal. Day three covers spices, regional history, and street flavors. Each day ends with a shared celebration dinner, often with small-batch Mexican wines and agave distillates like tequila, mezcal, and raicilla.
Three intense days of hands-on Mexican cooking in Mexico City
Close to forty recipes and the essential techniques behind them
Day one in the markets: ingredients, seasonality, quality
Day two, fire and tradition: tatemado, frying salsas, nixtamal
Day three: spices, regional history, and street flavors
Each day ends with a shared celebration dinner
First Foray:
Markets, the Beating Heart of Mexican Food
The adventure begins before you strike a single match. Alongside our best chefs, you’ll plunge into traditional markets, to discover one-of-a-kind ingredients that lie at the foundations of the nation’s inimitable flavor. Seasonality is a must. You’ll learn about traits that identify quality, freshness and what time of year ingredients should be used. They are the pillars truly authentic cooking demands.
Second Advance:
Fire and Tradition
Hit the ground running. The target is transforming basic ingredients into deep-flavor plates. You’ll get that Mexican food’s magic comes from simple steps, tasks that hearken to a time when you cooked slower and harnessed your expert ingredients knowledge. Grandmother-style cooking steers what we do toward taste levels that excite and inspire.
Basic training includes mastering three essential techniques:
-
Direct cooking on griddles or over flame that brings out deep, smoky tastes, plus a subtle, desirable bitterness, key to preparing chiles, tomatoes and sundry spices. It’s the secret to numerous moles and rich, complex salsas.
-
More than just blending, light caramelization and hot-oil contact lend brilliance, body and depth to salsas. It’s the only way to make it happen.
-
An age-old technique Mexico’s pre-Hispanic civilizations devised transforms corn into a dough whose elasticity, nutrients, aromatic complexity and flavor are key to hundreds of Mexican specialties.
Boot Camp is intense. But also a warm scene for enhanced agility, discovery and joy. Get ready for that transformative moment when you add a step you never knew, to a recipe that comes out perfect.
Forward March:
Spices, History, Street Flavors
Boot Camp explores Mexico’s vast regional diversity, in everything from old family recipes to the vibrant flavors that have popped up at street stalls. Every plate you prepare is a historical document.
Understanding spices and their contexts is a critical point on all three days:
-
In plates like cochinita pibil, connected to Maya culture, or chiles en nogada, that celebrates Mexican independence—alongside many other recipes—Casa Jacaranda’s top chefs take you through their cultural and historic relevance.
-
You’ll recreate street-food classics—carnitas tacos, stews called caldos, and the salsa for the roast beef or goat specialty known as birria—as you add your professional technique and what you’ve learned to honor the original taste and popularity.
-
Boot camp chefs present a wealth of personalized tips to add the perfect touch to a mole or adobo. You’ll tap into secrets granny swore never to share. Once you master spicing, technique and authentic tastes, your culinary knowledge takes on a before-and-after vibe. Your three days activate what Mexicans call sazón, an innate, perhaps magical ability to add perfect taste to anything you cook. It comes from the love you add to ingredients and flavors…just like grandma did.
Mastering spice, technique and authentic taste, your cooking feels like a before-and-after
Leverage every recommendation, every secret revealed…to blaze your own trail to the most authentic or innovative Mexico City tastes.
Magical Experiences
Boot Camp days wrap with a celebration where you and your fellow participants share everything they cooked, a well-deserved rest around the dinner table. As flavors mix, you’ll realize the finest ingredient in Mexican cooking is its human connection.
As flavors mix, you’ll realize the finest ingredient in Mexican cooking is its human connection.
At the day’s-end meal, you’ll savor splendid, small-batch Mexican wines…or discover new enthusiasm for agave distillates like tequila, mescal and raicilla. The selection reveals how provenance and regional plant varieties create an infinite spiritual universe.
Small Print
The 2026 Boot Camp calendar is in place:
30 July-1 August - USD 1,738.
17-19 September - USD 1,738.
Recommendations:
Fly in to Mexico City at least a day before Boot Camp commences
Plan a four-day+ stay, or a night-flight back home
The address is Calle Milan 41, in Colonia Juárez, a close-in neighborhood that offers an ample variety of lodgings for any budget. We recommend staying in nearby districts, particularly Juárez, Cuauhtémoc, Roma or Condesa
Get a good night’s rest
Comfortable clothes and shoes
Email us ASAP to lock in your experience. No FOMO!
Your Boot Camp investment goes way beyond recipes. It ups your creative energies and reminds you there’s always a new taste to explore from Mexico’s wide-ranging and delicious cuisines.
Boot Camp Cancellation Policy
We will refund 80% of the reservation cost if cancellation is made at least 30 days in advance. For cancellations made less than 30 days prior, there will be no reimbursement. However, we can reschedule your experience based on availability, or you may transfer your spot to someone else for your booked date or another available date.
Take on a life-changing experience.
We guarantee you’ll feel right at home!
Ready to join us? View boot camp dates and reserve your spot — or explore all our experiences to find the right fit.
Frequently Asked Questions
-
Day one begins in the traditional markets, learning to choose ingredients by season, freshness, and quality. Day two focuses on fire and tradition, turning simple ingredients into deep-flavored dishes through techniques like tatemado, frying salsas, and nixtamal. Day three covers spices, regional history, and street flavors.
-
Over the three days you prepare close to forty recipes, each one a lesson in an essential technique. Core techniques include tatemado, frying salsas, and nixtamal, along with how to use and contextualize Mexican spices.
-
The 2026 sessions run July 30 to August 1 and September 17 to 19. The boot camp is held at Calle Milan 41 in Colonia Juarez, a central Mexico City neighborhood.
-
The team recommends flying into Mexico City at least a day before the boot camp begins, and planning a stay of four days or more, or a night flight home. Nearby neighborhoods to stay in include Juarez, Cuauhtemoc, Roma, and Condesa. Comfortable clothes and shoes are advised, along with a good night's rest beforehand.
-
You receive an 80% refund if you cancel at least 30 days in advance. For cancellations made less than 30 days before, there is no refund, but you can reschedule based on availability or transfer your spot to someone else, for the booked date or another available date.
