There are thousands of places to eat in the CDMX. Everything: street, closed, greasy, lean, vegan, anti-vegan, post-vegan, traditional, modern, traditional and modern, sapid, tasteless. We lack nothing. However, we rarely stop to think about where the vegetables, fruits, vegetables and meat in the dishes we eat come from. We recently learned about the place that produces some of the ingredients for the classic Nicos restaurant, uno de nuestros restaurantes favoritos. In the process, we had several surprises.
Nicos, a restaurant that thinks in community
Since 1957, Nicos, a landmark of Azcapotzalco, has been offering cocina familiar bien hecha. With all this tradition behind him, Gerardo Vázquez Lugo, the restaurant's director and chef, has been working for several years to create a plan of action in favor of the environment. Thus, the chef promotes the evolution of Nicos at a time when it is essential to think in terms of community. This is why Nicos has been collaborating with Il Vecchio Ranch for the past year.
Il Vecchio is located in Tepetitlán, a small municipality of 10,000 inhabitants in Hidalgo's Mezquital Valley. This ranch has become an ally of Nicos for the production of some of the vegetables and chiles he uses in his dishes. These ingredients include three varieties of nopales -Milpa Alta, Atlixco and Copenhagen-, guajillo, serrano, manzano, chilaca, piquín and trompillo chiles. They also provide onions, cauliflower, squash, celery, parsley, carrots, beets, spinach and peaches.
Production is small, but it is expected that by 2025, 80% of Nicos' vegetable inputs will come from here. Importantly, the water they use for irrigation is obtained through rainwater harvesting. This is a good practice, considering that the Mezquital Valley is predominantly arid.
From the CDMX to the countryside and back to the kitchens of the CDMX
According to algunos datosIn Mexico City, between 13 and 14 thousand tons of food are wasted every day. Nicos and Il Vecchio have joined the restaurants working to reduce their organic waste. The process works like this: first, Nicos sends some of it to the ranch. There, about 200 kg of organic waste is processed through vermicomposting. This compost enriches the soil, where flowers, sprouts and vegetables grow and are returned to Mexico City.
In addition to the Il Vecchio Ranch, Nicos also collaborates with la guerrilla del huerto Tlatelolcowhere organic waste from the restaurant is processed with the help of a composting chamber that has a processing capacity of 200 liters per day. These measures have allowed Nicos to reduce its organic waste to zero. What better way to celebrate 67 years of creating some of the most beloved dishes in this gulping city.