Rancho La Puerta - Cuisine >> Cooking School

Celebrating the Seasons at Rancho La Puerta…our new cookbook honors the vision of our cooking school, La Cocina Que Canta (“The Kitchen That Sings”)…

Set in the heart of our six-acre farm, Rancho La Puerta’s Cooking School hosts cooking classes that celebrate the magic that happens whenever good cooks use just-picked local, seasonal, organically grown ingredients. The colors, aromas, and tastes are nothing short of amazing. This sensory experience, combined with your opportunity to cook side-by-side with great teaching chefs and then sit down to a fine meal you helped prepare, provides an unforgettable culinary experience.

Custom-built by skilled masons, tile masters, and other artisans, the 4,500-square-foot hacienda-style center is the colorful and creative home of Ranch chef Gonzalo Mendoza, guest teaching chefs from around the world, and the school’s friendly staff. In addition, La Cocina regularly hosts renowned guest culinary experts, cookbook authors, and teaching chefs, including such stars of the cooking world as Deborah Madison and Patricia Wells. Retired Golden Door chef Michel Stroot is a regular teacher, as is chef and cookbook author Deborah Schneider, co-author of Rancho La Puerta’s newest cookbook, which was nominated for a James Beard award in 2009.

Weekday classes emphasize the hands-on experience. Students gather around an immense chopping block island and work side by side with the chef and his assistants to prepare a full lunch or dinner. Conversation, questions, and laughter fill the room, along with the savory scents of garlic, rosemary, roasting peppers, cumin, and the other “Mexican-Mediterranean” flavors. Cooking completed, everyone sits down at long tables to enjoy the fruits of their labor, along with a sampling of wines from the nearby Valle de Guadalupe wine country in Baja California.

“Saturdays at the Ranch”—a one-day culinary experience, fitness and spa adventure for our neighbors in San Diego and northern Baja California.

In addition to its organic-farm setting, the La Cocina experience includes La Tiendita (a small gift shop), tours of the garden, a culinary library (soon), outdoor dining beside a rock fireplace (on occasion), and breakfasts prepared several times a week for Rancho La Puerta guests who are on the resort’s famous “breakfast hike.”

The feeling at La Cocina is magical… and unlike any other cooking experience in North America. Bird songs drift through flower-bedecked courtyards and open-air porches and patios. Rows of organically grown fruits and vegetables are literally just steps from the door. The blue-green slopes of Mt. Kuchumaa rise above the farm and school, and its proximity provides a mystical sense of ancient traditions and the forces of nature: The mountain has been a sacred site of Native Americans for thousands of years. But most important are the friendly and delighted smiles: of our staff and soon, we hope—you!

Class Schedule

Rancho La Puerta guests have the option of taking one or more hands-on or demonstration classes at La Cocina Que Canta.

Hands-On Culinary Experience: 3.5 hours, $75.00*

Approximately 16 students maximum

*Mexican tax will be added. Rates subject to change.

The La Cocina Team

La Cocina Designer and President: Sarah Livia Szekely Brightwood

Manager: Rene Gonzalez

Head Gardener: Salvador Tinajero

...and many others, including our talented sous-chef teaching staff and guest celebrity chefs.

Recent La Cocina class recipes

La Cocina Photo Tour

"What you have created is amazing! Day after day I watched the garden change with the seasons, saw the school evolve, observed the guest interaction with nature and food and community. Every class was different, every day was different, but I always had the feeling of being part of something much bigger than 'just' a cooking class. For guests to experience the garden, and then enjoy the fun of a cooking class and meal together has been, for many of them, one of the high points of their stay and a memory that they take with them when they leave.

For many guests, the experience was transformational. They arrive, often apprehensive, and during the class the light goes on as their confidence grows, and they leave inspired to take what they have learned to their home kitchen and become a healthier, happier cook. In every class, guests share that they have been reminded how fun and easy cooking can be, and resolve aloud to go home and cook for themselves. They're always amazed that healthy food can be so simple and so good. The real gift? Just before Christmas one of the guests, during our round-table sharing at lunch, choked up (we all did) when she said that she had forgotten how much fun it was just to be in the kitchen with other people. Community, friendship, joy in the food, joy in the garden. You can tell people all day long what they should do, but nothing teaches like experience. Thank you for letting me be a part of it."

— Guest Teaching Chef Deborah Schneider (also co-author of "Cooking With The Seasons At Rancho La Puerta”), January, 2009