As soon as the weather starts to get warm each year, Uncle R and I start thinking about paletas – the taste-tempting Mexican popsicles based on traditional Michoacán frozen treats and produced for almost a decade by sisters Norma Paz and Irma Paz Bernstein in their unobtrusive little 12th Avenue South store.
The sisters – including lovely Alma - are sweet, smiling and always friendly, dark-haired beauties who once surprised Uncle R with a spicy hot pepper-laden paleta that was almost too spicy even for him. They had heard him talking about his love for hot peppers and thought they’d gift him with a treat. Their lovely personalities are part of the enjoyment of visiting their store and we love finding out what their current favorite restaurants are and what they have tried recently that they found interesting food-wise.
Once in awhile Uncle R will slip into Las Paletas during his workday – maybe after dropping off or picking up work from one of his clients – and get a little pick-me-up-paleta. One day as he stood munching happily on one of the smooth, cool treats he noticed one of the sisters walking in with an armful of roses. He asked what the occasion was and she laughingly explained that they were to make “rose paletas”. Yes – you have all of the typical popsicle flavors like strawberry and chocolate and grape but you have a hundred other flavors that drift on and off of the large blackboard with each day’s choices and it all depends on what the sisters find fresh and appealing at the Nashville Farmer’s market. Evidently that is the nature of true Mexican paletas – they abound in a variety of interesting and seasonal ingredients. Uncle R has been more adventurous in his tastings than I have. I have the fault of wanting to fall back on my favorites – chocolate with banana or crisp, tartly sweet grapefruit, but he has tried many flavors such as cucumber with pepper, hibiscus, mango, rice and avocado. The rose paletas taste just like a bouquet smells – soft, delicate and fragrant.
The sisters have offerings that are usually divided into two columns on the board – creamy paletas and fruit paletas. Creamy paletas may include Mexican caramel, strawberries and cream, coffee or corn and the fruit paletas are light & sweet with as little sugar added as possible – just enough to help everything freeze smoothly. You never know what will be up there when you walk in – but whatever it is, you know it will be good.
These treats are healthy. Really. We like to think of them as a juicy, frozen serving of fresh fruit because that is what they primarily are – perfectly fresh fruit. The raspberry paleta is pretty much solid raspberries frozen together with a barest minimum of sugar. If you tried to buy that many raspberries in the store, you’d spend twice as much and not get as much perfect taste as in a paleta.
If the Pamela’s Girls watch the Food Network very often, you may have seen world-renowned chef, Bobby Flay surprise the sisters with a throwdown – making his own paleta to be judged along side theirs - they won! Naturally. Recently Uncle R and I dropped by for a paleta on a hot Saturday afternoon and found Food Network personality, Adam Gertler, interviewing paleta customers outside the store and plying the sisters with questions back inside their kitchen area for his new show, Kid In A Candy Store, which features Adam traveling around the country for more behind-the-scenes food discoveries, this time focusing on desserts. I believe that there might be a chance you’d see familiar faces - but just in the background - if you watch the Brain Freeze episode this coming Sunday
I think that Mommy M had a paleta when she was in Nashville last – back before she married Daddy L. And I have a feeling that there is a little boy named Baby B who would LOVE to get taken for a paleta – when he comes for a Nashville visit sometime!
Love to the Pamela’s Girls,
Auntie J
