Tortillería Collective Turns Up The Heat

Standing over a hot comal filled with half-cooked handmade tortillas, Elizabeth Gonzalez pinched her thumb with her index and middle fingers to grip the corner of a puffy tortilla and flipped it over — showing in a single swift motion how she and a small group of worker-owner chefs hope to bring a Central American and Mexican staple to the streets of New Haven.

Elizabeth is one of four members of the grassroots immigrant advocacy group Semilla Collective — and one of the co-founders of a nascent immigrant-led food venture called Tortillería Semilla New Haven.

She and her fellow foodie worker-owners Javier Gonzalez-Villatoro, Martina Perez, and Anabel Hernandez recently gave this reporter a first-hand look at how the budding tortilla cooperative plans to make its signature dish, all as Tortillería Semilla continues raising money to get their dining project up and running for a wider swath of New Haven to enjoy. 

Click here to donate to the group’s GoFundMe page, which, by the publication time of this article, had raised over $5,900 towards its $25,000 goal.

The Semilla Collective was founded in 2019 with a mission of socio-economic empowerment for New Haven immigrants. 

The founders and worker-owners behind the Tortillería Semilla are all immigrants themselves: Gonzalez-Villatoro immigrated from Oaxaca Valley, Mexico, six years ago; Hernandez immigrated from Tamaulipas, Mexico, 17 years ago; Perez immigrated from San Marcos, Guatemala, 20 years ago; and Gonzalez immigrated from Zacatelco, Mexico, 20 years ago. 

Their recent cooking demonstration-interview with the Independent took place at the home of Ariana Shapiro, a decade-long New Havener who supports Tortillería Semilla as a business coordinator along with her partner Luis Luna, who serves on the collective’s ​“support counsel.” 

The group cooked tortillas, a common corn-based flatbread cooked throughout Central America, from scratch in a recent demonstration for this reporter.

“This project will give us opportunities and the community opportunities,” Anabel said.

The Tortillería’s first stage will soon be to get into a commercial kitchen with the CitySeed Incubates that will allow for the members to provide the community with taste-testing opportunities to finalize a menu. The team will also focus on promotion and building a relationship with the community during this stage to prepare for its next steps.

The goal for the second stage is to have a storefront and enough funding support to get machinery to make fresh tortillas more quickly.

The Tortillería plans to serve appetizers, tacos, quesadillas, and other traditional Mexican foods in the fresh tortillas.

Javier said watching the entire corn process growing up from planting to harvesting to cooking interested them as a child, but they didn’t begin seriously cooking recipes from their family roots until adulthood.

They described the cooking connection as ​“grounding” and said it is a great way for them to connect with who they are.

Javier now recreates dishes their grandmother made in their childhood and each time is brought back to Oaxaca and their family’s Zapotec Nation ancestry, Javier said. From the preparing of the corn to balling up the dough in their hand to sometimes burning their finger tips when flipping the cooking tortilla.

“It feels good to be reminded of the traditions of my ancestors and the way of living we’ve been doing for such a long time,” Javier said.

From Hand To Comal

The team gathered on a recent Wednesday in Shapiro’s Westville kitchenn to make tortillas from scratch. 

The group showed this reporter the cooking process that reconnects each of them with their Hispanic roots. They also talked about their plan to bring Mexican culinary and cultural traditions to the streets of New Haven. 

While standing over the stove watching the tortilla dough cook, Elizabeth occasionally tapped a finger on the corner of the tortilla to determine when to flip it. She waited for the outer edges to begin to get toasted. 

The team members each took turns over the stove to cook dozens of tortillas and occasionally treated themselves to a snack sprinkled with salt or salsa during the process. 

Anabel scooped a small ball of dough from the bowl, gathering together the perfect amount by measuring it against only her fingers and not her palm. Once grabbing the right amount she rolled the dough into her palms and rounded it off by rolling it into the shape and size of an egg. 

Next, the ball of dough was placed between two circular sheets of wax paper in a tortilla press. With only one hand gripping the press handle, Anabel added some pressure to flatten the dough, all while making sure not to apply too much pressure that would make the tortilla too thin. She did this two to three times, checking on the tortilla’s thickness in between each press.

She then separated the dough from the wax paper and press and laid the tortilla flat in the palm of her hand, careful not to tear it. She set her hand above the comal, feeling the heat on her knuckles, and gently slid the dough from the side of her palm and onto the pan. 

Javier emphasized the skill required to transition the tortilla from the press to the comal because of the difficulty of the dough at time sticking to the hand and tearing, crumpling, or folding on itself on the pan. 

While waiting for the tortilla to cook the group shared stories about their cooking journeys and watched as an occasional tortilla puffed up — which, according to a Mexican superstition, means the chef is ready to get married. It also means the tortilla is cooked well, Javier added. 

“Now he can get married,” Elizabeth said, pointing to Javier’s inflated tortilla. 

Javier cheered.

Martina recalled her family cooking tortillas in San Marcos, Guatemala over a wood fire. She added that she makes tortillas every day for her family. 

Elizabeth stood over the comal watching the tortillas to be sure they didn’t dry out while cooking. She made sure to flip the tortilla, giving each side about a minute to cook. 

"Beautiful Opportunity To Rescue Our Tradition"

Since the start of the pandemic, the collective has supported mutual aid efforts for New Haven immigrants by distributing $300,000 in food boxes and cash to families in need and who were left out of federal relief efforts. 

The collective has also supported the statewide Husky 4 Immigrants healthcare campaign.

The goal of Tortillería Semilla is to create a collective of workers, Javier said, to ​“break the barriers for people by evening the playing field.” 

Javier added that the collective aims to reconnect the local Hispanic community with their roots and ancestral cooking traditions that often include the repurposing of home-grown corn crops. 

Once Tortillería Semilla is launched it will become its own entity separate from the collective, the group members said.

While giving back to New Haven with tasty meals, the Tortillería Semilla also plans to support small corn farmers in Mexico by importing corn directly from small family farms, Hernandez said. 

“It’s a way to rescue those traditions even though we are far away from them,” Javier said. ​“We are still the people of the corn.” 

Javier recalled their upbringing in Oaxaca Valley, Mexico, helping their family who had a farm that grew corn, beans, and squash. Their grandmother would wake up everyday at 5 a.m. to grind up the harvested corn at the communal mill then get to hand cooking tortillas for the family.

Javier said the childhood tradition of farming developed a ​“life-long relationship with land” for them. 

Anabel said she makes tortillas every day. Instead of making the dough from scratch, she buys corn dough from the store. 

Elizabeth recalled helping her mom cook over a wood fire for family parties but said she doesn’t particularly have a passion for cooking. 

“This is a beautiful opportunity to rescue our tradition,” Elizabeth said. 

Elizabeth said while her family owns a farm, she didn’t get the ​“country experience” of learning to harvest corn in the fields and instead worked the ​“city life” of cleaning houses. 

Anabel said she has been making tortillas since she was nine years old. As the oldest child in her family, she recalled having to cook lunch for relatives who would work in the fields harvesting produce. 

“Here it seems like there’s less time,” Anabel said while reflecting on when she would cook three times a day for her family. 

She described cooking as a hobby that helps her to remember the smells and taste of Mexico. 

Javier said cooking has reconnected them with their mind, body, and spirit because they center their diet around traditional recipes and non-processed ingredients as often as possible. 

Javier is reminded of his Mexican roots when they grinds their own pepper and cloves at home. ​“You can feel the difference,” they said. 

Martina said her family also grew and harvested corn. She knows every step in the process from seed to tortilla, she said. Her kids have also grown a love for the tortillas made from scratch and once when she told them she did not have the time to make them fresh anymore because she was working two jobs, her children insisted she teach them how to make fresh tortillas themselves rather than have her buy them pre-made from the store due to the difference in taste. 

Martina added that pre-made tortillas are not filling enough for her whereas fresh tortillas made from scratch are. ​“The store ones leave me hungry again like a hour later,” she said.

The group agreed that they are grateful to have learned to cook in a traditional fashion from their parents and grandparents. 

“Corn is more than just tortillas,” Martina said. ​“It’s tamales, soup, or just corn on the cob.”

Anabel also recalled her childhood memories of watching her parents and grandparents plant, harvest, and cook corn from their farm. She recalled leaning about the nixtamalization process that happens to make tortilla dough. ​“There’s three ingredients: boiled corn, lime stone, and doing it with love is the third ingredient,” she said. 

The team did the nixtamalization step before showing this reporter how they each make their own handmade tortillas. 

Anabel added that her family would make tortillas at all times of the day while living in Tamaulipas, Mexico. 

Javier added that when they began cooking their familial recipes they learned more about food sovereignty and healthy eating. 

Anabel and Javier agreed that while they love New Haven’s many food options, the city they now call home lacks a unique Tortilleria like they plan to create. 

“When the corn is from the U.S. its taste is very different,” Anabel said. 

“Native corn makes a huge difference,” Javier added. 

For Anabel food is the biggest difference since she immigrated from Mexico 17 years ago. She said she loves New Haven’s community and learning different cultures from her own. 

Javier recalled the culture shock they experienced from immigrating to New Haven six years ago. When they first came they said they just focused on working 60 to 70 hours a week and going to school. 

Javier now feels more settled and has grown to love New Haven and its many community-driven organizations. ​“There is a community who care for each other here and it makes me happy to call New Haven home.” 

“This is not only our dream, but is a community dream,” Anabel said. 

As they fundraise the team plans to continue to host taste testings within the community to learn ​“what reminds them of back home.” 

“Each interactions are like they’re hugging us,” Javier said. ​“It makes us feel like we’ve been seen and we are walking together.”

They will also do community surveys on the streets to hear about suggestions for recipes. ​“Every country, every town, every household makes it different,” Javier said. 

The group said they look forward to offering local immigrants the chance to find their community, reconnect with their roots, and make their own decisions on what’s in their food.