By Nina M. Scott
After our visit to the Trans World Food Market in Hadley (see Nov. 25 Hampshire Life), our Tasting Circle group (a class under the auspices of Five College Learning in Retirement) headed to Tony Garay’s Ecuador Andino Store at 41 Russell St., also in Hadley.
With my love of South American foods and recipes, I had discovered Tony a while back, finding in his store a treasure trove of dried chilies, fresh cheeses — both Mexican and Ecuadorian — herbs, spices, salsas, plantain chips, canned nopalitos (cactus pads), which make a great salad, etc. He is delighted that I am familiar with his native Ecuadorian cuisine and had fixed llapingachos when it was my turn to host the Tasting Circle.
Tony is originally from Cuenca, Ecuador, a beautiful colonial city surrounded by mountains. He left Cuenca in 2001 for New York, where he had family. But, unable to speak English, he couldn’t find work, so he headed for Northampton, where he got a job working in a Chinese restaurant, which he did for three years. Every morning before work he attended the International Language Institute to learn English.
Tony left the restaurant to work in a gas station, whose owner taught him to be a manager — skills which came in handy when he opened his own store in 2009. He also worked at Sisters’ convenience store and deli in West Hatfield and had run a Latino market in the Norwottuck Shoppes in Hadley, which burned down in 2013; luckily Tony moved out before the fire. His present site used to be a Dollar Store.
Tony has a thriving sideline in prepared Latino foods, take-out or eat-in, both at lunch and at dinner: tacos, burritos, meats with sides of rice and beans. Several of us have gone back to sample his menu.
“It’s a treat to know of that place,” Gail Gaustad said after having lunch there with her husband, John. “So friendly.”
My husband, Jim, and I indulged in a Cubano sandwich: ham, cheese, roast pork, sour pickles and mustard, on a warm, crispy roll which Tony imports from Puerto Rico because he likes the bread’s texture and taste. The Cubano is one of Tony’s best-sellers, but beware: it is the size of a small city block and will feed two or three amply, unless you are a teenager or a football player.
Lunch and dinner can be eaten inside or, in warmer weather, at picnic tables outside.
Nina Scott is a retired UMass Spanish professor. She facilitated the “Tasting Circle” class with Katy van Geel, a retired librarian and CPA. They both live in Amherst.
Next month, the 5CLIR tasting class visits Maple Farms Foods in Hadley.