Fiesta by Blanca a local salsa that's in demand

It's a good problem to have: Blanca Cardoza is less than three months into her new business of selling salsas and is already looking for help to handle the volume.

"I’m selling more than I thought I would, and faster," says Cardoza. "I’ve been doubling my business each week, and I’m reaching capacity."

Fiesta by Blanca, Cardoza’s cottage business of salsa made with fresh ingredients, launched in December 2013, with free tastings and demos at Natural Health Center at 4610 West Main in Kalamazoo.

"I was so nervous." Cardoza laughs. "I didn’t know what to expect, so I brought everything I had, but the response was so great. It was a good way to launch. Two times a year, the store features local foods, with little tables everywhere."

From there, Cardoza placed her salsas in nearly a dozen local stores, including People’s Food Co-op, Tiffany’s Wine and Spirit Shoppe, Beer and Skittles, Bert’s Bakery, Youz Guys Sausage Company, and Harding’s in Parchment, on Drake Road in Kalamazoo, and in Woodbridge. This spring, her salsas will be on the menu at Hangar, a restaurant at 4301 West Main in Kalamazoo.

Cardoza’s story began five years ago, with Cardoza giving away her homemade salsas to her clients at All About You hair salon in Milwood, where she has been a hairstylist more than 10 years and continues to put in around 30 hours even now while marketing her product every day. Cardoza gave the salsa away as holiday gifts, but her clients kept asking for more, encouraging her to consider selling it. Eventually, she listened.

That’s Cardoza’s salsa story, but her own story began in Mission, Texas, where she was born in a Mexican family that loved its salsas and served them with every meal. She moved to Michigan at age 7 when her mother was accepted as a student at Western Michigan University, and the family’s salsas came with them.

"My childhood was spent living with extended family under one roof," says Cardoza. "My grandmother made salsas and sauces from recipes that were passed on through generations in our family. We put it on everything. It’s part of my nationality. I took her recipes and made them healthier. Some of my uncles died of diabetes, so if my grandmother fried jalapenos, I cut them in fresh. My salsas are also low-sodium and gluten-free. People can enjoy my salsas and still eat healthy."

It took a grant of $8,500 from Can-Do Kitchen, part of the Fair Food Matters non-profit organization that helps people start food businesses, to give Cardoza the funding needed to launch her business.

But after two years perfecting the salsa recipes in her home kitchen, Cardoza had her dream nearly go up in flames when the rented house where she lived had an electric fire start in the basement. "Renter’s insurance didn’t nearly cover it, and I was out of home and money," she says.

By now, that all seems to be just a bad dream. The grant she and three other recipients received, gave her the new start she needed. With it came the encouragement of Lucy Bland, Can-Do Kitchen’s manager.

"She helped me to just go for it," Cardoza says. The grants were targeted on single parents of low income, and Cardoza, proud parent of a son and daughter, qualified. "That was me all around," she says. "So I got my business license and got started."

It took a year and a half, Cardoza says, to design the labels for Fiesta by Blanca. Not one detail would be missed. She met with representatives of the Department of Agriculture to learn exactly what is required to go on the label for the flavors she would initially carry: Pico de Gallo (mild), corn and black bean (medium), and pineapple salsa (hot), all preserved with organic lime juice, in 16 ounce containers, priced between $5.89 and $6.99, depending on the retailer.

"I use organic corn and organic black beans," says Cardoza. "I add tomatoes, garlic, onion, cilantro, jalapenos, and spices, then I puree the salsa just enough so that the onion isn’t chunky, but the salsa is still chunky."

In the springtime, Cardoza plans to add a new salsa to her line-up: peach. Customers have a chance to taste Fiesta by Blanca salsas at the Taco Bar at People’s Food Co-op, 507 Harrison Street, every Thursday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

"I make the salsas fresh there, at the Can-Do Kitchen, every week," she says. Most of her preparation time goes into chopping and dicing, but making the batch of salsa after that requires about an hour.

Cardoza also offers classes on how to make salsas. "I’m going to have classes at Kalamazoo Public Library, and I’ll be doing a demo on Friday, March 7, at the Epic Center downtown, for the Art Hop."

Cardoza says that if she isn’t styling hair at the salon, she is doing marketing for Fiesta by Blanca, working every day of the week, visiting establishments or sending out email blasts. A friend helps her package the salsas, and her daughter Ci'anna Gray helps with the labels.

"I’m already talking to friends to find someone who needs the work." She smiles.

In her demos and on the Fiesta by Blanca Facebook page, Cardoza offers weekly recipes that showcase her salsas. Most popular, she says, is her recipe for tilapia served with the hot pineapple salsa on top.

"I would love to have my own storefront someday," Cardoza says. Between chopping more vegetables, she speaks of a small kitchen in South Haven someday, a place with a few tables out front, and customers enjoying chips and her salsas in the sunshine. It’s a new salsa dream taking shape.

For more information, call 269-903-6509.

Zinta Aistars is creative director for Z Word, LLC, and editor of the literary magazine, The Smoking Poet. She lives on a farm in Hopkins.

Photos by Erik Holladay.