Owners of first of its kind bodega in Apple Valley didn’t give up on their dreams
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The doors slide open to Bodega 42 in Apple Valley and the aromas of fresh produce, meats and tortillas instantly welcome shoppers. The market’s name comes from its close proximity to County Road 42.
The aisles are stocked with beans, rice and other authentic staples of Latin American cooking.
Bodegas, or food markets, can offer a taste of home for people living away from home. As the number of Minnesotans with Hispanic heritage has steadily grown, so has the presence of markets which offer authentic tastes of Latin America.
"In essence this is like bringing Mexico here, the aromas …this is as true as it can get,” said co-owner Saul Mellado.
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If the market's sights and smells take customers down memory lane, Ezequiel Quijada, also a co-owner, says that's intentional.
“So there's that connection between what we make and what we offer to what people have traditionally been accustomed to in their country,” he said.
Quijada and his two brothers-in-law Saul and Fernando Mellado, discussed the possibility of opening a Bodega for a couple years before the idea finally came to life.
Immigrating from Mexico City to Minnesota in the late 1990s, Saul and Fernando cleaned restaurants to earn a living — often working overnight shifts — ending a workday at 8 a.m. and heading straight to school.
“It's been a long journey,” Fernando Mellado said.
He paused during the interview when he was asked about that journey — his eyes welled up with tears as he looked back on his life — from helping his mom wash clothes in Mexico, to becoming an entrepreneur.
“The work, the sacrifice, and the stuff that people don't see,” he said.
The three men, who are in their 30s and 40s, say those years of sacrifice and hard work are paying off. Saul Mellado says the nearly 22,000-square foot marketplace which also includes a butcher, deli and restaurant called Homshuk, is the first of its kind of this size in the state that is 100 percent Latino-owned.
“We are a community of dreamers and people tend to give up on their dreams. I think anything's possible. We're in the land of opportunities,” Saul Mellado said.
The market, says Saul Mellado, serves as a one-stop-shop for Minnesota’s Venezuelan, Colombian, Ecuadorian, and Mexican communities.
“This is exactly what they have in each corner of Mexico,” he said.
Saul Mellado said there was a lack of products available to his family growing up so they had to drive to small stores in Minneapolis.
Ezequiel Quijada, who’s from El Salvador, says here, you can walk in and purchase a bag of freshly made tortillas — a common experience in Latin American countries that now exists in Apple Valley.
“It's not something that's prepackaged with preservatives, they're able to come here and pick it up,” he said. “And that's something that at least for Fernando, Saul, they were very accustomed to in their country — where they could go to the corner store... and get a kilo of tortillas. That has been lost somewhat here because of the distance between a fresh source and what people consume and now we're able to offer that.”
The three men say the market and restaurant are just the beginning to what will hopefully transform the lives of the generations who come after them. Fernando Mellado says they're examples of how hard work can pay off.
“And that's why I can kind of get a little bit emotional,” he said thinking about the path they’ve taken. There has been a lot of sweat and tears. “But also [there] has been a lot of looking back and sitting here and then thinking, wow, you know, it's not as it's not as easy as people think. But also it's not impossible.”
