Craving paletas? Here’s where to find the Triangle’s Mexican-style popsicles and ice cream
On a recent, muggy Tuesday afternoon, about 10 customers wait in line for a treat from La Monarca Michoacana, a Mexican ice cream shop off North Roxboro Street in Durham.
Citlaly Hernández, 41, was one of them, making a pit stop before her drive back to California after visiting family nearby. Her order was simple: one scoop of Mexican vanilla and a second of “fresas con crema,” or strawberries and cream in Spanish, served on a waffle cone. Though simple, she says, these flavors are special.
“It just tastes different from (American) ice cream,” Hernández said in an interview in Spanish. “It reminds me of eating ice cream at a nevería back in Mexico.”
That feeling — transporting the diner to a special place back home — is one of the ice cream shop’s goals, said Diana Morales. She is the daughter of La Monarca Michoacana’s owner, Azucena Morales.
“We love when people tell us our ice cream reminds them of being back in Mexico because the flavors are identical,” said the 23-year-old, who is helping run the business while her mother is out of town.
La Monarca Michoacana is one of about a dozen Mexican ice cream shops that have popped up in the Triangle since the early 2000s. While they illustrate a growing presence of the Mexican immigrant community, social media apps like TikTok and Instagram have helped these Mexican street desserts become more mainstream.
La Monarca Michoacana is one of many that pays homage to the original “Michoacana” shops in México and California. The term means “from Michoacán,” the southwestern Mexican state. In a 2019 article for Latino culture site Mitú, writer Justin Lessner says the Michoacana brand “is as ubiquitous as Burger King is to hamburgers or Dunkin Donuts is to donuts.”
Morales and her family migrated from Michoacán in 2001 and opened the Durham location 15 years ago. Their business has expanded with locations in Raleigh and Greensboro.
They enjoy bringing fellow immigrants a piece of home, Morales says, with their family’s secret ice cream recipe. Flavors range from the tried-and-true vanilla, strawberry and chocolate, to more unique ones, such as spicy tamarind, blackberry cheese and coffee.
“Our recipe has been in the family for almost 30 years,” Morales said. “My uncle (Humberto) makes all of our ice cream and popsicles from scratch.”
While shops like La Monarca Michoacana are best known for their decadent homemade ice creams and fruity paletas, or popsicles, they also cater to savory palates with treats like esquites, a type of Mexican street corn removed from the cob and served in a cup. It’s then topped with a hefty dollop of mayonnaise (which has to be made with a hint of lime) and a sprinkle of salty Cotija cheese crumbles.
A paletería with a twist
With this spike in popularity over the last decade, there has been an ongoing debate among paleta enthusiasts and business owners about who came up with of this style of Mexican ice cream shops, which lean more towards being snackable street food vendors.
What’s more, for years people often use the term “Michoacana” in a generic sense to refer to their local Mexican ice cream shop, regardless of whether it’s affiliated with the trademarked “La Michoacana” brand.
Both Diana Morales and Daniel Torres, owner of Vida Dulce, said their families steer away from using “Michoacanas” in their own branding, not only because their menus are different, but also to avoid trademark infringement.
Torres, 25, owns Vida Dulce, a Mexican-style ice cream shop and paletería — with a Southern twist. There are two locations — in Cary and Knightdale. The Cary location opened in 2018, just a few blocks from WakeMed Soccer Park, in a small shopping center along East Chatham Street in Cary.
Vida Dulce, means “sweet life” in Spanish. The name is fitting for the eatery featuring the fan-favorite “Churro Split” in its menu. The dessert is a take on a banana split, replacing the fruit with two cinnamon sugar churros that are made from scratch and deep-fried in the store.
“That’s really what set us off: getting that American, Southern culture, bringing the Mexican culture, clashing it together, and just being the success that we are today,” said Torres, a Raleigh native, in an interview at his store.
Another popular menu item is the mangonada: a cup of cut-up and chilled mango chunks filled to the rim and drizzled in sweet and tangy chamoy sauce made from fruit pulps, chili and limes. At Vida Dulce, the mangonada is topped with a generous sprinkle of Tajín, a mixture of salt, dehydrated lime and chili powder. It includes a spicy tamarind straw called pulparindo, for good measure.
“It’s insane the amount of mangonadas we go through,” Torres said with a laugh.
Paleteros, or popsicle vendors, are staples in Mexican plazas in cities big and small, says Torres, recalling his research and development trip down to Guadalajara before setting up shop in Cary.
A sign of setting down roots
Cecilia Márquez, the Hunt Family assistant professor of history at Duke University, said the fact that businesses like paleterías keep opening in the area is a sign that the Mexican immigrant community continues to set roots in North Carolina.
“Starting in the early 2000s, you start to see corner stores-slash-restaurants that start showing up,” Márquez said. “That’s one of the ways to tell that there is a sort of Latino community that’s really settling, that is not migrants, that is not seasonal, that is really becoming a part of the community that they’re in.”
On Saint Albans Drive in Raleigh, you’ll find Paletería La Michoacana Premium, and not too far away, La Monarca Michoacana’s most recent Triangle location on New Hope Church Road.
Other Mexican paleterías and ice cream shops in the Triangle include La Deliciosa in South Raleigh, and Pincho Loco in Durham.
That growth is welcome from Torres’ point of view.
“It’s nice to see the Mexican culture growing. And just everybody’s putting their own twist on it. It’s amazing. It’s a beautiful thing,” he said.
While stores like La Monarca Michoacana and Vida Dulce are open year-round, summer is their busiest time of year, thanks to the refreshing nature of paletas and their creamy counterparts, the nieves.
Bringing Mexican traditions to the area, and helping the paletería concept go mainstream, Torres says, is a dream come true.
“Our products and our stores are Instagrammable. Everybody wants to take pictures,” he said. “We see people coming in, putting their phones to my face, and (say) ‘Hey, I want this. What is it?’ And it’s just… Social media is awesome right now.”
This story was originally published July 1, 2021 at 2:15 PM with the headline "Craving paletas? Here’s where to find the Triangle’s Mexican-style popsicles and ice cream."
