79-Year-Old Grandpa Becomes YouTube Cooking Star After Losing His Job

After losing his job due to coronavirus, “Tito Charly” decided to start his own cooking show

Some days, you just need to watch a sweet, elderly man happily cooking in his kitchen to remind you that there is still good in the world. When this man had to give up his job as a grocery bagger after the pandemic hit, he decided to start a cooking show with the help of his family and is now a major YouTube sensation — all at the tender age of 79.

Some of us have tried our hands at some banana bread or making sourdough from scratch while quarantined, but Carlos “Tito Charly” Elizondo is leaving all of us in the dust. In the past month or so, Elizondo has been cooking everything from chilaca chiles stuffed with shrimp and chorizo, to ceviche, to dried meat with piloncillo, and even grilled cheese with bacon and chorizo, and then putting his lessons on his YouTube channel “Tito Charly” for the world to enjoy.

Elizondo was happily working part-time at a grocery store in Monterrey, Mexico for seven years until the pandemic hit which forced him to leave his job and stay home. Instead of feeling sorry for himself, he enlisted the help of his daughter and grandson for technical assistance and began filming his cooking. People quickly tuned in and Elizondo now has almost 400,000 subscribers to his channel.

Tito Charly’s cooking show aires every Sunday on YouTube, and although the videos are in Spanish, you can follow along with subtitles if you don’t know the language and quickly master some of his delicious-looking snacks, appetizers, desserts, and meals. Or, you can just leave it as is and sit back, watch, and listen to a man so clearly passionate about what he does that it’s pure, wholesome entertainment to watch. Pro tip: make sure you have something to snack on because his videos will make you seriously hungry.

Elizondo, a widower with three children and six grandchildren, didn’t stop there. He also created his own line of ingredients he uses in his recipes such as cheese, chorizo, and dried meats which he sells direct-to-consumer. All of the products are available for purchase through the messaging service WhatsApp number 811-102-6685, Reforma reports. Unfortunately for those of us in the US, his products are only available in Monterrey, Saltillo, San Luis Potosí, Chihuahua, Torreón, and Guanajuato in Mexico, but Elizondo would like to expand as his business grows. Of course, he does.

“I have always been positive, I like to see ahead,” he said. “There are no impossibles, there is always a way.”