EXPO COMIDA LATINA

<figure id="attachment_1767" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1767" style="width: 300px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a class="highslide" onclick="return vz.expand(this)" href="http://laprensa-sandiego.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-comida-01… loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-1767" title="expo comida 01" src="http://laprensa-sandiego.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-comida-01-…; alt="Marcela Jimenez, who works with Los Altos food products in Industry, California, serves samples of fresh Mexican cheese at the Expo Comida Latina trade show exhibit at the San Diego Convention Center. Founders of the company began by importing cheese from Mexico, but later began production in the United States.Photo - David Maung" width="300" height="201" srcset="https://dev-laprensa.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-co… 300w, https://dev-laprensa.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-co… 1024w, https://dev-laprensa.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-co… 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px"></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-1767" class="wp-caption-text">Marcela Jimenez, who works with Los Altos food products in Industry, California, serves samples of fresh Mexican cheese at the Expo Comida Latina trade show exhibit at the San Diego Convention Center. Founders of the company began by importing cheese from Mexico, but later began production in the United States.Photo - David Maung</figcaption></figure>
 The Expo Comida Latina food show held this week in San Diego, the largest industry tradeshow of it’s kind, brought together food producers, distributors, restaurants and others involved in the rapidly expanding race to satisfy the growing appetite for Hispanic food in the United States.
<figure id="attachment_1770" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1770" style="width: 300px" class="wp-caption alignright"><a class="highslide" onclick="return vz.expand(this)" href="http://laprensa-sandiego.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-comida-03… loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-1770" title="expo comida 03" src="http://laprensa-sandiego.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-comida-03-…; alt="A bartender serves samples of tequila at the Expo Comida Latina trade show exhibit at the San Diego Convention Center. Photo - David Maung" width="300" height="201" srcset="https://dev-laprensa.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-co… 300w, https://dev-laprensa.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-co… 1024w, https://dev-laprensa.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-co… 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px"></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-1770" class="wp-caption-text">A bartender serves samples of tequila at the Expo Comida Latina trade show exhibit at the San Diego Convention Center. Photo - David Maung</figcaption></figure>
 Thousands of attendees got a chance to mingle among the more than one hundred and thirty displays to chat and sample a wide array of foods and beverages from tamales to candies to seafood to cactus drink.
 According to John Corella, publicist for the Expo, Hispanics and Hispanic food products are an increasingly important part of the US economy.
<a class="highslide" onclick="return vz.expand(this)" href="http://laprensa-sandiego.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/expo-comida-03…;“Hispanics are the second largest population group in the United States with about 41 million. By 2025 it’s going to be 80 million, and they eat and they love their own food,” said Corella who has participated in the Expos for the past five years.
 “Ever since salsa and hot sauce surpassed ketchup as the number one condiment in the United States, we’ve seen a convergence of other Latino originated products and expectations. It used to be you could only find tortillas in certain ethnic neighborhoods, now you find them pretty much everywhere,” said Corella.
 According to a 2008 report by the Selig Center for Economic Growth, Hispanic spending power in 2013 is projected to reach almost $1.4 trillion, vastly outspending other minority groups.
 The report titled The Multicultural Economy, 2008, states that “…the U.S. Hispanic population continues to grow much more rapidly than the non-Hispanic population. By 2013, one person out of every six in the U.S. will be Hispanic.”
 “The immense buying power of the nation’s Hispanic consumer continues to energize the nation’s consumer market,” adds the report.
 One indicator of just how far Hispanic foods are making it into mainstream American culture is that the Expo Comida Latina shared floor space with the Western Foodservice and Hospitality Expo, a large food service tradeshow serving mainstream hospitality demands in the United States.
 “Here at the Expo you’ve got mainstream buyers from restaurant chains and retail companies that are looking for the next hot cross over product,” said Corella.
 “You see a lot of large American restaurant chains looking for a Mexican-Hispanic flair to add as another element for the customer,” he added. “Just look at the quesa-dilla. It’s become another peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”
 Dudley Rainey, a bartender with Le Fleures Catering in Tujunga, California, was impressed with the wide range of Hispanic foods and was on the look out for products that he could bring to the table in the business that he shares with his wife.
 Giving a thumbs up after trying several samples of pickled jalapeño peppers from Mexican producer of canned peppers Sr. Jalapeño, Rainey begins an exchange of telephone numbers and emails in broken Spanish with Eimer Guillermo Gomez, who speaks no English.
 “We do a lot of the catering for the Mexican community with carne asada and a lot of people like jalapenos. There are the traditional brand of jalapenos that everybody always gets but this one is a unique and a new one. It always interesting to try out something new and they’re really good so that’s why we’re willing to see about using their product,” said Rainey.
 “Demand for Mexican food has been steady, and we’re promoting it more because we find people are really interested in it,”  added Rainey in company with his Mexican mother-in-law. “A lot of what we do is with the Gringos, with the Americans and we try to give them a Mexican dish with flavor as close to authentic as we can, so that’s why when I find a good jalapeno like this it helps.”
 The display with Sr. Jalapeño’s hot peppers was just one from a long line of other Mexican producers; part of growing number of food suppliers south of the border who recognize the United States as a natural and rapidly expanding market of consumers.
 “En Mexico estamos muy fuerte porque tenemos años trabajando en el mercado Mexicano pero también estamos incursionando en el mercado de Estados Unidos,” said Margarita Garcia de Alba, director of Nopalitoz, a producer of cactus food products from Mexico.
 “Hemos encontrado que incluso la gente que no es Hispana conoce el nopal porque hay mucha influencia en Estados Unidos de la comida Mexicana y el nopal está posicionado como un producto mexicano. Muchos restaurantes ofrecen el nopal. ya no es raro o diferente ver a la gente estadounidense que sepa del nopal,” added Garcia.
 Hay muchos restaurantes de mexicanos en todo el mundo y la gente empieza a querer estos ingredientes en sus casas. Al momento buscan consumir en su casa estas comidas también. Es parte de la diversidad que ya existe en el mundo.