Empanada Entrepreneurs

Empanada Entrepreneurs is built around a fairly specific question: who should be in the room when founders take a morning away from building? For Bagel Entrepreneurs, the answer is a curated group of venture-backed founders and active investors, meeting over coffee and empanadas rather than a published sequence of presentations.

The gathering takes place in New York on Tuesday, October 13, 2026, from 8:30 to 11:30 AM EDT. It closes out Hispanic Heritage Month at First Citizens Innovation Banking, with Nuchas providing the empanada connection and Awana joining the bank and food company as a sponsor. Attendance requires approval. The registration page invites eligible founders and investors to request a spot, not assume that submitting a request secures admission.

That distinction matters. This is a founder-heavy community gathering with a deliberately selected audience, not an unrestricted conference or a recruiting fair. Its usefulness will depend on the people attending and the conversations they choose to have; the organizers have not announced a keynote, panel or scheduled investor pitch session.

A founder room with a New York food story

The choice of Nuchas gives the morning a connection to entrepreneurship beyond the usual software-company conversation. The event identifies its empanada partner as a New York business founded by Ariel, a Latino founder. Ariel Barbouth is also listed among the hosts, alongside Javier Dutan and Pam Kavalam.

Nuchas describes its own beginnings as a Times Square kiosk. Its founder story traces Ariel and his wife Leni's arrival in New York in 2009 and their ambition to make the Argentine empanada a convenient meal for a wider audience. The company subsequently expanded into manufacturing and wholesale, with food-service locations including New York's Javits Center and Atlanta's Georgia World Congress Center, as well as direct-to-consumer sales.

That history is relevant to this particular gathering because the food partner has a business-building story of its own. It is not simply a catering name attached to a founder event. Taking a handheld food concept from a kiosk into production and multiple distribution channels creates a different set of operating questions from those facing a software startup, while still involving decisions about product, customers, teams and growth.

The event does not say Nuchas will give a presentation, and the company's background should not be read as an announced session. It does explain why its presence fits a morning connecting entrepreneurship with the close of Hispanic Heritage Month. Nor does the venture-backed audience description establish anything about Nuchas's own financing history.

Capital and hiring sit alongside community

The sponsors bring two other recognizable parts of a founder's working environment into the gathering: banking and technical hiring. Neither is presented as a formal workshop. Their participation supplies context for the room, rather than a promise that an attendee will receive financing, a hire or a commercial introduction.

First Citizens Innovation Banking describes its work around high-growth companies and their investors, from early-stage businesses through later-stage organizations. Its offering spans banking, lending and treasury services, with support for venture capital and other investment firms. The current First Citizens branding identifies Innovation Banking as a division of First Citizens Bank, continuing the technology and healthcare banking business associated with SVB.

For this event, the important fact is the fit between that institutional focus and the audience the organizers are selecting. Founders at different stages may bring different questions about operating a business and managing capital. The listing does not promise banking consultations or access to particular bank executives, so participants should treat those as possible conversation topics rather than an advertised service at the gathering.

Awana's public site focuses on helping companies recruit technical talent from Latin America, including engineers across backend, frontend, mobile, data and AI work. Its stated engagement options include direct hiring, contract-to-hire and freelance arrangements. The event's own sponsor description also names AI evaluators and technical go-to-market talent in sales, marketing and operations.

Those details put hiring alongside capital in the event's context. They do not turn Empanada Entrepreneurs into a job-placement event, and the organizers have not listed a recruiting presentation. A founder weighing what to build next may nevertheless recognize the intersection: capital, technical capacity and commercial execution often become connected operating decisions.

Curation is the main program detail

Bagel Entrepreneurs describes an invite-only founder community whose formats include breakfasts, dinners, happy hours and other gatherings. Empanada Entrepreneurs follows that relationship-led approach. The registration listing specifically says curation is intended to keep the room founder-heavy and asks venture-backed founders or active investors to request attendance.

The organizers also point to previous editions bringing together founders from pre-seed through Series E alongside investors. That is background about earlier gatherings, not a confirmed roster or attendance forecast for October 13. The current listing does not identify participating funds, individual investor guests or a company-by-company attendee list.

For prospective attendees, the clearest preparation is therefore to decide what kind of conversation would make the morning useful. A founder can arrive ready to discuss a real operating question; an investor can bring a perspective grounded in the companies and sectors they know. There is no published schedule requiring visitors to choose among tracks or sessions.

Request access before planning the visit

The official registration page lists New York as the city and names First Citizens Innovation Banking in its public event description. The precise address is reserved for guests. Visitors should use the official Empanada Entrepreneurs registration page for an attendance request and the organizer's subsequent access instructions.

The public listing does not state a ticket price. It also does not publish a detailed agenda, a speaking lineup or named investor attendees. What it does offer is clear: a three-hour, approval-required founder gathering on October 13, with coffee, empanadas and a community selected around venture-backed entrepreneurship and active investing.