Flour tortilla shell mold, 1987
notes: label: Description
content: Azteca Foods followed the health–conscious craze of the 1980’s by offering baked instead of fried shells along with providing healthy and innovative ways to use corn and flour tortillas.
label: Description
content: The traditional corn tortilla and the increasingly popular flour tortilla became a significant component in everyday American meals after 1950. As companies tapped into the growing Latino market by mass-producing Mexican as well as Central American and other Caribbean foods, they also produced taco shells, tortilla chips, and frozen burritos, which became staples in grocery chains and convenience stores. By the 1990s, salsa challenged ketchup for condiment supremacy in America.
label: Description
content: Chicago entrepreneur Art Velasquez founded Azteca Foods in 1970, which sold Mexican and Central American foods in supermarkets across the country. The company enabled supermarkets to sell more flour and corn tortillas by adding a preservative into the masa (dough) to extend shelf life. He was one of the many entrepreneurs of the 1970’s to move tortillas from an ethnic based product to more of a popular everyday non ethnic product.
topic: label: Subject
content: Food Culture
label: Subject
content: Latino
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Ethnic
label: See more items in
content: Food
label: See more items in
content: FOOD: Transforming the American Table 1950-2000
label: Exhibition
content: Food: Transforming the American Table
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Azteca Foods
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2012.0032.01
label: catalog number
content: 2012.0032.01
label: accession number
content: 2012.0032
objectType: label: Object Name
content: taco salad mold
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall; base: 3 in; 7.62 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: 3 1/2 in; 8.89 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall; top: 9 in; 22.86 cm