La Mesa del Barrio: A 3-Hour Culinary Experience

Everyone invited! Space is limited!

If you have eaten at Barrio Café or any of the many award-winning restaurants she has created, or seen the articles and television interviews that made you long for a single bite, you already understand what Chef Silvana Salcido Esparza brings to the table.

Her cooking has always been guided by lineage and care. She has said, “I set out to change erroneous perceptions of Mexican cuisine,” and she has done so by honoring the Doñas who taught her, the regions that shaped her, and the traditions she carries in her blood.

La Mesa del Barrio is a three-hour culinary experience hosted at her home in Playas de Rosarito, Baja California, Mexico. It is intimate, generous, and deeply intentional. This is an evening with Chef Silvana in her own kitchen, on her own terms.

Throughout the evening, she prepares a complete menu live while guests observe, listen, and ask questions. She cooks as she always has, with confidence and clarity, sharing technique, memory, and story as the dishes unfold. The Doñas who taught her are present in the pacing of the meal, the way ingredients are handled, the gestures passed down through practice, and the care that shapes each dish.

The demonstration takes place in her transformed show garage, a kitchen that offers a glimpse of what is coming as the Taller de Cocina Mexicana is built. It is a space shaped by intention rather than polish, reflecting a chef whose work has always been rooted in substance.

Following the demonstration, guests are guided into the courtyard of Casa Salcido for a seated, multi-course dining experience featuring the dishes prepared that evening. The meal is refined, grounded, and unmistakably hers. Fine dining a la Mexicana, shaped by tradition, precision, and heart.

For those who have followed Chef Silvana for years, La Mesa del Barrio is a continuation of a lifetime of feeding people well. Proceeds support the Taller de Cocina Mexicana, her tuition-free culinary program for neighborhood youth, extending the same care, discipline, and generosity that have always defined her work.

The 2026 season marks the beginning of this chapter. These gatherings are intentionally intimate. In 2027, the experience will evolve into something more polished and more exclusive. This moment is for those who recognize the lineage, the Doñas, and the love that have always lived at her table.