There is perhaps no better way for a baby to be brought into this world than wrapped in a fresh, warm H-E-B butter tortilla. But H-E-B tortillas generally aren’t big enough to wrap around a baby, so an H-E-B tortilla-themed blanket is a nice option as well.
That’s exactly what one San Marcos couple did when they had their baby boy on Monday. “Birth brought to you by @HEB,” Miguel Miro posted on X yesterday, featuring his wife Emilia wrapped in a giant H-E-B tortilla-themed blanket.
Born at 10:22 p.m. on Monday night, baby Andres is still as fresh and warm as a newly baked tortilla. “Our baby bean wrapped in no better tortilla,” new father Miguel told Chron. “To point out the butter ones are far superior to all others.”
But the warm tortilla blanket was not acquired by simply ordering one online or picking it up via curbside.
“We got that tortilla blanket at the Texas Tech vs. BYU game last year in Lubbock. My wife and her brother are Texas Tech Alumni, so they introduced me into the notorious tortilla-throwing fun they partake in,” Miguel told Chron.
The Texas Tech tortilla-throwing goes back decades, with fans darkening the skies by launching a flurry of tortillas at kickoff, often ones from H-E-B. There are two primary theories for how the tradition began. One posits that in the late 1980s, Texas Tech fans would heave the lids off their 44-ounce Cokes onto the field. When the large sodas were discontinued, the tortillas became an easy substitute.
A second theory suggests the tortillas were launched out of spite. It’s believed that in 1992 during a Texas Tech vs. Texas A&M game in College Station, the announcer said there was “nothing but Tech football and a tortilla factory in Lubbock.” And so fans have been spitefully covering the field with them ever since.
“Unfortunately due to the NCAA rule changes,” Miguel tells Chron, “tortilla throwing became a penalty.”
It certainly did. In 2025, Texas Tech banned the tortilla-throwing kickoff tradition. They asked fans to no longer throw them at kickoff or anytime during the game, saying it would result in immediate ejection and possibly prevent future ticket privileges. Big 12 athletic directors voted to penalize teams 15 yards after two warnings for anything being thrown on the field, though everyone knows they were referring to the tortillas.
Which brings us back to the blanket. “To counter that judgment (genius marketing move),” Miguel jokingly tells Chron, “they gave out tortilla blankets at the game.”
And that’s how baby Andres (Andy for short) came to be wrapped in one. “Being a Puerto Rican native raised in Texas, H-E-B really sets the tone for what being a Texan, in my opinion, really is about,” Miguel said. “So we brought the tortilla blanket to maybe wrap baby Andres.”
Though he’s just been born, Miguel jokingly mentioned to H-E-B that Andres told his dad “he’s ready for a butter tortilla already!”
“Welcome to the world little one!” H-E-B responded. “We see many butter tortillas in your future.”