After working in kitchens from Mexico City to Copenhagen and Chicago, Alejandro Huerta has opened his first restaurant as an owner-operator. At Barro in Adelaide, some of his most personal influences come from his mother, grandmother and the food he grew up eating in Mexico
Alejandro Huerta has spent much of his career moving through ambitious kitchens.
Born in Mexico City, Alejandro worked at Pujol before moving to Spain, where his experience included Quique Dacosta. He later staged at Noma in Copenhagen and Alinea in Chicago.
In Australia, he has led kitchens including No. 92, Lottie and Comedor.
At Barro, however, some of the strongest influences come from much earlier.
Alejandro opened the Adelaide restaurant with his wife, chef and sommelier Galia Valadez, and long-time friend Eduardo Conde in July.
It is his first restaurant as an owner-operator, and much of the food draws on the dishes and memories that shaped him before his restaurant career began.
Cooking from memory
Food was a constant part of Alejandro's childhood.
His memories include his grandmother cooking for family gatherings and spending time in the kitchen with his mother. As he has grown older, those experiences have become more visible in his own cooking.
At Barro, a family mole coloradito carries that history particularly clearly.
Alejandro's grandmother moved from Poland to Mexico during the Second World War. There, her mother-in-law, Alejandro's great-grandmother from Puebla, taught her to make the mole.
The 19-ingredient recipe has since travelled through the family. At Barro, it is served with mushrooms and zucchini flowers.
Pozole provides another connection.
Alejandro remembers making the chilli-seasoned soup with his mother and grandmother. Rather than reproduce it directly, Barro takes those flavours and turns them into a reduced sauce.
Queso de puerco, a pressed pork preparation familiar in Mexico City, provides the starting point for another dish built around pig's head.
These are not attempts to recreate childhood meals exactly.
They are family references being carried into the kitchen Alejandro cooks in now.
Mexico through South Australian produce
That also means working with where Barro is.
The team sources spices and chocolate from Mexico while building much of the menu around Australian produce, including South Australian seafood.
The menu moves between those two places.
Dishes have included nannygai ceviche with green tomato and coconut milk, spanner crab with burnt shishito, duck cooked over coals and pressed pig's head tacos.
Alejandro has worked with Mexican flavours and Australian produce throughout his career here, but Barro gives him more control over how the two come together.
The 48-seat restaurant sits on Rosina Street in Adelaide's CBD.
Its name comes from the Spanish word for clay, a material closely connected with Mexican cooking, tableware and vessels used for drinks such as mezcal.
The team describes Barro as a wine bar with a Mexican soul rather than a formal Mexican restaurant.
Building the restaurant together
Galia brings her own perspective to the restaurant.
Born and raised in Mexico City, she has worked as a chef, pastry chef and sommelier. At Barro, she leads much of the front of house and wine program while continuing to influence the food.
Her own family references appear on the menu too, including a dessert inspired by ate con queso, the Mexican combination of fruit paste and cheese.
Eduardo leads the drinks side, extending the restaurant's Mexican focus beyond tequila and mezcal into spirits including raicilla, sotol, bacanora and charanda.
Together, the three are building Barro around a version of Mexico shaped by their own experiences rather than trying to represent the country through a single style of food.
Coming back to Adelaide
Opening Barro has also taken Alejandro back to where his Australian career began.
Adelaide was his first home after moving to Australia, when he came to lead Mexican Society on Gouger Street.
He later moved to Sydney and spent much of the following decade there, but Adelaide remained the city where he and Galia wanted to open their own restaurant.
The produce, wine industry and hospitality community were part of the reason for returning.
Barro now gives Alejandro somewhere to bring together the different parts of his career without making any one of them the story.
Pujol, Quique Dacosta, Noma and Alinea are part of the experience he brings to the kitchen.
But the food at Barro is not interesting simply because of where he once worked.
It is what he has chosen to carry forward: a family mole, memories of making pozole and dishes that connect a restaurant in Adelaide with the kitchens he grew up around in Mexico.
