A steady stream of midday customers pop in and out of newly opened Tortilleria Mi Tierra. They are primarily there for the corn flour tortillas, the taco (mini) tortillas, or the chili guajillo-infused flour tortillas displayed on the counter in clear, cellophane packages. Behind them, in full view, is a commercial-grade tortilla maker at work, nearly as long as the counter and twice as high. The dough is made with masa harina, a dried and powdered corn flour made from maize, and is stuffed into a wide funnel at the top. It disappears into the stainless-steel machine and re-emerges minutes later in a single-file parade of tortillas, perfectly round and cardboard-thin.
The tortilla shop’s diminutive owner, Irma Paez, sports a sunny yellow T-shirt and a ballcap printed with the shop’s logo, her short dark ponytail neatly pulled through the cap’s back. She’s clearly in charge, as her staff, also decked out in the shop’s signature yellow T-shirts and caps, come to her with questions as she rings out customers at the register. Irma stops for a moment to snatch a puffy, hot tortilla as it drops out of the machine, interrupting its final ascent on up the conveyor belt to where the freshly baked tortillas are stacked. She places the steaming, lone tortilla on an aluminum foil square and says, “We eat it like this,” first sprinkling it with salt and rolling it into a cigarette-like cylinder before taking a soft, chewy bite.
Bryan College Station has been home for Paez and her husband, Mario Paez, for the past 20 years. Her family is originally from Reynosa Tamaulipas, Mexico, and she grew up in Mission, Texas, close to the Rio Grande Valley. “I usually go there to visit family, and every time I come back, I bring back tortillas
and fresh queso — queso fresco — and other items you can’t find here locally,” she says. “Every trip, I go, I wish there was a tortilleria in town — for years. And then I got busy, you know, with my kids, and work.” Now, her eldest is a graduate of Texas A&M University, her middle child has a degree from Texas State University, and her youngest is now 14. “I decided it was time,” she says. Her husband was supportive of her dream. “We were at the point where we want to accomplish it,” she says.
“Back in my hometown, we make a line to get fresh tortillas, and that’s what I see now that I opened — the people making the line to get the fresh tortillas for lunch or for dinner,” she says. The shop’s rush hours are before customers go to work at around 7:30 a.m., at noon, and after work when they are on their way home, she says. “People work nowadays a lot,” she notes, and have less time to prepare meals at home. She says her customers stop by not only for the tortillas but for rice, beans, and stews, called guiso — short for guisado. “We sell the food by the pound or by the plate, usually something we prepare for the day, fresh every day,” she says.
The recipes are traditional from Mexico; some are family recipes with Paez’s own twist. “I wake up at 4 a.m., and I start working with my team. We make fresh masa every day, fresh tortillas, and fresh everything,” she says. “I experiment with flavors. That’s what I do. I love doing that.”
The tortillas are made without preservatives or artificial colors, Paez says. “I recommend to people who are not used to fresh tortillas to pull them apart from each other, unstick them, because when they are warm, they stick to each other,” she explains. “Then you put them in a plastic bag, put them in the fridge, and they can last up to four or five days.”
The menu is ever-changing as they figure out what people enjoy. “They don't want to eat the same thing every day,” she says. Customers can also pick out a variety of cheeses, such as asadero and queso fresco, and prepared red, green, chimichurri, and molcajete salsas from inside a refrigerated case. On Saturdays and Sundays, Tortilleria Mi Tierra offers barbacoa, carnitas, and menudo. House-made tortilla chips are available for purchase, but Paez cautions that they go quickly.
“It’s a small little place, and when we purchased the building, we didn’t think it was going to be this big of a success,” Paez says. “I think it’s a little small, now that I see all the people who are really interested in fresh tortillas!”
Tortilleria Mi Tierra
710 W. William J Bryan Parkway, Bryan
(979) 485-2665
Hours:
Tuesday to Friday: 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Saturday and Sunday: 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Closed Monday
