SAN ANTONIO — Toasted marshmallows and brown sugar thrown into your coffee; they are a few items you'll find at Folklores, which is a coffee shop started by a San Antonio native.
"My wife and I, we live on the south side. And at that time, there were no coffee shops. We figured, you know what, our our community needs it. So, we decided to open one," said owner Tatu Herrera.
But, due to the pandemic, they had to close up shop. However, that didn’t stop them from serving the community.
"We're kind of like, you know what? We're not going to make it. So, we started feeding the senior citizens in our community," said Herrera. "At the end of last year, our tally was 90,000 senior citizens served throughout San Antonio and the surrounding counties. The state of Texas gave us this award for being a part of that," said Herrera.
Now, they’re running their store on 1526 East Grayson Street, right across Fort Sam Houston.
"We're doing good. But our business is based on community service, you know, and the love for each other," said Herrera.
And of course, people come into try their coffee drinks. And we got to see a few of their most popular options.
The Suzie
"It's like a Mexican latte. It's chocolate, it's cinnamon. We brulee marshmallows on top. So that's one of our real popular ones" said Herrera.
Cuban latte
"That one's going to be espresso, cinnamon, vanilla and brown sugar. So that's kind of like, all right, I want something that's crazy. But I don't want to be, like, real crazy. Because that's what we do -- we do a lot craziness," said Herrera.
Horchata coffee
"That's going to be horchata, caramel, cinnamon. We do it iced or hot," said Herrera.
And the artwork on the wall gets a lot of attention. Some of it is made by San Antonio artists, and the other pieces are donated by San Antonians.
It’s one of the many things that makes this local business stand out. And Herrera told us, he hopes the community can visit other local places.
"My thing is -- support small businesses, because if you don't, they're not going to be there. And then we will always wonder, 'How come we don't have this and we don't have that?' Well, no one supports them. And that's what we need," said Herrera.
So, if you’re in need of an energy boost, and want to support a place full of culture, and caffeine, click here for more details on Folklores.
"We're real big about family and we're real big about, you know, supporting each other." said Herrera.
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