Mexican restaurants scramble, get creative to survive during tough pandemic times

People dine at Mi Tierra’s outdoor patio earlier this month. Mi Tierra converted its parking lot into a outdoor dining space to drum up more business as the pandemic has hit restaurants hard. | Tyler LaRiviere/Sun-Times

In the decade that Kevin Suarez has worked at Mi Tierra Restaurant in Little Village, he has seen the popular business go through a change of ownership, a fluctuating local economy, several makeovers and a variety of clientele and performers.

But never has the survival of the Mexican restaurant been so precarious as during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It affected us because this restaurant has a lot of capacity and many employees on staff,” he said. “In the beginning we laid off a lot of people and we’re practically counting this year as a loss.”

Latino restaurants had no choice but to adapt to the public health crisis. For many immigrant owners, their businesses are their only lifelines. It was do or die.

Mi Tierra, known for their extravagant dishes consisting primarily of grilled meats and traditional cuisine, introduced a special menu — more reasonable portions and greater affordability — that would make carry-out options attractive to their customers. They also ramped up their online sales on Uber, GrubHub and DoorDash.

A family is served drinks while sitting at Mi Tierra’s outdoor patio earlier this month. Mi Tierra converted their parking lot into a outdoor dining space due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We then opened up our parking lot and took our live-music performances outdoors on weekends,” after Mayor Lori Lightfoot relaxed the safety restrictions on establishments during phase three, said Suarez, who is the general manager.

Alejandro Reyes, manager of La Costa Restaurant in Belmont Cragin, a neighborhood devastated by the pandemic, said he didn’t understand the gravity of COVID-19 until his Chicago-based seafood providers halted their operations.

“I was in awe because here we were, the crowds packing the place, with people lined up on the sidewalk to wait for a table, while the mariachi played,” he said.

La Costa had 55 employees on payroll that had to be reduced to a rotation of 15 workers a day. They implemented the state-mandated sanitation guidelines and studied the material from the ServSafe certification, a sanitation training that employees take every two years.

La Costa restaurant, in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood, has windows that can provide customers with a good view — and good ventilation — during the pandemic.

Nobody knows impeccable hygiene better than people who handle seafood, Reyes said.

The restaurant kept their regular menu, and carry-out and delivery were surprisingly successful. People continued to order their classic Nayarit-style dishes, from the shrimp empanadas, to the fresh ceviches, to platters of spicy crab legs, shellfish, clams, oysters, and mussels.

Mi Tierra and La Costa applied for temporary permits from the City of Chicago to have outdoor dining when the city streamlined the applications to expedite the issuance of permits during the pandemic.

“The regular patio permit was a super complicated process,” said Reyes, who noted that it was already outside the grasp of many Latino restaurants. “It required architectural drawings, strict specifications, you gotta get your local authorities to sign off on it, like the alderman and the fire marshal. It’s a drag.”

Over 250 individual bars and restaurants have been able to apply to operate outside in private or public property through the Expanded Outdoor Dining Permit that, according to the city, is good for 180 days. The city has waived any fees.

Aside from its back patio, La Costa has vertical windows on the front facade that open up like an accordion to give customers a view of the street. It allows for ventilation, while people waiting on the sidewalk can listen to the live norteño music playing inside.

Per city guidelines, restaurant operators do not need any additional permits to run “an indoor space where 50% or more of a wall can be removed via the opening of windows, doors, or panels.”

Those restaurants that didn’t seek a permit found other ways to operate safely during COVID-19, like setting up improvised food stands in front of their buildings.

Andrés Reyes of Birrieria Ocotlán had to close one of his two locations in the beginning of the stay-at-home order, while at the South Chicago location, “We put employees in hazmat suits and gloves while taking orders outside,” he said.

Eventually he reopened and installed a sliding walk-up window on the front of both restaurants, which have had great reception.

“Birria has been in my family for a little over a century now, my father began here in Chicago back in 1973,” he said of his family restaurants, which are famous for their traditional Jalisco-style goat dishes.

That legacy is why keeping the business going was not a question. Lately, he’s been promoting his own version of the trendy quesabirria, the “quesataco”, a street food that consists of a birria quesadilla that’s dunked in the goat broth.

Reyes recently purchased a food truck that he’s calling El Chivo (The Goat) on Wheels, and should be more dynamic to operate during the remainder of the pandemic.

Because outdoor dining can’t always be practical in Chicago.

“Winter is coming,” Suarez said. “Mi Tierra staff is bracing for any situation. We’re already discussing innovating safe ways to serve our customers well into next year.”