How La Mexicana Became a Kissimmee Institution

Though Odilia Alvarado is responsible for 80 employees, the first people she attends to in the mornings are her children. Every day by 8:00 a.m., she drops her 8-year-old daughter and 10-year-old son off at school. Then it’s off to La Mexicana Restaurant, or the nearby affiliated bakery, for breakfast service. In the last three decades, Odilia has helped her mother, father, siblings, aunts, and uncles, build a series of Mexican food businesses that have taken Central Florida by storm, usually under the moniker “La Mexicana.” In 2011, she and her husband struck out on their own and opened th...