All in the Family

More than 30 years ago, hating the hours and hard work at his father’s restaurant in Tampa, Florida, Albert Perez decided to seek his own career path in the airline industry. Perez, known affectionately as Big Al, loved his new job. At home, he still took pride in preparing his favorite foods for his family, and his kitchen became a place for tasting and preparing empanadas for everyone to crimp, cook, eat, critique, and share.

Big Al soon began selling empanadas to a friend and co-worker who had her own bar business. Demand grew quickly, and supplying empanadas to the three bars became a challenge. So Big Al opened an empanada shop, where the whole family worked hard while both parents held down regular jobs elsewhere and the three children went to school.

Big Al’s original dream is known as Mr. Empanada, a fast-casual restaurant with five units in Tampa and one in Brandon, Florida.

Empanadas are, naturally, the core menu item at Mr. Empanada, offered in a large variety including ground beef with and without cheese (both are best-sellers); Italian sausage and cheese; and apple, stuffed end to end with no air pockets before deep-frying in trans fat free oil. The crab meat empanada features 100 percent blue crab meat cooked in tomato sauce with onion, green bell pepper, and olive oil before being stuffed inside the empanada dough. Occasional specials designed to enhance menu interest might include a ropa viejo empanada and varieties such as pizza, barbecue chicken, and ham and cheese.

Each empanada on the menu is about a quarter pound and costs less than $3. Some are less than $2, although most orders either combine two empanadas or are bundled with add-ons. Mini empanadas are sold three to an order with fries and a beverage for children’s meals and in quantities of 25 and up for party orders, a big part of Mr. Empanada’s business.

The family-owned flagship restaurant in a predominantly Latin community in West Tampa serves as a commissary for all stores, with empanadas made by hand behind glass, exhibition-cooking style.

Audrey Perez, Big Al’s wife and franchise director, says four years ago she used to know all her customers by name when they’d visit the store her family still owns and operates. Since then, Mr. Empanada’s popularity has grown, and it’s no longer only people from the community who crave a crabmeat or Italian-sausage empanada.

“Now my husband and I are working out front, and we don’t know two-thirds of the people anymore,” Perez says. “We have the influx of the Cuban culture coming in, but now it’s no longer only Cubans who dine here. Our customers represent all ethnic backgrounds, and many bring their children. We really try to market to children, because if they like our food, they’ll bring their parents.”

It’s true that comfort foods for most Americans often reflect the school lunches they liked as kids. Capitalizing on that marketing opportunity, Mr. Empanada supplies lunches to the local school district, a practice the restaurant started when it opened more than 20 years ago. “When we reopened Mr. Empanada in 2003, a man wrote a letter thanking us because he grew up with empanadas at school,” Perez says.

Empanadas were a part of Perez’s childhood, too, when she and her mother and aunt would spend all day preparing different varieties of empanadas at the kitchen table. “It was a wonderful tradition as I was growing up, and that’s what I remember when I eat an empanada,” she says. “We hope to bring that old tradition to children and enourage an unusual food that is sort of a treat.”

In light of everything good about an empanada, to echo Wilson of Johnson & Wales University, it is amazing that they’re not everywhere. As awareness and demand continue to spread among American diners, empanadas clearly have that potential.