My first visit to the Grand Central Market was in 1974. I don’t remember much about it except that we went there to get tacos during our lunch hour. I freelanced at the May Co. headquarters downtown in those days and someone in the office swore by the tacos at GCM. The shop’s name was Tacos by Thomas. They were good, but not the best. The best tacos were at a little place called Tacos Al Carbon, which I don’t think exists anymore.
Fast forward to 2011: Grand Central Market was still home to that taco shop, Tacos by Thomas, but many of the other vendors had disappeared. There were now empty spaces instead of shops.
Grand Central Market before gentrification
Shoppers — mostly blue-collar locals who lived in cheap/budget/low-priced apartments downtown–could still buy fresh fruits and vegetables, select from a huge array of dried chiles, rice, beans, shrimp, as well as other spices at Valeria’s and get bargain cuts of meat at GCM, so downtown L.A. wasn’t entirely a food desert. But it wasn’t thriving either.
By 2014, 40 years after my first visit, downtown Los Angeles had begun to gentrify and the GCM began to fill up with cleverly named fast dining venues and cafes like Eggslut and Berlin Currywurst. Both faced onto the wide open entry on Broadway, so new-to-downtown diners didn’t necessarily have to go deep inside the block-long building where blue collar workers still ate their lunches.
Old-time shops gain new life
Downtown gentrification continued and the empty spaces at GCM filled up. A few old-timers like Tacos by Thomas, Torres Produce, and the amazing dried chile and mole shop, Valeria’s, endured as legacy vendors. Under a new ownership of GCM, they gained new life–and, no doubt, new customers.
Then recently I read a post on Twitter that stated that the chile place in Grand Central Market had closed. What!!? How could that happen?! Several people, myself included, replied that we would miss it, especially their mole sauces. Then came a surprise!
As I discovered during a recent trip back to L.A., the report of Valeria’s demise was overstated. It’s still there. Smaller and I didn’t see the moles but maybe they were there somewhere. Dried chiles, rice, beans, dried shrimp, etc. — they’re all available in a more compact store.
Still a great place for people-watching
So I cruised around to see what else and who else there was to see. People-watching–both tourists and locals–as well as sign ogling was good. As you can see in this slide show, the man in office clothing — white shirt and yellow tie–stood out from most of the people around him. And the ladies in black looked like office workers, too. I especially liked the pirate flag above the lobster roll shop. Are they trying to tell us something? And just in case you have forgotten where you are, there is that big Los Angeles sign!
Bulleit whiskey and Michoacana signs set the standard for neon signage throughout GCM.
A few remnants of the old market
And yet, a few little details of the “old” Grand Central market remain. The steps between levels look as if a million feet have walked on them. And the exit to the parking garage, on the right, still reads “Vaya con Dios”. It barely shows in the far right of that photo but the very upscale Belcampo meats which replaced the bargain butcher, has vanished. Things continue to change at the GCM.
Back in Tucson where I now live, there is nothing really like the Grand Central Market. But food trucks are everywhere. I haven’t found a Berlin Currywurst yet here, but I’ll bet there is one parked on a corner or in a parking lot somewhere not far from me.
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