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Located only one mile away from the historic mission and fortress of The Alamo, Sanitary Tortilla Manufacturing Company was first established in 1925 by a Spanish man, Francisco Garcia. The first attempt of the company was to set better sanitary conditions for the tortilla manufacturers at the moment, the “Chili Queens” of San Antonio, semi-ambulant taco vendors that cooked chili con carne and tortillas, usually selling at the plazas of San Antonio.
The business was originally located at the intersection of South Laredo Street and West Commerce Avenue, Just a few blocks away from the actual address.
Back in 1925, however, our founder took a very controversial step away from producing the hand-made tortilla offered by the "Chili queens" for around 100 years before the company's foundation. Mr. Garcia had the first tortilla-making machines for the entire region installed into our factory. Initially the people of San Antonio were reluctant to accept our new "machine-made tortilla", but in the end our Sanitary Tortilla's consistency, flavor, and excellent quality proved to be "a winner".
As time passed by, and with the industrialization of food, the corn tortilla industry also changed, especially because of the corn flour. This flour with additives gave the tortillas a longer life, replaced the mills for mixers and made production cheaper. This was a drastic change for the industry, so big that in the present it is really hard to find tortilla producers that use corn kernels as raw material, not just in the U.S. but also in Mexico.
Years later, in 1971, "Sanitary Tortilla" would move to its present location at 623 Urban Loop, just across the street from Immaculate Heart of Mary Church.
In Sanitary Tortilla Company we believe that a good product is the reflection of hard work. During almost 100 years of operation our traditional tortilla prevails. Giving our customers a tortilla that because of its process have an alkaline pH and 0% additives.
So remember when you want a tortilla that has a rich and fresh flavor with a smooth aftertaste, this tortilla is and will always be a tortilla from Sanitary, the real tortilla.
Our process starts with the selection of kernels, only the highest quality of American corn arrives at our production facility in San Antonio, Texas. The kernels need to be cooked under an alkaline water solution, just as the aztecs did it thousands of years ago.
To give the water solution its properties we employ a small amount of food grade lime, which is manufactured locally. After soaking the kernels in the water solution we start the cooking process. After this we need to let the grains steeping for several hours.
The next day, around 4 AM the kernels are ready to be converted into masa or dough. We drain the corn and feed it to our traditional stone mill. Depending on the different products that we offer, we adjust the mill to go from a very finely milled masa, for an exquisite tortilla, to a coarse one that will give us the perfect crunch in our chips.
The next steps are forming and baking. If the kernels were over or under cooked the tortilla will not have the perfect form nor width, just perfectly cooked kernels will work. The baking is also one of the crucial moments when producing tortillas. Flexibility, flavor, color, product life, and texture are some of the properties that our tortilla will develop only if the oven is set at the perfect temperature.
Of course this is a complex process, but that’s why we have been doing this everyday for so many years, we want to be 100% sure that we are doing only the best in our work team to give you the best tortilla we can. Using 100% American Raw Materials but with the Traditional Mexican Process to give you the REAL TORTILLA, the Sanitary Tortilla.
We do tortillas that are simply the best, our classic recipes are both tasty and healthy.
- Our Tortillas have an alkaline pH because we use fresh nixtamal masa.
- We don't use any preservatives, we want you to have only fresh food.
- If you’re watching your sodium intake don't worry because we don’t add salt to our tortillas.
- Our ingredients are free from gluten, even though our products are not certified as Gluten Free in our production lines and warehouse we keep completely separated all that could be a risk of gluten contamination.
We've been perfecting our recipe for the last 95 years ! We earned a place in the hearts of the people of San Antonio.
We ship through USPS,
fresh tortillas from the factory to your table !
Our tortillas are healthier than most tortillas thanks to our Nixtamalization process... and tastier !
We produce tortillas for restaurants too! Let us know what kind of tortilla you need and we will deliver them to your business. Amazing Taste!
If you’re looking for products to use in your restaurant please contact us via email or give us a call, we have several solutions and some other products to offer you .