La Michoacana Grocery and Meat Market Owner Eager for the Grilling Season to Begin

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Like a lot of Iowa City residents, Jose Garcia is eager for warm, dry weather to return to the area.

Last year, Garcia, the owner of La Michoacana Taqueria opened a new meat market and Mexican grocery store bearing the same name right next door to the popular taco joint at 436 Highway 1 West.

The problem is that despite his best intentions, he opened the grocery store in August-- in the waning months of the grilling season, and wasn't able to give his new venture the start up he thought it deserved.

"I wanted to get it up for the season when people were grilling," Garcia said. "I started to get everything together, but it just took forever to get started."

The reason Garcia wanted to emphasize grilling was that so many of the unique cuts offered at the La Michoacana Meat Market are made for grill friendly gatherings enjoyed in Hispanic culture and cuisine. Such as skirt steak, a sometimes a think flank cut favored for use in fajitas in Southwestern cuisine in Texas and Mexico, and pulpa a boneless round steak.

Garcia said that La Michoacana also makes its own chorizo (Mexican sausage) and offers it for sale along with the other cuts it uses in the tacos at the taqueria. He said that everything is available at the store for taco lovers to buy supplies to make their own La Michoacana style tacos at home.

"You've just got to take it home and put it all together," Garcia said.

As a sidenote, Garcia said that La Michoacana's chorizo is used on some of the pizza's at the Mill Restaurant, another step in the local partnerships he's looking to establish.

In addition to its specialty cuts, the store also offers a variety of other Mexican spices and supplies, including Mexican candy, hot sauce, peppers, and a hair styling product called Gorilla Snot, a hair gel popular with Hispanic men according to Garcia.

Garcia said that one of the main goals of the grocery store is to teach the curious American consumer more about Mexican cooking, and with this in mind they are always open for questions about the type of cuts and different cooking methods from anyone who stops by.

In other La Michoacana news, Garcia said that the Taqueria may soon offer breakfast featuring such dishes as chorizo filled breakfast burritos.

Until then, he'll be eagerly waiting for the next grilling season.

You can find out more about how to contact the store at the La Michoacana website. The phone number for the store is 319-358-2333.