Chef Alfonso López De Anda
Restaurante Terraza
Salsabor Prehispanico
by Trenia Logan
nternational Chef Alfonso López De Anda
Comes Home to His Prehispanic Roots in
Restaurante Terraza Salsabor Prehispanico
From a very young age, Alfonso was
destined to enter the world of food, perhaps
because of his high sensitivity to tastes and
smells which prevented him from eating just
anything or maybe it was because being born at just
seven months gestation, he was born before he could
develop completely.
His mother recounts that during his childhood, she always
had him in the kitchen up on the kitchen table watching
anything she was doing including observing the ingredi-
ents of the food and reviewing amounts. She always told
him, "If you want to do it yourself, then you will learn to
cook.”
In college, he studied graphic design however he
frequently prepared food for his classmates when they
were doing all night projects for final exams. He wanted
to understand his own body chemistry in order to avoid
eating foods that his body could not digest. Always the
curious boy by nature, his vocation led him to "Il Lorenzo
de Medici Institute" in Florence, Italy, where he worked
and studied. At that stage in his life, he learned the basics
of how a kitchen worked, the toughest roles within restau-
rants and subtleties of university life .
Amazingly, while in Italy, he met an elderly man who lived
on a farm producing olive oil of the highest quality who
ended up being his great uncle. Young and enthusiastic,
he quickly worked up from dishwasher to SousChef, even-
tually working in Holland at the Mexican restaurant "Café
Pacifico" where he frequently served Prince William Alex-
ander.
His culinary education in Italy taught him to pay close
attention to the quality of each ingredient. The value of a
dish lies within each ingredient and must be of the highest
quality. Regardless of the dish, be it an excellent pizza,
a fine bread, a single tomato or grape, each ingredient
speaks for itself upon that first bite. His culinary education
in Holland, taught him an appreciation of discipline and
doing things the right way, as embodied in the spirit of the
Dutch people and their land.