Our story
The Boab Tree exists because two people refused to keep their worlds apart: a kitchen and a studio, hospitality and painting, Andalusia and New York.
Granada
More than twenty years ago, Anissa Mendez and Jorge Martínez met in a small, hidden bar in Granada. She was visiting from the United States. He was living an Andalusian life — warm, loud, built around people.
For a short time they lived in that bubble of possibility. Then she flew home, and the Atlantic did what the Atlantic does.
Ten years
They lived apart for a decade, on separate paths, carrying the quiet memory of each other like a spark waiting to be reignited.
One message
Then, one ordinary day, a Facebook message. Within a week Jorge was on a plane. The moment they saw each other it was as if no time had passed at all. A year later they were married.
Today they share a life of love, art and laughter, and two children — a boy and a girl — who are a daily argument in favour of second chances.
Anissa & Jorge
Jorge Martínez Ruiz
Jorge is a self-made entrepreneur who built his career the hard way — running restaurants, growing businesses, learning every job in the building before asking anyone else to do it. That path led him to direct an international spa company with locations in New York City, Chicago and Spain.
He has worked with local families, international travellers and well-known names, and took the same lesson from all of them: real hospitality starts with making a person feel valued.
At The Boab Tree he runs the operation — logistics, team, service, the guest experience — and has built a culture where the staff behave like family and excellence is simply the standard.
“A successful restaurant is built on far more than exceptional food — it is built on trust, consistency, teamwork, and creating an experience that guests remember long after they leave.”
Anissa Mendez
Anissa is an artist, educator, author and illustrator from New York City. Her work has been shown across the city's art scene — West Broadway, Chelsea, the Hamptons — and her paintings are in private collections around the world.
She has spent more than 27 years teaching art. She wrote and illustrated the Masters of Energy children's book series, and founded i.Inspire, a virtual gallery for young artists.
At The Boab Tree she paints in the room alongside the guests, mentors artists who ask, and makes sure every child who draws at a table is treated like an exhibiting artist.
“Like a great painting, an unforgettable meal is created one thoughtful layer at a time. It is not the ingredients alone that make it memorable, but the passion, creativity, and love with which they are brought together.”
The name
The boab is a tree that stores what it needs to survive, lives for centuries, and becomes the thing everyone gathers around. Strength, resilience, longevity, connection.
It is not a bad description of a marriage, and it is not a bad description of a restaurant either — a place where strangers become friends, creativity is celebrated, and something keeps growing.
I love you because…
I love you because…
On it we wrote four words: I love you because… and invited guests to finish the sentence.
People pause. They reflect. Some laugh. Some become emotional. Some stand quietly for several minutes before writing anything at all. One by one the board fills with messages for parents, children, partners, friends, strangers, pets, nature — and, now and then, for themselves.
Conversations start. Strangers connect. The room changes. It turns out that love mostly needs somewhere to be put.
i.Inspire
Children who make artwork while dining are invited to have it photographed and added to the i.Inspire Children's Gallery, where they join young creators from around the world.
The story is only useful if you can sit inside it. A table, a bottle, and an artist working a few metres away.
