Have you ever tried a food that rocked your world? I'm talking just-brewed, locally roasted coffee. Squeaky cheese curds fresh from a dairy farm. Sourdough bread made by master bakers. It’s the little things.
One local food that recently rocked my world – and makes me want to eat a breakfast taco every day – is the tortillas made by Caz Tortilla Company.
Caz Tortilla is owned by the husband-and-wife team of Casey and Katie Masters. Despite its name, the company is based in Syracuse.
The Masters’ served in the U.S. Air Force and moved to Central New York from the White Sands area of New Mexico. They found they missed the tortilleria in their local grocery store, where they purchased tortillas that were “never more than an hour old,’’ according to Casey. They started making tortillas at home in Cazenovia, and before long they decided to turn their home project into a business. They hoped to find a production space in or near Cazenovia, Casey said, but instead set up shop in Syracuse. The small tortilla production facility is on Burnet Avenue, between Kilian Manufacturing and Visual Technologies.
Casey Masters and Operations Manager Drew Merkel weren’t making tortillas when I visited on a recent weekday, but gave me a quick tour of the place. It features a storage room for ingredients like masa, flour, baking powder and salt, a mixing room, and a production room with separate lines for pressing out and baking corn and flour tortillas. With a handful of employees, they produce thousands of five- and six-inch tortillas weekly.
To see the production process, watch this report by Emily Kenny, who covers food production and agriculture for Spectrum News.
If your only experience with tortillas is grocery store tortillas, you’re in for a pleasant surprise. The local tortillas taste fresh, contain no sugar or artificial ingredients and have more “heft” to them than flimsy (and tear-prone) mass-produced tortillas. I’ve mainly used them for breakfast tacos, heating one tortilla at a time over the slots of my toaster and filling them with pan-roasted pepper and onion, scrambled eggs, cheese and salsa for a weekend breakfast of champions. One of these days I’ll get more adventurous and use them in an enchilada casserole with roasted vegetables.
I purchased my tortillas (10 for $3) at the Central New York Regional Market in Syracuse, and love knowing they were produced the day before a couple miles away. Check the Caz Tortilla Company Facebook or Instagram page to see if they’ll be at the market on a given Saturday.
Want to taste tortillas from Caz Tortilla Company? Restaurants that use them include Alto Cinco, Decir Algo, Steve’s Cantina and Mamacitas in Syracuse, Madison County Distillery in Cazenovia and Mad Taco in Nelson. Retail locations include The Curd Nerd, Syracuse Cooperative Market, Thanos Market and Green Hills Farms, Syracuse; Natur-Tyme, DeWitt; and 20/East and Heartstone Artisan Bakery, Cazenovia.
Last but not least, you can purchase tortillas directly at Caz Tortilla Company HQ, 1622 Burnet Ave., Syracuse. Hours (approximate) are 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday to Friday. If you see the sandwich board out front, they’re open. The front entry has an honor box and a rack holding packages of tortillas. Bring cash.
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