A Guatemalan Cooking Class | Cuscun Culinary School

Of all the trips I’ve been on, I truly felt most immersed in Guatemala. Aside from visits to local markets and Mayan villages, taking a Guatemalan cooking class was as cinematic as it sounds. When I think about travel, food is almost synonymous, and it presents a unique opportunity to understand the history and culture of a new place through its best dishes.

I’m reminded of movies like Under The Tuscan Sun or Eat Pray Love where, in a sense, as the main character discovers food, they discover themselves more intimately. In Mexico, I shared a table with an Italian couple and an Indian couple. Here in Guatemala, I shared a table with a Mexican couple and a Polish couple one day and a British couple and a French couple the next. Although we all spoke different languages, had vastly different backgrounds, and came from all over the world, the through line for these experiences was the food.

What was particularly interesting this time was not just sharing a table with different people; it was sharing a kitchen. Cooking is something I consider to be intimate and very much about love and feeling more than it is following a list of instructions. I’m not one to share a kitchen with just anyone, but something about people choosing to be there to create a meal, not out of obligation, but sheer willingness to learn and feel, was quite the fulfilling experience.

I was reminded of the unity that can be found even with differences when I observed how each of our contributions came together for one delicious meal. It can take a lifetime to develop the sort of closeness that makes someone reach for the wine and pour more into your glass just because they noticed it was empty or to ask your opinion on whether the sauce or guacamole needs more salt. In nearly an hour, a sort of warm energy developed that said I trust you to do what you feel with the dish you’re making.

We made three traditional Guatemalan dishes, pepian, tostadas, and rellenitos de platano, all delicious in their own right with layers and layers of explosive flavor. Perhaps even more surreal was the moment we convened on the rooftop terrace to enjoy what we made. Over stunning views of the mountains, steaming pots of food, fruit flavored rums and hisbicus tea, I felt full before I even took a first bite.