La Latina of Lowertown
Between running a restaurant and opening a new shop, Valeria Oropeza says there just wasn’t time to have grand opening, so La Latina Groceries quietly began welcoming shoppers on Dalhousie Street in April 2023. Oropeza manages La Latina and El Taco de Oro, a Mexican restaurant just a block away on St. Patrick Street. The two businesses are co-owned by her parents. Her mother, Blanca Aguirre, takes care of the business side of things, and her father, Leopoldo Oropeza, is at the helm of the kitchen.
In the winter of 2018, Val was bartending at Angelo’s, El Taco de Oro’s predecessor, when the owners announced their plans to retire. She mentioned the news to her parents. “My dad has always wanted his own restaurant,” she explains. Her parents had first met at a restaurant in Mexico while Leopoldo was working in restaurant management. With help from their family back home in Mexico, the Aguirre-Oropeza family took over the space and opened El Taco de Oro in April 2019. Since then, they’ve worked hard to stay afloat during pandemic shutdowns and have become part of the fabric of the neighbourhood. “From friendships made [with] Lowertown locals, bar staff and other businesses,” Oropeza notes that they’ve become “super close” to the community members in the area.
In the first three years El Taco de Oro was open, common feedback from diners was how much they wished to have a Latin American store within walking distance of the neighbourhood. “We had been keeping an eye out for a while,” Oropeza says, when an opportunity on Dalhousie Street came up.
In La Latina’s early months, some shop visitors said they were still able to smell the previous incarnation of the space — a “spiritually inspired” shop that sold an array of things such as crystals and tarot cards. “They burned incense all the time, so it lingered,” Oropeza says with a laugh.
With the family’s background, La Latina’s primary focus has been to stock Mexican products, though there’s a growing Colombian section, too.
“Our bigger goal is to try to get all the essentials from as many South American and Latino countries as we can,” Oropeza says, noting that it’s a balancing act to be able to import products from countries farther away from Canada at prices that would cover the shop’s overhead and still be appealing to customers. They are also looking to expand into selling artisanal crafts and objects. Since opening day, a suggestion jar has sat on the front counter and it's helped Oropeza learn what folks are looking for on the shelves, whether it be food that brings back memories of their travels or from back home.
Oropeza’s favourite childhood snack, Gansitos, is a fluffy chocolate-coated treat with cream and strawberry jelly fillings. “We put them in the fridge so the chocolate gets crunchy,” she says. Leopoldo also stocks the fridge with homemade items not found on El Taco de Oro’s menu, such as empanadas and tamales that are ready to grab and go, and Mexican rice pudding for dessert. There is a wide array of salsa (with varying spice levels), crunchy snacks such as different types of chicharrones and Takis, and sweets such as marzipan and drinking chocolate, along with all the staples needed to stock a Mexican kitchen. La Latina also carries colourful piñatas for celebrations, or for simply brightening up the next taco night at home.
La Latina Groceries
217 Dalhousie St.
613.241.0007 | @lalatinaottawa
