Food safari
The menu at Q Mex is co-created by Medina and his kitchen partner Peter Zhang, who has rich experience in Mexican, Italian and French cuisine.
To create the menu, the duo travel around Mexico on a food safari each year, exploring local cuisine and seeking inspiration to update the offerings at Q Mex.
Since moved to Beijing, Medina had never returned to New York. But, in February, he decided to take his team to New York for a food safari as he thought the variety of Mexican food there could offer them inspiration to develop new dishes.
From the street corner where Medina and his brother ran their first food cart, to fancy Mexican restaurants, Medina led his team to explore dozens of restaurants in New York during the seven-day trip.
"There is everything you can imagine in Mexican food in New York. From the cheapest little cart to the most expensive high-end restaurants, or the most highly trained chefs," he says.
While he was there, he noticed that roast duck in New York is a delicacy and considered expensive, but it can be harmoniously combined with Mexican cuisine.
Beijing has a long tradition of roasting ducks and it is not that expensive and offers top quality.
Medina and Zhang created the roast duck burrito inspired by the trip.
The burrito includes Mexican jewel rice, guacamole, kale, duck sauce, fried duck skin and slow roasted puddle duck - the flavor of the roasted duck and the crispy duck skin add a different touch to the burrito.
"I love roast Peking duck. It's one of my favorite foods," he say.
Medina pairs the burrito with a specially blended lemon margarita which makes for a special Mexican summer treat.
