From the outside, La Tonina – a humble taquería in the San Rafael neighborhood that’s been in business for some 80 years – gives nothing away. It’s not until you step inside and the scent of fresh flour tortillas hits that you suddenly find yourself transported out of the city and up to northern Mexico.

La Tonina

La Tonina was founded in 1946 by Héctor Garza, a professional wrestler known by his lucha libre ring name Tonina Jackson (more on that later). Héctor was from the northeastern city of Monterrey – where wheat and flour tortillas are essential to the local cuisine – which is why, in his restaurant, corn never stood a chance. Perhaps, as one food writer suggested, Tonina craved the norteño flare from back home and the flour tortillas that are so hard to find in central and southern Mexico. For 78 years, flour tortillas and gorditas de nata (a Mexican sweet bread that looks like an English muffin and whose level of sweetness falls somewhere between a pan dulce and a dessert) have been La Tonina’s specialties, alongside dishes from northern Mexico like macha con huevo and cabrito from Monterrey, cochipecho from Sonora, chilorio from Sinaloa, and adobo from Chihuahua.

La Tonina

Each flour tortilla is handmade and, as such, unique. “Industrial ones don’t have the same texture,” explained Patricia Soto Ramos, 61, the current owner of La Tonina. “[Ours] are artisanal.” Patricia began working at La Tonina when she was a teenager, but took over the business in 2015.

La Tonina has undergone a few changes since the original owner opened its doors. For starters, it is no longer owned by Tonina Jackson or his family. In the 1940s, Tonina Jackson wrestled across the U.S. from New York City to San Antonio, Texas. He dabbled in acting in the 1950s and starred as a wrestler in seven movies during Mexico’s golden age of cinema. During this time, his sister, Idilia Garza, took care of the restaurant and is the one who passed down her recipes to Patricia’s mother, who worked at the restaurant for 50 years.

Patricia Soto Ramos

Despite the change of hands, La Tonina is still a family business. On a typical weekday, one of Patricia’s daughters waits tables. Towards the back, near the door that leads to a kitchen, her husband rolls flour dough into tiny balls which one of her son in-laws will then roll flat into tortillas. Her young grandchildren take up one of the vintage booths before heading to school. In between rolling tortillas and flipping gorditas from the comal, Patricia packs the kids a few flour tortilla tacos for lunch.

La Tonina is still a small operation reminiscent of the days when Patricia and her mother worked there. The restaurant’s small team of about 10 people are able to pump out some 3,000 flour tortillas a day, according to Patricia. It’s all-hands on-deck – everyone has their own wooden rolling pin, be it for its grip, weight, or size. To master the art of the paloteo, the rolling of the dough, each must find their perfect match.

La Tonina

Starting in the 50s, the legendary Cine Ópera in the San Rafael neighborhood showcased the hits of Mexico’s Golden Age of cinema, bringing in long lines of people that wound down a few blocks from the restaurant. The cultural scene grew when the Teatro Manolo Fábregas theater arrived in 1965, inaugurated by none other than the legendary actress María Félix. “Fancy cars pulled up,” remembers Patricia, referring to the customers who appeared all dressed up for an evening at the theater, but not before stopping for their tacos. “They arrived looking like they were going to a wedding.” Actors who were set to appear in a play used to eat at La Tonina during rehearsals. Patricia remembers running out of the restaurant with a few of her coworkers to catch a glimpse of famous Mexican actors.

La Tonina

The current La Tonina is a few storefronts down from the original location and is slightly bigger. The original was essentially a small corridor with just enough space to fit five booths. The restaurant kept the dark-blue cushioned booths, but today has a few more tables and a kitchen in the back. Unless one counts the trays of flour dough balls scattered over empty tables as decor, there’s little of it, except for a few old photos of La Tonina Jackson hanging on bare walls and a couple of ceiling fans to fend off the heat emanating from the big griddle at the front.

La Tonina

The one thing that hasn’t changed is the original flavor. Patricia has carefully preserved the traditional recipes she inherited from the owners. “I wanted to make it into a family business so that the tradition continued,” said Patricia, who has always considered the restaurant one big family. It was that connection with the previous owners and former co-workers that earned her the recipe for the flour tortillas and gorditas that make them stand out in Mexico’s taco mecca.

La Tonina

The golden days of La Tonina ended along with those of the movie theater, which shut down in the 90s, but the restaurant is still standing and going strong. “I feel that this place is a lot about generations, meaning the grandma who came with her small grandchild and now the small kid comes in with his family,” said Patricia. Patrons walk in and greet her by name. Those who don’t stay to eat pick up their packages of tortillas or gorditas and chat with Patricia as she switches between rolling tortillas, making tacos, and flipping gorditas.

People have come back throughout the years because the taste of the gorditas reminds them of the ones their grandma used to make. Or they even come to buy some to place on their loved ones’ altar for Día de Muertos, Patricia explained. Others come back out of pure nostalgia. Patricia enjoys talking to her customers and listening to their stories, some of which unfolded at La Tonina.

La Tonina

The success of La Tonina speaks for itself, but that doesn’t mean Patricia can just sit back and enjoy the rewards of decades of hard work. She still puts in long hours, starting some days at 7 a.m. and staying far into the evenings. The restaurant only closes on Christmas and New Year’s Day and after all her years working in a norteño style restaurant, Patricia hasn’t had the time to visit Monterrey, the city behind La Tonina’s flour tortilla recipe.

The day we spoke with Patricia, she wore a baby blue outfit, complete with a hairband, that matched her restaurant’s sign. Springy and charismatic, she keeps wads of cash in her apron’s pocket for whenever a supplier walks in or something needs to be taken care of.

Flour tortillas

When asked about her thoughts about El Califa, a Mexico City taquería around the block from La Tonina that just became the first Mexican taco stand to win a Michelin star, Patricia was unfazed. “I don’t want a star because it was crazy,” she said, of the crowds that flocked to the taquería. Patricia can do without a massive influx of foodies, but she still wants La Tonina, her home and family in more ways than one, to grow. “I hope the restaurant never dies,” she said.

Lorena Rios TrevinoAndrew Reiner

Published on November 08, 2024

Related stories

February 11, 2025

Ghebi: Subterranean Comfort

Tbilisi | By Pearly Jacob
TbilisiFew locals, let alone tourists have reached the isolated mountain village of Ghebi in Georgia’s northern borderlands of Racha. However, many have passed through the doors of its namesake basement restaurant in the bustling left bank district of Marjanishvili in downtown Tbilisi. For more than a decade, the eatery has been steadily serving up comfort…
María Ciento38
September 12, 2024

María Ciento38: Sicilian Soul in CDMX

Mexico City | By Cristina Alonso
Mexico CityThere are few feelings as universally heartwarming as sitting down at the family table – that space where everyone is welcome and the food always tastes incredible. That was the feeling owner Cristina Cialona was looking for when she opened the doors to María Ciento38 in 2016. Serving classic Sicilian cuisine, something no other Italian…
August 8, 2024

Conservas Pinhais: Tenacious Tinned Fish

Porto | By Austin Bush
PortoMatosinhos, it could be said, has seen better times. In its heyday, the semi-industrial-feeling port city just north of Porto was once home to 54 fish canneries. Today, only two remain. Along the city’s wide, empty-feeling streets, some of the city’s former factories and their graceful Art Nouveau facades have been reappropriated as other businesses…