Trivia time! How many six-inch tortillas, laid side by side, would it take to reach the moon?
That's the best way I can think of to announce the return of KCRW and Gustavo's Great Tortilla Tournament, which keeps getting bigger and better with every year and deserves to reach the stars.
Because while the moon may be made of cheese, you still need some tortillas to make it into one hell of a celestial quesadilla, you know?
But should it be corn or flour?
That's where #TortillaTournament comes in.
For the past six years, COVID-19 be damned, we have celebrated tortilla culture in Southern California with clashes between restaurants and tortillerias, mom-and-pop operations and… Jeff Bezos?
This year, yes!
We do this to urge people to eat better tortillas, to make better tortillas, and to let the world know that Southern California is the epicenter of tortilla culture in the United States. We do this with a month's worth of original essays, reports, dispatches, videos, audio and a full tortilla directory.
And, of course, a sports-style tournament to determine who will take home the Golden Tortilla and hoist the Chiquihuite Cup.
So over the next month, check out kcrw.com/tortilla for the progression of our tournament and everything else. You can also explore all 96 contestants — 32 from San Diego that are competing in their own tournament, and 64 in the big tournament — laid out in a map that contains all previous contestants.
And for the first time, YOU can play at home with our Fantasía Bracket — pick the most winners through every round, and you'll win a $200 gift card from Northgate Market. Download the bracket here, and start playing here.
96 tortillas! So many tortillas, so little time… but we make time for them all at #TortillaTournament. Happy guessing!
Two human and one canine attendee paint tortillas at last year's Tortilla Tournament. Photo by Larry Hirshowitz
Join Us In Person
It all leads up to the final tortilla tête-à-tête, going down in person Oct. 8 at the weekly get-together of great food that is Smorgasburg Los Angeles. Think of it as a festival within a festival: sets from KCRW DJs, an "Ask a Tortilla Expert" booth, and, of course, our Fuerte Four finalists serving up tortillas for my fellow judges and I. The esteemed judging panel includes Good Food host Evan Kleiman, KCRW Communications Director Connie Alvarez, longtime #TortillaTournament scout Sean Vukan, and a to-be-announced guest judge.
We will award the Golden Tortilla to this year's winner and present the Chiquihuite Cup, a 3D-sculpted tortilla basket (aka a chiquihuite) perched on a tower that sits on a base listing all previous #TortillaTournament winners. The champion gets to show off at their place for a year.
This year, we're debuting a new award: The Bronze Comal People's Choice Award! This will go to whichever of our Suave 16 contestants (announced Sept. 13) gets the most votes from the public. Get ready, restaurants, to rally your fans!
As always, our Tortilla Tournament finale will be free to the public. There will be no free samples, because we don't want to put even more of a financial burden on our Fuerte Four finalists during these inflationary times. But we have invited them to offer their delicious tortillas for sale, so everyone can taste the best Southern California has to offer. Don't be cheap, and buy up!
Enrique and Monica Ramirez of La Princesita Tortilleria in East LA won the 2022 Tortilla Tournament and took home the Chiquihuite Cup. Photo by Larry Hirshowitz
Methodology
The method to our Tortilla Tournament madness will be familiar to anyone who follows the NCAA's March Madness or the FIFA World Cup knockout stage: We'll start with 64 tortillas — 32 corn, 32 flour — split into four brackets of 16. Within those brackets, every tortilla is assigned a seed, so that the highest-ranked tortillas are up against the lowest-ranked ones in the early rounds. That makes it easier for the best of the best to advance toward the finals, but also allows for upsets.
How do we determine which tortilla gets which seed? The Suave 16 from the previous year get assigned the top four seeds in each bracket depending on where they placed. Every other seed, Gustavo determines after scouting tortillas across Southern California throughout the year.
You'll notice there are #5 and #6 seeds in our brackets that say "San Diego." That's because San Diego has its own Tortilla Invitational, and the two finalists for corn and flour (announced next week) move on to the bigger tournament and take the highest-available seeds after the Suave 16. This year, we've included 16 corn and 16 flour tortillas from across San Diego County, and will continue to do so… until we start incorporating other regions of California and beyond and eventually have tortilla LEAGUES.
(L to R) Professor and author Natalia Molina, KCRW communications director Connie Alvarez, journalist Mona Holmes of Eater LA, Good Food host Evan Kleiman and journalist Gustavo Arellano of the LA Times judge the 2022 Tortilla Tournament. Photo by Larry Hirshowitz
Judging
Evan and Gustavo have the corn category this year; Connie and Sean, flour. For the first two rounds, we buy the tortillas fresh, then freeze them that day to see how they hold up after defrosting. (Pro tip: dust off all the ice when you take them out of the freezer, toss out the top and bottom tortillas once they're ready to eat, and get a towel to sop up any additional moisture.)
We do this long before we announce the contestants because it's physically impossible to eat all the contestants fresh in the first two rounds — we're talking at least 16 tortillas per judge in the first round then 8 in the second. By then, tortillas are no longer as fresh as they could be. By freezing, then defrosting, judges can better plan so that tortillas are all on equal footing. Besides, a great tortilla will maintain its brilliance after a freeze.
After we've locked in the Suave 16, we'll buy new packs of the advancing tortillas and eat them fresh until we get our Fuerte Four finalists.
This year, we had sad developments with some of our 2022 Suave 16 finalists. Two of them will not participate this year. Maria's Tortillas in Westchester (which was in the corn category) is under new ownership while El Burrito House in Bell (which made wonderful, huge flour tortillas) shut down completely.
In their place, we've brought back two previous Fuerte Four Finalists. Kernel of Truth Organics is probably the best machine-made corn tortilla in Southern California and gets in because they asked how they could get back in, and here they are. Sometimes, all you gotta do is ask. And El Cholo comes back in the flour tortilla category because they're celebrating 100 years of business in 2023. Happy birthday, kid!
Meanwhile, one of last year's corn finalists, Tallula's in Santa Monica, served their last meal this past Sunday, August 20. And 2019 Golden Tortilla Winner, Taco María in Costa Mesa, shut down in July. We allowed each to stay in the tournament, however, because they announced their closures after the judges had already gone through their brackets.
Gentle readers: PLEASE support your local tortillas, and check out the ones we recommend. We do this tournament to promote los buenos — the good folks — that make Southern California worth living in.
Judges at the 2022 Tortilla Tournament taste one of the flour tortilla finalists. Photo by Larry Hirshowitz
Tasting Parameters
How do we determine what makes a great tortilla, and what doesn't, especially when food is so subjective? After years of doing this, some parameters of taste have emerged.
When it comes to corn, there can't be any bitter flavor. That's the telltale sign of preservatives, that there is something in the ingredients other than the holy trinity of corn, water, and lime. The best corn tortillas taste like, well, corn: earthy, almost funky. Flavors can vary depending on the type of corn that's used but if you're not feeling thousands of years of tradition in your tortilla bite, then you're not eating a good corn tortilla.
When it comes to flour, there can't be any bitter flavor. That's the telltale sign of preservatives, that there is something else in the ingredients other than the only four things a great flour tortilla needs — water, flour, a binding agent like lard or butter, and baking powder (okay, maybe salt). Flour is a harder category to judge because there are so many different varieties — Tex-Mex, Sonoran, Chicano, New Mexican — but in general, we're looking for something that doesn't taste like paste. Pretty simple.
For both corn and flour, issues like thickness, size, and how it cooks are nearly irrelevant. Flavor rules all.
Mariachi Tierra Azteka performs performs at the 2022 Tortilla Tournament. It was one of the many forms of entertainment at the festivities. Photo by Larry Hirshowitz
The Fine Print
We know that your tortillas (or that of your parents, your tias, grandmas or comadres) are better than everyone in our competition. But unless those homemade tortillas are available for sale — via Instagram, a restaurant, a taco tent, or even a kermes — we wouldn't know. So tell them to start selling!
Your favorite tortilla didn't make it this year? They've probably participated before, and lost. No hard feelings. My favorite corn (Miramar Tortilleria in East L.A.) and flour (Jimenez Ranch Market in SanTana) haven't been in #TortillaTournament in years. We haven't gotten to your favorite yet? Send me their name, and we'll consider them for the next time — and there's always a next time. If you have a problem with the seeding or the entries, hit me up, and only me. My name is in the tourno, after all.
Now… enjoy and start eating! Don't forget to use #TortillaTournament in your social media posts. See you Oct. 8 at Smorgasborg for the finale!
And the answer to my tortillas-to-the-moon question, of course, is 2,522,784,000. That's how many are in my freezer right now. Who wants some?