Felix Lopez is seated at a table so far to the back of the restaurant that he is practically in the kitchen, but a steady stream of patrons finds him anyway, and he is interrupted continually as they stop by to say hello. It is only three weeks since his new Glendale restaurant, Sabor, opened, and yet the visitors all seem as if they’ve known the local entrepreneur for years. Many have. Lopez himself has been a staple in the local Hispanic community since the acquisition of his first Latin bakery and caf & #233;, La Adelita, in 1994. Since then, La Adelita Food Company Inc., which Lopez likes to call the “7-Eleven of tortillas” has grown to four locations with plans to open several more. Now, with partner Luis Rodriguez and his son Andy recently graduated from Pepperdine University, Lopez has expanded into his first, full-service restaurant, a large open space just across the way from the Nestle building on Brand Avenue. Lopez had been eyeing the location for three years. When its former owner finally decided to sell, another buyer got to the table first. But that deal fell through, giving Lopez his opportunity. “You get a corner. You get all the windows, and I knew this place was going to be a key factor,” he said. “There was a need for a Cuban restaurant, but also it was a dream of mine to have the best looking Cuban restaurant.” Lopez, who left Cuba in 1967 and moved first to Madrid before coming to the States, grew up in the restaurant business his parents opened one of the first Cuban restaurants in L.A. But he had different ambitions, rising to become director of sales for a region that stretched from South America to Canada at Domecq. When the distiller was acquired and its headquarters moved to Detroit, Lopez chose to stay in L.A., and instead bought a 15-year-old tortilleria called La Adelita. “I used to fly in the front of the plane with my feet up, and now I was in the back of this bakery covered in flour,” he joked. He pumped $350,000 into the bakery, buying new machinery, renovating the d & #233;cor, and perhaps most important, changing the menu. “We did focus groups,” Lopez said. “One of the things we found out is the area changed, and we were selling Mexican food in an area where there were all Central Americans.” Another store Soon, a second store was added in Santa Monica, then in Pico Rivera and Grand Central Market. The stores range in size from 8,000 square feet to 2,500 square feet. Each offers about 50 different types of fresh bread and tortillas, pastries and steam tables of food, all made freshly on the premises. And each offers selections tailored to Mexican, Nicaraguan, Salvadoran or Guatemalan tastes depending on the ethnic makeup of the surrounding location. Lopez calls the little chain his “bread and butter. “We have a pretty good concept. I’m not afraid of any major supermarket because they’re not competition for me,” he said. But Lopez’s one expansion attempt in the San Fernando Valley did not turn out as planned. He lost nearly $200,000 on the tortilleria he opened in Sunland. “The location was not right. There was a lot of traffic, but there were not enough Hispanics and it was an industrial area,” Lopez said. “It took me a little time to recover.” When Lopez found the location for Sabor in Glendale, a short distance from many of L.A.’s Hispanic communities, he was confident it was the right one for his upscale restaurant concept. Miami connection But it took three trips to Miami, scouring the restaurants and knocking on doors until he found a chef who agreed to sign on. “I had to go there,” he said. “Where was I going to find a Cuban chef in L.A.?” Although L.A. has a number of Cuban restaurants, most are small and very casual. Sabor, decorated with original artwork and designed in a contemporary, open style, with live music on the weekends, is considerably more elegant. While the menu has a decided Cuban influence with traditional dishes like black beans and rice, fried plantains and Cuban sandwiches, the offerings also contain a mix of foods that also include paella and ceviche, what the owners call Latin fusion. “You have a little of everywhere,” said Andy Lopez. “People are afraid to try different things. By fusing the food, you can order the Chicken Madera and if the person next to you is having something else, you will taste it. So I gear the menu to touch all the bases.” Lopez estimates there are some 200,000 Cubans in L.A. But he says the majority of his customers are not ethnic at all. “Eighty percent of my business is Anglos,” the elder Lopez said. Visitors immediately notice the variety of the menu. “Every plate had a base of Cuban food, but there were Colombian items, Puerto Rican, a lot of different cultures,” said Vladimir Victorio, senior vice president for specialized lending services at Mission Valley Bank who is of Colombian descent. “There are so many different types of Latinos in L.A. He’s not really going after one particular market, but he’s creating a broad Latino feeling.”
