PHOTOGRAPHY BY LAUREN DI MATTEO COURTESY OF MESA AGRÍCOLA

Probably every culture on Earth has its version of the stew.

Simmering ingredients steaming within a vessel over a flame may very well be humans’ first culinary feat. But if today were man’s last day on the planet, I’d recommend they include the guisados at Escondido’s Mesa Agrícola on the menu of their final meals.

Guisado comes from the Spanish verb guisar, which means “to cook slowly.” Not the easiest feature dish Chef Juan González could have chosen. He’s up and prepping at 6am before an 11am open Wednesday through Sunday because it takes at least four hours to make just one guisado.

Yet, the day I visited, he had 15 different stews on the menu, including cochinita, a warm, citrusy pork dish, and tinga de res, shredded beef and peppers with sharp, fresh spices. Unlike stews eaten with a spoon, these guisados are served via taco or burrito.

I waited for my interview on Mesa Agrícola’s sidewalk patio, admiring the simple order-at-the-counter setup inside. The cheerful sous chef took care to explain each dish to patrons vying for the precious few tables inside. Each time someone opened the front door to order, the smell of spiced meats, peppers, and fresh herbs wrapped around me like a warm, steamy blanket.

Megan Strom, Mesa Agrícola’s co-founder and partner to González, shared that she was prepping the fields of the five-acre farm the couple uses to grow much of their restaurant’s produce.

The two grew up a world apart, Strom in St. Paul, Minnesota, and González in the Baja California coastal town of Rosarito. Strom’s from farm country but started out working in restaurants. On a trip back home, she worked an autumn harvesting apples at an orchard that grew the first Honeycrisp trees, invented under the University of Minnesota’s apple breeding program.

“I just fell in love with the lifestyle,” Strom said. “I’m working with food and people in the same capacity as restaurants, but outside.”

She moved to California and learned desert farming, working 100 acres in Coachella Valley and helping to manage 40 employees growing high-end culinary ingredients for restaurants in Los Angeles and San Francisco. That’s how she met González.

They bonded over plotting how to add value back to the 30% of an organic farm crop that wasn’t pretty enough to be served.

“If you’ve got holes in the arugula, you can’t serve that to a Michelin-star restaurant,” Strom said.

González grew up climbing fig trees on his grandfather’s property in Rosarito, where people from around Mexico would rent out storefronts to sell their cuisine. Two ladies from the Yucatán Peninsula sold tacos filled with cochinita pibil, slow-roasted, tangy pork flavored with citrus and achiote.

“I can’t forget that taco, and I was just six years old,” González said. “I have a picture of it in my mind.”

He was the chef among his friends at a young age—surfing the Mexican coastline, then grabbing fish and clams for beachside sushi and meals over a bonfire before the next surf session. But he also spent much of his time helping his grandmother in the kitchen, memories he translates into the flavors of his food.

I asked what he thinks about during the many hours he spends tending to his guisados every day.

“For me, the most important piece is cooking with your heart,” González  said. “If you’re at home and cooking for someone special, you’re thinking about when they will get there. Or maybe I’m thinking about my grandmother. I feel like that energy translates into your food.”

Mesa Agrícola is, in a way, San Diego’s own version of The Bear, a drama series where a chef trained in fine dining takes over his family’s Chicago sandwich shop. González also worked in upscale Los Angeles restaurants and beachside eateries in Santa Barbara. The couple shares a friendship with Travis Swikard from San Diego’s popular downtown restaurant, Callie. (That chef’s Instagram post about Mesa Agrícola helped blast the North County establishment into the viral social media space.)

But life for the Mesa Agrícola family is now about moving slower, not unlike the nature of a guisado. The couple has a young daughter and wants to spend more time on her childhood than hustling (why Mesa Agrícola is closed Mondays and Tuesdays).

Strom is excited to begin growing corn from ancient seeds on the family farm so the restaurant can make its own masa for tortillas. They also sell bags of heirloom beans at the store, as well as a killer Basque cheesecake González makes, which nods to his own Galician heritage.

Guisados are “the best representation of Mexican comfort home cooking,” González said. Every culture has a stew, but his Mexican comfort food can tug at the heartstrings of cultures an ocean away.

Some customers from France told González they had a Ratatouille moment with one of his guisados. The calabacitas—a colorful array of stewed squashes and onions—reminded them of their grandmother’s ratatouille.

González said, “For me, that’s the best part, knowing you have a connection, even if it’s sentimental or a memory, something deeper than just having a good meal.”

» mesaagricola.com

This story was originally published in the Edible San Diego e-newsletter on April 9, 2026.