Kansas City’s Yoli Tortilleria earns national recognition with James Beard Award nomination

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Since Yoli Tortilleria earned a James Beard Award nomination for Excellent Bakery, it has seen much more enterprise.

However for co-founder Marissa Tapia Gencarelli, the nomination is greater than simply gaining extra clients.

Yoli’s corn tortillas begin with simply three elements: corn, water and traces of lime. The nixtamalization course of they undergo means steeping that fastidiously sourced corn for hours.

“With Kansas, Missouri and Illinois corn for probably the most half,” Tapia Gencarelli stated.

She stated that corn is then floor with volcanic stones which makes masa, a maize dough. The masa is then used to make Yoli’s famend tortillas.

“It makes your tortilla extremely sturdy,” stated Tapi Gencarelli, as she folded a tortilla right into a ball in her hand and watched it spring again unbroken.

For her, these are greater than tortillas. They’re partly reminiscences of rising up in Sonora in Mexico.

“Each nook has a tortilleria, so relying in your neighborhood, it’s corn and flour,” she stated.

When she moved to Kansas Metropolis and couldn’t discover tortillas like residence, she co-founded Yoli Tortilleria, promoting each corn and flour tortillas.

“It’s purely Sonoran fashion, so it’s so much thinner,” Tapi Gencarelli defined. “It’s chewy.”

Don’t be stunned for those who get a scorching and contemporary flour tortilla proper while you stroll within the door at its Westside location.

“For me, it is simply reminiscences of being little, strolling in, I’m simply getting a scorching tortilla,” she stated. “Typically it’s too scorching to carry, however then you definately roll it up and simply eat it — for me it’s excellent. “

KSHB 41 Information Anchor Lindsay Shively first met Tapi Gencarelli in 2020, and since then, her enterprise has simply continued to develop. It ships to clients all around the nation, and sells tortillas in some grocery shops and dozens of eating places.

“We’ve got over 100 eating places in Kansas Metropolis alone now,” she stated.

Now they’re much more well-known after the tortilleria earned its first James Beard Award nomination.

“Saturday was nonstop, and this week, we’re over I might say 80% up in gross sales,” Tapi Gencarelli stated. “So it’s like 80%. It was insane. We preserve restocking and restocking, so it’s good.”

For her, that nationwide nomination is past only a enhance in enterprise.

“There’s something concerning the tortilla getting the popularity, identical as bread,” she stated. “There’s one thing very particular that we by no means imagined that that was doable. I feel that that’s simply such an honor and I acquired calls from all around the tortillerias right here in america and different areas from Belgium, from the Turkey space, throughout and it is loopy as a result of they’re simply so excited {that a} tortilleria is being represented.”

And at Yoli, it has by no means simply been concerning the meals.

“We actually began making it out of frustration and personally for me is methods to take care of grief,” Tapi Gencarelli stated. “I misplaced my mother and father after I was younger and so for me, making tortillas is a dialog with my mother and father.”

She additionally stated that to her, meals is about connecting with individuals and sharing the sentiments it evokes with others.

Past tortillas, Yoli has created some informative zines, self-published printed works about Sonora and masa.

You may need tried a few of their burritos or tamales through the years or a few of their specialty merchandise you’ll be able to typically discover at their Westside location, like salsa macha. The corporate has plans to increase their meals choices at their Westside location within the coming months.

The 2023 James Beard Restaurant and Chef Awards ceremony will probably be held in June in Chicago.