A Taste of Mexico

How food truck owners in Austin entered the food industry and faced adversity.

BY: RYAN LOPEZ

Working several hours a day and every day of the week making and serving food is the type of life food truck owners go through. They all hope to see the light on the other side of the tunnel but it may take years to reach that point. Every order they complete may just be for a smile or a small tip from a customer but that lake is all of the satisfaction they need to persevere. Lis Mariscal, Miguel Vidal and Tony Galindo all work at or own an Austin area food truck that specializes in Mexicanrelated cuisine. Their food trucks first opened in 2008 and 2013 and have attracted a lot of attention since. All of them are passionate about the food industry and the inspiration for their food has come from their childhood and family. Mariscal is an employee and family member at Veracruz All Natural. Having been born and raised in Veracruz, Mexico, Mariscal’s family business showcases true Mexican cuisine. “Our food is very directed to the region of Mexico, where we come from, which is Veracruz, Mexico,” Mariscal said. “It’s authentic Mexican food. We don’t make Tex-Mex style food because we wanted to keep it authentically traditional to where we are from.” Vidal, the owner of Valentina’s Tex-Mex BBQ, was raised in San Antonio, and he started to work at his first restaurant at a very young age just like Mariscal. They were both brought into the industry as young teenagers. “I have worked in a restaurant since I was 15, and I started really paying attention or enjoying food and cooking when I was in my early 20s,” Vidal said. “There’s just something about when you enjoy a good meal, the memories and sparks that you feel, which is why I wanted to start a business.” Creating a business, however, does not come without challenges along the way. Vidal struggled to earn enough money to buy the

Three generation family ordering food at Veracruz All Natural. Photo courtesy of Ryan Lopez

This graphic shows where Veracruz, Mexico is located. This is the place where Lis Mariscal and her family are from.

Veracruz All Natural food truck located at 4209 Airport Blvd. Photo courtesy of Ryan Lopez

necessary things for a food truck just like many other restaurant owners. “In the very beginning, we started with very, very little money,” Vidal said “We had to go through the ups and downs of adjusting stuff to have all of our things in order and there are very small margins in food. If we’re not paying attention to waste and weight of food and food costs, then at the end of the day, we could be losing tons of money to where we couldn’t pay our employees.” Galindo, the owner of Mellizoz Tacos, also faced many struggles leading up to the day his business shut down. COVID-19, among many other factors impacted Galindo’s business heavily. “When COVID-19 hit, we were still open but that’s when the landlord actually told us that he wasn’t going to renew our lease. Our trailer was 42 feet long, he could get two or three trailers more in that location for the same price,” Galindo said. Business models for many places were completely changed by COVID-19. Vidal and many other business owners dealt with these changes in a timely manner by doing what was best for the community at the time rather than what would just benefit them. “One of the biggest struggles probably in the whole time of being open has been dealing with this COVID-19 situation and having to kind of change our business model to go to strictly online orders,” Vidal said. Mariscal had to adapt to the new situation going on with COVID-19, but to her, it felt like something was missing. Her business was doing much better than others financially, but the social connection was deteriorating. “There’s also that missing human interaction when you go to a place you expect to be treated with hello,” Mariscal said. “But with the pandemic, we kind of lost that personal touch with customers. So that was very hard as well. Veracruz is a company that thrives out of that personal touch with your customers. And not having that interaction really kind of made us feel like there was something missing.” Vidal and Mariscal both thought that COVID-19 most impacted the overall experience of going to a food truck more than any other factor. Vidal still noticed that some of his customers were coming back despite the adversity.

“There’s just something about when you enjoy a good meal, the memories and sparks that you feel.”

-Miguel Vidal, owner of Valentina’s Tex-Mex BBQ

“Eating with your eyes first has gotten lost a little bit with strictly online ordering and packing everything to go but I’m really happy with the support

of the community,” Vidal said. “Every time that we’ve made a move or changed the location, the community seems to get behind us and support us and we see the same repeat customers all the time as well as new people.” A food truck is a business that requires quick access, which means that most people that live far away will not be able to go to it. Mariscal realized that some of her most popular customers no longer reside in the Austin area due to how unaffordable it is. “I think we’ve noticed that the demand has gone up in certain locations,” Mariscal said “We’ve also noticed a lot of locals missing that have moved out of the city that no longer lives here. You know, Austin is becoming less and less affordable to live in with time. I know a lot of the people that have been following us for so long, no longer reside within the city limits. We’ve also noticed that the population is definitely growing. Traffic is getting worse to get to each location. We also do have a lot of new customers and we can tell that it’s bittersweet if you want to ask me if we miss our customer base. We miss the faces that we don’t see anymore, but we’re also happy to receive all these new, fresh customers.” Along with the challenges faced by COVID-19, Mariscal realized how panicked everyone was when COVID-19 first began. All of these insecurities led to problems for businesses like Veracruz.

“There was stuff that we didn’t know during the time,” Mariscal said “If someone was coughing it was like, ‘Oh, you need to go home and quarantine and take a COVID-19 test.’ And during that time, COVID-19 tests were taking like three days to come back,

Valentina’s Tex-Mex BBQ style food. Photo courtesy of Caleb Smith “We miss the faces that we don’t see anymore, but we’re also happy to receive all these new, fresh customers.”

-Lis Mariscal, employee at Veracruz All Natural

The Mellizos Tacos food truck located at Cruzteca Mexican Kitchen. Photo courtesy of Tony Galindo

The Valentina’s food trailer is located at 11500 Manchaca Rd, Austin, Texas. Their Tex-Mex style food is made fresh in a barbecue pit behind the trailer. Photo coutesy of Ryan Lopez

and getting an appointment was really hard. Staffing and produce shortages were hard and then all types of items went up in price which made it a really crazy time.” Despite these challenges, Mellizoz Tacos, Valentina’s TexMex BBQ and Veracruz All Natural have all won awards for their outstanding cooking and dining experience. Valentina’s BBQ pitmaster Vidal believes that his business spread throughout the public without his own intention of gaining popularity. “I think that we gained popularity by word of mouth, and the modern word of mouth is social media,” Vidal said. “At the end of the day, I never tried to reach out to anyone or try to really be anything that we’re not. I tried to stick true to who I am, what my family did, and take my knowledge of the restaurant business to new places. I applied what I did when I was around growing up to what I learned in the restaurant industry working my whole life.” These three food trucks along with many others started with a family that had a dream and that dream has come true. The challenges that COVID-19 came with put a burden on the food industry, but these businesses were able to fight through that struggle and are on their way to becoming Austin food staples.

Awards that Valentina’s has won for their food. Photo courtesy of Ryan Lopez

“I tried to stick true to who I am, what my family did, and take my knowledge of the restaurant business to new places.”

-Miguel Vidal, owner of Valentina’s Tex-Mex BBQ