Chupacabra Paletas Are No Myth — They're the Perfect Summer Treat

“‘Chupa’ means 'to suck' in Spanish and ‘cabra’ is 'goat,' so 'chupacabra,' like the legendary urban myth, means 'goat sucker,'" explains Michel Alexander Polania, the owner of Chupacabra Paletas. "I consider my product to be the G.O.A.T. [greatest of all time]. So that’s why, in the logo, you see the Chupacabra eating a goat paleta. Because it’s the greatest.”

Polania, who runs the business with his mother out of a commercial kitchen downtown, launched the venture in March 2021. Now it churns out 400 traditional Michoacán-style paletas six days a week, selling the bulk of them wholesale.

You can find its branded coolers in forty locations across the Front Range, from convenience stores, Hispanic grocery stores and bakeries to ice cream shops and even restaurants like Cabrón Carbón. It also sells them directly to customers at several farmers' markets, including the Parker Farmers Market.

The process starts with a high-quality ice cream base (milk fats), which is mixed with whole milk, pure cane sugar, fresh fruit, flavorings and other mix-ins. The paletas are hand-assembled in stainless-steel molds and decorated with various ingredients like fresh strawberries, mangos, kiwis, pineapples and Oreo cookies. Then they get flash-frozen twenty minutes before being packed, sealed and delivered.
Polania’s mother is in charge of assembling and making the paletas while he handles everything else, including sourcing the ingredients, negotiating contracts with the vendors, delivering paletas all across Denver, and marketing. “One of the most difficult parts was, how do we get our product out there? How do we get people to know about this? How do we get people to try it? Where can I put my product in a business that’s going to actually sell it? And it’s explaining and explaining it,” Polania says.

The business is a total family affair. Not only is Polania’s mother its sole employee, but the business concept and recipes come from his father, who has run his own paleta business in Virginia for eight years. “I essentially got the blueprint from him," Polania says. "He helped me get started. He told me everything on what to do for the business model, how to make them, how to store them, how to sell them, how to move them.”
Chupacabra currently sells seventeen flavors, ranging from classics like Mango Chamoy and Guava to more experimental twists like Bubble Gum. Its best seller, though, is the Strawberry Cheesecake. It's ice cream base mixed with cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, fresh strawberries and fresh strawberry purée," Polania says. In second place is Cookies and Cream, which has cookies mixed into the base and a whole Oreo cookie pressed into it.

"Denver, and the state overall, doesn’t have too many people bringing this kind of product," Polania notes. Especially not a handmade version like his, so he hopes that as more customers get a taste of his freshly made paletas, they’ll fall in love, and he'll be able to expand to more locations and more types of businesses.

For more information, including a list of places to find Chupacabra's paletas, visit chupacabra303.com.