Hello friends.
We’ve been very busy with lots of farmer’s markets, events, catering, and building a great team. Also, we’ve been making a lot of masa for a few friends/visiting chefs. I apologize for missing the Thursday market last week, but to make it up to you all, we are making tamales this week!!
It’s not super common to have an heirloom masa business in your city, so when some visiting chefs come to the Bay Area and want to use high quality, landrace masa made from exceptionally sourced maíz, I usually get a call. Or I recommend Tierra Farm in Santa Rosa.
Ana Castro is the executive chef of Lengua Madre in New Orleans and one of the most talented people I know. We became friends through Instagram, exchanging tips and comments about masa. I finally got to eat at her restaurant during a brief trip to New Orleans earlier this year. At the end of that dinner, Ana let me know that she was coming to California to do a residency and that she wanted to use my masa for her menu.
Skip to this past Sunday, after we had made her 700 tortillas, 30 lbs of masa, and 300 tostadas each week for two weeks— on top of our regular farmers market orders, 4 events, and I’m exhausted. We’re driving to Healdsburg for dinner at J Winery, where her residency is being hosted. I’m nervous because I’m in my head about my masa, spiraling about all the ways I can make incremental improvements. But, once I taste some of Ana’s food, her green mole memela, her tlacoyo, her al pastor cod, I began to relax and get swept away by the history lesson she is giving.
Every dish contained masa. She highlighted the humble ingredient I work with and made me feel as seen as I ever have been. Memelas, tostada, tlacoys, chochoyotes, tortillas, and nicatole. Growing up in wine country, St. Helena, Ca, luxury is seen as caviar, champagne, foie gras, French technique. Luxury was never brown, Mexican, or non-Eurocentric. Yet, the entire agricultural system in Napa and Sonoma counties was/ is created and propped up by the labor of people of color. Through presenting her dishes in the context of a tasting menu, she showed that luxury is the enjoyment of someone’s labor and skill. The dishes were refined and delicious, but the point was to make us reckon with the idea of luxury and what we define as luxurious or valuable. Beans and maíz held their own and outshone the caviar on the plate. Grasshoppers were used as a seasoning on the tostada with a hamachi crudo (I can finally can check off “chapulines + wine pairing” from my bucket list).
The hours I and my team spent making masa, hand-pressing tortillas, drying then frying tostadas are hours we will never get back, and that is part of what you get with our masa. Luxury is time spent with friends, partners, family, lovers. And, giving up that time to make something that is important to me, that you then get to enjoy, is part of what makes Bolita and what we do so meaningful to myself, my staff, and all those chefs visiting and asking for our goods.
Bolita exists out of sheer will and a drive to showcase masa and the effort that goes into making it. I’m assuming that if you are reading this, you also see and understand the labor that goes into making this product. I believe that you see the value and importance of maíz and masa.
I’m bad at transitions, But here are some are some dates and information on where to get your masa things. We’re doing less pop-ups going forward, so please come out when we do have them, it means a lot. Thank you!!
THURSDAY 9/28 - Mission Mercado, 84 Bartlett St., SF 3:00-7:00pm
TAMALES!!!! And all the things you love! Tortillas, masa, salsas, tetelas, tlacoyos.
THURSDAY 9/28 - Berkeley Kitchen, 2701 8th St., 5:00-7:00pm
TAMALES!!!! And all the things you love! Tortillas, masa, salsas, tetelas, tlacoyos.
Saturday 9/30 - Grand Lake Farmer’s Market, Splashpad, Oakland 9:00-2:00pm
TAMALES!!!! And all the things you love! Tortillas, masa, salsas, tetelas, tlacoyos.
THURSDAY 10/5 - Mission Mercado, 84 Bartlett St., SF 3:00-7:00pm
All the things you love! Tortillas, masa, salsas, tetelas, tlacoyos.
THURSDAY 10/5 - Berkeley Kitchen, 2701 8th St., 5:00-7:00pm
All the things you love! Tortillas, masa, salsas, tetelas, tlacoyos.
FRIDAY 10/6 - Pop-Up at Gilman Wine Block, 1350 Fifth St, Berkeley, CA 3:00-8:00pm
Come By! Check Instagram for menu details — we’ll have tuna ceviche tostadas, tomato + eggplant tostadas, brisket & pepper quesadillas, and more
Saturday 10/7 - Grand Lake Farmer’s Market, Splashpad, Oakland 9:00-2:00pm
All the things you love! Tortillas, masa, salsas, tetelas, tlacoyos.
Thank you for supporting Bolita! We hope to see you soon and can’t wait to feed you!