Last week i went for dinner to Mark´s at Bucerias, a small town north of Puerto Vallarta, in the Riviera Nayarit.
I was amazed by the changes i saw in the town, the main street is finally fixed! Now it is a nice street of “adoquin” boasting a bunch of Restaurants, Coffee places, a cozy Tea Room, Art Galleries, Bars, nice vacation villas and small hotels.
This town has a Bohemian essence that is very captivating, it makes you feel at home but at the same time at a very authentic little Mexican town.
This evening was planned by my dear friend Hugo Brodziak, from Baja Sea Food, a provider of the finest and most variated Sea Food products from Ensenada Baja California and other parts of the world.
The aim of this afternoon was to know and try some of their products, cooked by the magic hands of Jean Marie Benton, the New Zeland born (and now adopted Nayarita) at Restaurant Mark´s, one of the best clients of Baja Sea Food.
Mark´s restaurant is a treasure you have to visit when you come to this part of the world, a place that invites families to come together to enjoy a nice dinner, relaxing conversations and romance.
Jan came to México to travel the country and practice water ski, but she crossed paths with Mark, the owner of the corner restaurant at Bucerias and after 18 years, they are still happy together and shaking the culinary scene at the fast developing touristic destination Riviera Nayarit!
They had wide open eyes to learn together what people wanted, like the fresh fish that now 4 local fishermen bring everyday, the products that Baja Sea Food provides and the use of seasonal ingredients, so their clientèle is always expecting delicious different dishes as the “specialty of the day” and their celebrated menu keeps pulling the year by year tourists to this beautiful corner in Bucerías.
Jean is great to talk to, she has a nice accent that caused her some misunderstandings and she and Mark laugh and make us laugh about them, she is fun and very talented. She talks about her childhood in New Zeland with a very special shine on her eyes and tells how she learned from her father the pleasure of cooking and eating fresh tomatoes, fresh herbs. She said something i liked a lot: “Food never leaves you”, so true, once you learn to cook and enjoy food, this passion will never leave!
What impressed me a lot too is their longtime employees, knowing the restaurant industry and how hard is to keep them, i can tell that (along with other very few places that you´ll read about here on my blog) Mark and Jan Marie, have found the formula to make their staff loyal to their business. How? helping them to learn, motivating them, paying them well. Some of them developed their techniques and tastes cooking with her in Mark´s kitchen and now they tell her that is time for her to get out of the kitchen, good for us because this gives us the chance to enjoy her presence and her conversation.
We asked for bottle of Lapaccio, Primitivo Salento 2007, Oaked Aged from Pasqua, in the south of Italy. It was a normal wine, with some red fruits and casis taste and a nice Rubi color. It became alive with the second course of our dinner because they paired perfectly!
To start, a nice plate of “Ahi Tuna, two ways” arrived.
One was a Sesame crusted Sashimi style Tuna with Wasabi and the other was a Tuna Tartare with roasted Shitake, Avocado and Soy-Misa Vinaigrette.
Baja Sea Food is the provider for this Tuna that comes from Indonesia, it is instant frozen; this means the tuna is frozen in seconds to allow it to keep all its characteristics: color, texture and taste.
I loved the Sesame crusted Sashimi style one, it had a beautiful reddish color, it was cooked exactly the way it should to keep all this characteristics and Jan added some soft, interesting flavors.
The second course was a marvelous Beet and Apple warm salad, with Organic Arugula and Pistacchio breaded Goat cheese, with a delicious Raspberry Vinaigrette.
This dish is a must if you visit Mark´s, the flavors paired perfectly with the wine and i enjoy every single piece and every single sip of the wine with it!
The main course was a Pan Roasted Organic Pork Chop from the rack, imported from Alberta, Canada by Baja Sea Food. It was served with a crispy potato scallion cake, Apple-Ginger puree and a delicious port and star anis sauce.
This has become the most popular dish at Mark´s and now i know why!
I is a soft, juicy, tasty, delicious meat and it was cooked exactly as i asked it: medium-well done. The sauce and the Apple purée were delicious! The only thing that i found it a bit difficult to eat it properly was the crispy potato cake as the pieces “jumped” when i tried to cut it, so next time i´ll deffinitely have this dish again, but i will ask Jan to serve it with a mashed Potato purée with caramelized garlic and herbs; i am sure she does an amazing one!
For dessert we had a Chocolate Mousse with whipped cream, topped with red fruits. The mousse was spectacular.
My host Hugo Brodziak explained how Baja Sea food started, he is an Oceanologist and was working in Alaska. Then, he got married and came to Vallarta to start a Whale Watching tours business, but as the Whales come to Banderas Bay only from November to April, he needed to find another business to do during the non whales season.
He started selling a Mediterranean Type of cultivated, alive Mussels, he took 20kgs and walked downtown offering them, he thought that if he got 3 clients it was worth it…people got really excited to taste them and from 22 restaurants that he visited, 17 made their first request of 5 kg each! He sells so much Mussels that Chef Thierry Blouet from Café des Artistes, named him “El Rey del Mejillon” (The king of the Mussels) After a while the Restaurateurs, Hotels and Chefs, were asking for different products and Hugo, never said “no”, he was determined to bring all the products needed to help the Chefs with their culinary creativity.
When he started the business, he was everything: sales man, delivery man, office man, money collector man…after 2 years, Baja Sea Food has a team, thanks to the perseverance and discipline of his founder. Now they have more than 70 products like: Meats, Fish, Sea Food, Organic Baby Vegetables and Organic Spices.
And as Chef Bernard Güth from TRIO Restaurant says: “Hugo, with only 3 sales people you have ALL vallarta very well organized” Yes he does and he is very soon expanding to Cancún and La Riviera Maya…Go Brodziak!
I had a great time, the perfect evening with good friends, good food, good music and laughs.
Jan is the beautiful talented Chef and her husband Mark, the handsome perfect host at Mark´s in Bucerias, Riviera Nayarit!
