Inside the Michelin-Starred Mexican Restaurant Hidden in a Strip Mall — Mise En Place

Quick Overview

Executive Chef Emmanuel Chavez of Tatemo in Houston, Texas, details the rigorous, highly focused preparation behind his Michelin-starred Mexican tasting menu, which involves traditional techniques like nixtamalization for masa and labor-intensive curing for duck, all executed in a small kitchen space to maintain quality and tradition.

Key Points: Tatemo, located in a Houston strip mall, earned a Michelin star for its 15-seat tasting menu, which heavily incorporates traditional Mexican elements. The team processes corn daily, using a specialized machine to turn different colored corn varieties into masa, which is never rinsed to preserve starch. A key dish is the 'Enmolada' featuring A5 New York Strip, mole negro, and chapulines (grasshoppers), which is served as a taco on a plantain tortilla. Duck legs are cured for one day, rinsed, patted dry, seared skin-side down until almost burnt, then confited in duck fat with aromatics like orange and garlic for two hours. The team also prepares a highly technical blue masa quesadilla filled with Oaxaca cheese, huitlacoche, and chapulines. Chef Chavez emphasizes that the Mexican culinary landscape, particularly in Houston, is diverse and that every dish must balance sweet, acidic, savory, nutty, and spicy elements, reflecting the culture's depth.

Context: This video profiles Emmanuel Chavez, the Executive Chef-Owner of Tatemo in Houston, Texas, a restaurant that has achieved Michelin recognition despite its unassuming strip mall location. The segment focuses on the intensive 'Mise En Place' process that supports Tatemo's highly detailed, modern Mexican tasting menu, highlighting the dedication to traditional ingredients like corn (maize) and complex preparations like duck confit and mole.

Detailed Analysis

Chef Emmanuel Chavez of Tatemo explains that his 15-seat tasting menu is deeply rooted in Mexican culinary tradition, even as they push boundaries with modern techniques. The process starts with nixtamalizing corn—using three different colored corn varieties (red, black, yellow) to create masa for tortillas and sopes, avoiding rinsing to keep the beneficial starch. They process about 80 pounds of masa weekly. For the duck carnitas, they cure the duck legs for a day, rinse them, pat them dry, and sear the skin side extremely hard (almost burning it) before confiting them in duck fat with orange, garlic, and cinnamon for two hours. The final duck preparation, the 'Enmolada,' uses a plantain tortilla, mole negro, and duck carnitas. Another dish is a 'Quesadilla' featuring Oaxaca cheese, huitlacoche, and chapulines (grasshoppers) encased in a blue masa shell. Chavez stresses the importance of balancing flavors—sweet, acid, nutty, savory, and spicy—as a foundation of his cooking, inspired by the diversity of Texas and his Mexican heritage. The kitchen operates with high focus, using precise measurements (e.g., weighing masa portions to 25 grams) to execute the complex dishes, which include a dessert course featuring a bunuelo, fruit de pate, and Mexican concha, all prepared with extreme care.