Hi friends, thank you for tuning in again.
And if you have never watched my podcast, my name is Tracy Martens and this is YQG in
Bloom.
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week.
And many of you guys like real authentic Mexican food.
Now in the Windsor-Essex County area, it is a little hard to find.
They have some in Leamington, courtesy of this lady and quite a few others.
Now today I am here with Nelcy Martinez and she is the owner of Hot Tacos.
Now you have two locations in Leamington and a brand new one in Windsor.
Hi, how are you doing?
Good, how are you?
I'm good.
Oh, and before I forget, the Windsor location is open on Mondays, which no Mexican restaurants
in Windsor are open on Mondays.
We usually have to go over to the States.
Yes, that's why we talk about that.
We just open Mondays being great.
I know you've been in Leamington a little longer than Windsor.
How long have you been in Leamington?
It's about four and a half years before we started in 2020 before the COVID.
Just when the COVID started, we started and we're still alive.
And you have two of them in Leamington?
Yes, I have two.
I used to have another one called El Patron Bar and Grill, but we don't have a kitchen
right now.
We renovated.
For now I have two in Leamington and then I expand to Windsor in March 2024 this year.
So we're just brand new here.
And as you can hear in the background, it is popping here tonight.
We actually have a lady that is teaching a painting class.
Are you guys going to be hosting more events like that here?
We getting in there.
We doing the connections right now.
We started with the connection and we're going to start doing a lot of events.
And we try to call the community to get in here and we get in touch with the community
of Windsor.
Yeah.
This is a lovely place.
It's huge for Ouellette Avenue.
Thank you.
It's really big.
Now, do all of your restaurants, do they all have the same menu or is there a different?
I will say 80% the same, maybe even more are the same and the same recipes.
And we have different chefs in each restaurant.
We have one in Leamington, one more focus on like on street food, like fast food, but
Mexican fast, authentic fast food.
Now what classifies as Mexican fast food?
Dorilocos and we have all the tacos, we have hot dogs, we have burgers, but Mexican style,
all handmade, all from the spice, with the spices from Mexico.
I didn't know that there was Mexican hot dogs.
Now, do you guys do chimichangas?
Yes, we do it in Leamington.
In Leamington?
In the street food.
Yeah.
Okay.
So that is a street food.
Yes.
Yeah.
So I was going to ask you when I didn't see it here.
Each location has the menu according to the capacity of the building.
So the smallest one is where we have the fast food because we can prepare really easy and
give to the tables, to the clients.
But the bigger one has a bigger menu.
And here we have a kind of medium size menu.
But here we have everything.
We have burritos, tacos, and a lot of really authentic Mexican dishes.
I had last night the enchiladas with the bean sauce.
Oh my goodness.
It was so good.
I have to say the bean sauce was amazing.
I've never had anything like it.
I'm glad to hear.
I love those too.
And they are not spicy so those are my favorite too.
Yeah.
When they do serve your little nachos, it comes with a tray of four different sauces
to go with it for the table when you get here, which is, I love that.
Yeah.
I love love love.
All the salsa are handmade.
We make from scratch, we make from our original products, spices and chilies from, they bring
from Mexico.
Oh, okay.
So we use high quality of chilies and spices from Mexico to make the salsa.
They make it every day like they are fresh.
And we make four because we want people to try different flavors, different kind of spicy
too.
I like the avocado one.
It has a little bit of a zip, but it's still really, really good.
Yeah.
It's really well, anything avocados.
People love that one.
Now what made you come to Windsor?
What made you come to Windsor?
A lot of clients, a lot of public was asking why we don't move location to Windsor or to
London, to Toronto, because we have a lot of visitors to Livington.
And then they come to Hot Tac and they mention they do the reviews and say you guys should
expand.
So we thought, okay, yeah, why not?
Why not Windsor?
Because it's a lot of community here too.
It's a lot of Canadian people.
They love Mexican food.
Like when they go to Mexico, they love the food.
So then it's nice to have the authentic Mexican food here where people can feel like they
on vacation.
It's true.
Yeah.
And that's the good thing about Windsor is we are, I like to call the melting pot of
foods because we have your Arabic, your Indian, your Mexican, your Asian.
I mean, we have a little bit of everything, but to get really good, authentic Mexican
food, it's either we had to drive out to Leamington or drive across the border to Mexican town.
So it's really nice to have it here.
Now everybody can find it here.
Yeah, and it's right on the left.
And now this isn't your first business.
You just came into this four years ago.
What other business did you have before?
I came in 2006 to Canada.
I came right to Leamington and I came with three kids, with three boys and they big now.
And I just started one year later, I started my own business.
I started a spa and I was in the spa, growing the spa for about 12 years.
Okay.
And then I sold the spa and started the restaurants.
The difference, like I was on the spa, so I worked all day at the restaurants.
I, I, I, I, I'm not going to work at least with my hands.
No, because I'm not good cook.
I'm from Columbia.
So I hired the special people to do the.
Now did you come up with the recipes with the chefs or are these your family recipes?
No, this is all the chef's recipes from Mexico.
We hire all the chefs are Mexican.
Oh, that's why the taste and that's why it make us different.
Yeah.
Cause we all, all the location has chefs.
Yeah, we have two chefs and one cooker in Leamington.
We have two chefs and a lot of helpers working in.
Now do you guys have a food truck or is it something that you're looking at or are you
just staying with locations?
We don't have it yet.
We were looking at it at one point, but right now we kind of trying to settle down for a
little bit until we grow the business.
All of them, because like this one is new.
We want to have more, more, more business.
We want to have a busier and eventually we want to go to the events, to the festivals
and be there too with the truck.
Yeah, that would be nice.
That would be nice.
Well, obviously the words getting around because I mean, this place is often the night.
No, you said that lunches are pretty busy.
So the business people are loving it as well as the dinner crowd.
Yeah.
So we want to get to everybody like to the people, the offices and all the people who
loves Mexican food.
Oh yeah.
Welcome.
We welcome them.
Oh, for sure.
For sure.
So you do have desserts as well.
And I'm trying to think, what would be your most popular dish?
I think the carne asada is the biggest seller.
The carne asada is a steak, really thin steak, beef steak.
That comes with rice and beans and salad.
It's so delicious.
It's my favorite.
And actually the one that's the more popular one.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
And do you have that one in Windsor?
Yes.
Okay.
I'm going to have to try that one next time.
I went for safe yesterday when I came in.
And I liked the gorilla tacos with the pulled pork and what is it called?
Oh yeah.
Birria.
Birria tacos.
That's right.
That's a very popular one in Windsor.
I had never heard of that until this year.
Yeah.
That's lamb tacos.
It's lamb?
Yes.
It was really, really good.
Yeah.
I like lamb.
I would have thought it was a pulled pork.
No, it's lamb.
Wow.
You're venturing out in the meats and it's not just the standard like anybody else would
do like just a pulled pork or the beef or the chicken.
Like you're going for good quality which is amazing.
We also have fish tacos too.
They are delicious.
You should try that one next time.
The fish tacos, oh well, they are really good.
Do you like fish?
Oh, I do.
And that's usually my go-to fish tacos wherever I go.
So I'm trying to get away from that and try different things but I definitely will try
that one here.
Now this location, is it open seven days a week?
Yes, it is.
Wow.
And do you find that you pull in a lunch and dinner crowd every day?
Yes, actually for us and when we leave on Tuesday is the lowest day, the slower day
but here is the Tuesday is the busiest time.
Yeah.
I know that's what I'm looking at.
Right now it's kind of busy, it's nice.
I'm glad, I'm very happy and thankful for the people for the support.
Oh yeah.
You definitely, we have to make sure people know that this location is open on Mondays
because that's the worst.
I love supporting small business.
I'm all about small businesses, small restaurants.
It's hard on Mondays when you don't feel like cooking and all the restaurants are closed.
Yes, I know.
I'm sorry after having tacos and enchiladas here, you can't go to Taco Bell.
No, it's totally different, yes.
Oh, it's wonderful.
Now where are you guys located in Leamington?
We have one location, the biggest location is at 16 Talbot Street East.
Okay.
And the other one is 26 Erie Street South.
Oh wow.
They are closed actually.
I was going to say.
Yeah, they're very closed.
And we are on Oled.
We are here at the 325 Ouellette Avenue.
And you can find them on Instagram.
Facebook and we have a website.
Hot Taco Restaurant.com.
Is it dot com?
Dot com, yes.
Yeah, and then Instagram and Facebook is at Hot Taco Restaurant.
And I like your website where it's set up so that you can see the three locations.
And pick which location.
And also we want to focus on ordering online because a lot of people don't want to go
out every day.
But if they want to cook, they can call us and we can bring the food to their house.
Okay, so we have this Uber Eats and Skip the Dishes and all that.
We actually, yeah, we have Skip the Dishes, we have Door Dash, but we also have our own
program from ordering online.
If they go order online, then that will take us to our system from Touch Bistro.
Oh, okay.
And they can order from there and we send the order from a driver from Door Dash.
Oh, okay.
So we use their drivers.
Oh, that's nice.
To bring the food.
Or we can deliver.
If people start ordering more, we can have our own delivery.
In Livingston, we have two or three deliveries at the same time.
That's not bad.
Because people order a lot, yeah.
Well, I definitely, definitely think that this is going to be a hit once people, more
and more people find out about it.
I mean, if tonight is any indication and if you're going to start offering, like having
different events in here.
So we are looking into getting a liquor license.
Yes, we are in the process.
We already applied and hopefully we get it soon.
They have a liquor license before here.
So I have one liquor license in Leamington.
So hopefully that helps.
Yeah, sometimes.
Yeah.
So you guys do the margaritas.
Oh, yeah.
We're going to have all kinds of cocktails and drinks.
Okay.
Then you guys are going to feel like Mexico.
I live for more margaritas.
I swear to goodness.
That's awesome.
Well, Nelcy, I want to thank you so much for inviting me in and for me being able to
get to know you and your wonderful food.
And I'm so glad that Hot Taco is in the Windsor area now.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate that you came and then did this with me and helping me to get out the word
out about the restaurant.
And I hope we can get a good support from the Windsor community and help like entrepreneurs,
ladies like me.
Oh, yeah.
I've been working really hard to get my business running.
Now I want to see more results, more people coming in.
My goal is to make everybody happy when they come here, to make them feel like they're
home.
Yeah.
Like the Mexicans like home, like when they're in the staff because in Leamington we have
more Mexicans.
But for the Canadian, I want to make sure they feel like they're in Mexico.
They're getting the Mexican experience.
Yeah, because they're getting that experience.
We want to give them the best experience we can.
Now what are the...
I know you're seven days a week in Windsor and I just want to finish really quickly.
What are the hours in Windsor?
In Windsor location, we are Monday to Sunday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day.
I like that, especially on Sundays.
And as I can only say a million times, Mondays.
I'm very excited about that.
So make sure you get down to Hot Tacos here on Ouellette in Windsor, Ontario, or the two
locations in Leamington, Ontario, Hot Tacos as well, that you got the Hot Tacos restaurant
and the Hot Taco street food and support this local business, which is amazing.
Thank you so much, Delce.
Thank you so much.
Again, my name is Tracy Martens and thank you so much for joining me for another episode
of YQG In Bloom.
Make sure you subscribe.
Have a good one.
Thank you.
See you next time.