San Franciscos Mama Tess serves elderly a taste of home

Filipino restaurant is also a community space in the heart of the city

Owner helps elderly and nonprofits in the area

Mama Tess Diaz-Guzman takes a break at her JT Restaurant. (PHOTO BY PAUL DUNN/CENTRAL CITY EXTRA) Click to see the full Special Report, Old and Poor in Tech City.

SAN FRANCISCO, California Someone who doesnt live or work in the area around 6th and Mission might walk past the Mint Mall and miss the tiny JT Restaurant. But around the neighborhood there are many, from elderly residents to construction workers to Filipino and Latino families, who know the business not only for its home-style chicken and pork adobo, but also for its vital role as a community space.

At the center of it all is the owner and chef, Tess Diaz-Guzman, who is called Mama Tess by those who know her.

Im proud because everybody calls me [that], she says, laughing. I have a lot of nephews and nieces, but [many are] American.

Diaz-Guzman, 55, owns JT Restaurant in the South of Market neighborhood in San Franciscos central city area, with her husband Juan, whom she married in 2010. Formerly a butcher and originally from the province of Laguna in the Philippines, she came to San Francisco 13 years ago, shortly after her first husband passed away.

Her brother already lived in San Francisco and had started the Filipino restaurant in the 1990s. Diaz-Guzman and Juan took charge of it a few years ago, renaming it JT Restaurant (the initials for Juan and Tess).

Business is community hub

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San Franciscos Mama Tess serves elderly a taste of home