Our priority/goal/focus is to bring a flour tortilla to the market that tastes 100% authentic to Mexico and that is as natural and healthy as possible. You can read about our ingredients in the Nutrition Information page on the website (no preservatives, additives, vegan, etc). Our other goal is to sell our tortillas wholesale to Latino grocery stores, natural grocery stores, and Mexican restaurants. Once we are wholesale and our production increases, we hope to be able to switch to organic flour (we currently use unbleached flour with no preservatives, no additives, and no GMOs).
We will be starting at the Hastings Park Farmers Market and our last day there will be May 1. See below for our summer market dates.
From our market research, we have found a lot of positive responses. People are loving our tortillas and we often hear “now that I have had Lita’s Tortillas, I can’t eat the ones from the grocery store anymore!”. Hearing that makes this all worth it! There is a serious lack of an authentic tasting flour tortilla in the BC market (and Canada) and as you will see from our website, our tortillas are completely unique because the customer cooks the tortilla at home (which takes 3-60 seconds), so the tortilla always tastes fresh, and this style of flour tortilla is very common in Mexico.
My husbands name is Argelio Santos Gonzalez, his story is very inspiring I think. Argelio, came to Canada in 2005 on a SWAP visa. He and I met in 2006. We fell in love and after living apart for a while (as his visa ended and he had to return to Mexico), he moved back to Vancouver, applied and got into The Sauder School of Business at UBC to get his masters. After 5 years, he got his Canadian citizenship, and now we have a family with 2 little girls. We hope his story inspires other Latino immigrants to push forward and not give up on their dreams, as it can be difficult when you move to Canada with no family and with a degree from your home country (as Argelio has in Engineering), and still cannot get a job. It’s discouraging and despite all that, he continued to try hard, study, and now, make this business with me. His main motivation for making the tortillas was because he could not find any in the stores here that he liked, they all tasted terrible to him. So he started to make his own, pass them onto friends to try, and when people started to tell him how great they tasted and that he should make and sell them, he started to take it seriously.
For me, I am originally from New Brunswick. I spent most of my childhood on my grandparents farm and lived in a small town. I lived and travelled in China for 4 years in my late 20’s, and moved to Vancouver at 30 to study sciences, Acupuncture, and Holistic Nutrition. I now have my own business practicing Acupuncture and Holistic Nutrition. My nutrition background is the basis for us ensuring the ingredients in our tortillas (and future products) be as natural as possible. We are strongly against adding any toxic preservatives, additives, GMOs, etc. I have 2 little girls, and I want them to eat foods that will not harm them, and so I will not produce foods that have toxic or dangerous ingredients.
The last great thing about our story is our recipes. Lita’s Mexican Foods is starting with Authentic Flour Tortillas, but we will not stop there. We plan to also introduce salsas, chili paste (like a bouillon), and cookies…all of which use recipes from Argelio’s grandmothers and mother. We are continuing his families traditions with authentic recipes and authentic taste!
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