Tamales El Plebe was born in a kitchen in the city of Downey with a very good response
After working for 19 years as director of Plaza México in the city of Lynwood in southeast Los Angeles County, on February 14, Mario Cárdenas was left without a job and with a wife and four children to support.
This immigrant from the state of Sinaloa in Mexico did not close his world, he immediately set to work to become a business consultant, what he never imagined is that in a few weeks the coronavirus pandemic would cross his path. road .
"I had to take a half break from consulting to think of other ways to provide for my family," he says.
But when his 18-year-old daughter Madai told him that he wanted to start working to pay the monthly payment and car insurance that had been bought for him when he was still employed; and the other 15-year-old daughter Valeria started with ideas of what to do to attract income to the house. They came up with the idea of preparing and selling food.
"The idea of creating Tamales El Plebe belonged to everyone, ”says Mario.
“When we thought about what we could do, we said that tamales people really like; and the Sinaloa tamale is very liked ”.
This is how parents and daughters turned their kitchen into a space to make chicken tamales, meat, rajas and also vegans.
Vegans have been in high demand. They have nopales, carrots, mushrooms, potatoes, chili slices, a pesto cream, a little coriander, parsley and basil, "he explains.
At the request of their clients who not only wanted to eat tamales but also to taste other Mexican snacks, in recent weeks they expanded the menu to include cakes and sopes. Sopes are known in the state of Sinaloa as gorditas with the difference that they include vegetables such as lettuce and tanned onion.
Madai, a psychology student at Cerritos Community College, says that they decided to name the nascent family business with the peculiar name of Tamales El Plebe because in Sinaloa, the land of their parents, children and boys are affectionately called plebes. When someone refers to "The Plebs" they are talking about "The Child" or "The Boy".
And he says that working as a family has been a challenge. "We have learned to work as a team because it is very different from daily living at home," says Madai.
Mario says that in reality the hardest work has been done by his wife Malena Díaz, and “the plebes” as he calls his daughters Madai and Valeria.
"I help them, but I'm more focused on marketing, presentation, and sales."
Los Cárdenas are selling food from Thursday to Friday, but on weekdays they work through orders.
Valeria who is in grade 11 of high school, has as hobbie lto preparing desserts and cakes. That encouraged them to include chocolate covered strawberries on the menu.
For years, Mario shared his love of cooking on his social networks, and frequently published photos and recipes of the meals he made with his daughters on weekends. "Many people told me that I should open a business to sell the dishes we made, but I did not think that a pandemic was going to be the trigger to launch myself and reinvent myself."
What I like gives him, is that he has been able to start on a family plan accompanied by his loved ones.
“It is a very important challenge, and it is a struggle. The line between being an employee and an entrepreneur is very thin. I am going to continue with business consulting, but also with gastronomy because it is also making my common people take responsibility ”.
Madai says that she likes to promote family food, talk and connect with people. "We sell a lot for family gatherings."
Valeria says that working with the family can be easier, but also harder.
If you want to try Los Tamales El Plebe and support the Cárdenas family, call: 310-474-1589 and 310-350-3709.
