Las Cuatro Milpas customers start lining up at 3 a.m. for the grand reopening

There is a particular kind of devotion that can only be measured in lost sleep.

Robert Martinez woke at 1:30 a.m., crossed the border from Tijuana, and stood in the dark outside Las Cuatro Milpas for five hours.

Daniel Olivas didn’t sleep at all. He came straight from his son’s baseball game, worked a full night shift at Solar Turbines, then drove to Barrio Logan, convinced he had a shot at being first in line for the long-awaited revival of what had been a nearly century-old dining icon.

He arrived at 3:48 a.m. - two minutes too late. Martinez was there first.

As the sun rose, the line for Las Cuatro Milpas’ famous tortillas and hearty Mexican fare snaked across the street as loyal patrons showed up for the much promoted grand opening.

There were families in lawn chairs, construction workers in vests, and Frank Sharpe, who had been coming for over 60 years, brought a large mixing bowl. “Don’t you know?” he said. “You can take home the chorizo.”

Six months after closing its original Barrio Logan location, Las Cuatro Milpas served scores of San Diegans at its new home at 1985 National Ave., Suite 1131, within the Mercado del Barrio complex. The restaurant is open from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Las Cuatro Milpas was founded by Petra and Natividad Estudillo 93 years ago. Today, their descendants follow the same recipes, rolling tortillas and mixing beans.

“I was a chubby kid,” said Junior Estudillo, who has worked in the family business for the past 14 years and is the son of the co-owner, Natividad Estudillo.

He has done every job at Las Cuatro Milpas - except make the tortillas. “Only aunties can do that,” he said.

“I remember having a little side gig as a kid selling burritos to my friends during school lunch,” he laughed, looking out at the line of hungry customers circling the block. “That’s how you cut the line.”

His two sisters chewed on warm tortillas behind the counter, playing games on their iPhones until one of the aunties whispered something in Spanish.

Valery Estudillo, 15, put down her tortilla and Coke and slipped on blue sanitary gloves to help bus tables. “Don’t drink my soda,” she yelled to her little sister.

Outside the restaurant, Silvia and David Ramirez FaceTimed their 19-year-old daughter, Adelina, in New York.

“I’m heartbroken I can’t be there,” she said from her dorm at Barnard College. She had been going to Las Cuatro Milpas for as long as she could remember. As a child, she’d cross the street from Sherman Elementary to get three rolled tacos with a side of rice and beans.

To Adelina, it’s more than a restaurant; it’s a San Diego symbol. “So many restaurants have closed from gentrification,” she said. “This tradition persists.”

“Felicidades,” Silvia screamed as she finally sat down to enjoy her three rolled tacos.

David Ramirez reminisced about the years he spent as a college counselor for Southwestern College’s Puente Project, where he would bring a bus full of prospective students to Las Cuatro Milpas at 6 a.m.

“There’s always a line,” he said, “but I always felt bad for the person behind us.”

At the front of the line, Margarita Hernandez, co-owner and family matriarch, sat at the new register, which can now take credit cards. The new restaurant has also increased prices to keep up with rising food costs.

“Before I think tacos were like $3.50,” said Ramirez. Today they are $4.75. “I was bracing myself for sticker shock, but this isn’t bad,” he said.

The previous Las Cuatro Milpas location closed due to financial pressures. The family ownership, which was facing significant tax debt, sold the restaurant real estate and an adjoining parcel for $2.2 million to Iglesia del Dios Vivo Columna Inc., the owner of the neighboring Light of the World Church.

Long before the restaurant property was put up for sale, the business and the real estate had accumulated $60,000 in county property taxes and $130,000 in other tax liens, including $103,000 in unpaid sales tax owed to the state of California over several years. Since the sale, the property taxes have been fully paid.

The family members would not disclose how much they invested in the new restaurant, although “it was expensive,” said Natividad Estudillo, a grandson of the original owners who runs most of the day-to-day operations. The new location was a former brewery and required new appliances and a remodel.

Las Cuatro Milpas’ new space - the former home of Liberty Call Distilling in the Mercado del Barrio retail center - is a major change from the restaurant’s longtime location on Logan Avenue, which is now boarded up. The newly revived restaurant is far more contemporary, with a roll-up glass door and a 400-square-foot patio. It is about 2,800 square feet.

“Change is always good,” said Natividad Estudillo. “OK, I’ve got to go.” Sweat running down his brow, he headed to the kitchen.

Staff writer Lori Weisberg contributed to this report.

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This story was originally published May 12, 2026 at 5:04 PM.