Happy National Tortilla Month! Isn’t it funny that this joyous and time-honored event happens to coincide with Hispanic Heritage Month? It makes us want to run past teen mothers sitting on a stoop, over fields ripe with fruit for picking and straight to a small hut where a wise old woman with crinkled eyes and work-hardened hands us a fresh, soft tortilla! Just like when we were children, growing up in a place where tortillas were absolutely not a staple of Latino cooking. Fucking fuck. Anyway! Tortillas! Outselling sandwich bread in the U.S! Not, like, right now. But eventually!:

The Tortilla Industry Association (TIA), announced today that September has been declared by Congressional resolution to be “National Tortilla Month.” The sale of tortillas is poised to outpace the sale of sandwich bread for the first time in United States history with sales crossing the $6 billion dollar mark making this a momentous occasion marked by the declaration.

Tortillating!:

Tortilla sales in the U.S., split about equally between corn and flour, are growing at double digit rates according to research being conducted by TIA “Two factors are driving this growth,” says Jim Kabbani, TIA’s Executive Director. “One factor is demographic – increased immigration and birth rates of Hispanic Americans.”

From specific countries where tortillas are eaten, right? No, why mention that. Also:

“[B]ut just as significant is the adoption of healthier eating habits by other Americans. People are eating wraps instead of sandwiches which is contributing to the positive trend in sales and consumption.”

On the one hand: Good for tortillas. On the other: We’re still going to probably buy both. Ok? We’re not going to go out and buy a tortilla - or a can of beans or a serape or a bottle of hot sauce or a pair of maracas or whatever - because some business tells us it’s somehow integral to our Latinoness. For that, we’ll eat a hot dog. ON SANDWICH BREAD.

Update!

And, oh? What CAPITAL-LETTER-LOVING EDITOR has been quoted in the Washington Times?

NATIONAL TORTILLA MONTH DECLARED AS MILESTONE REACHED [Business Wire]