In Texas culture, the vaqueros’ roots go deep. The original cowboy, these cattle drivers and horse riders go back before Texas was even Texas.
But the evolution of their food has sparked heart-eyes and growling stomachs all over the world. It can be a pavlovian reaction when hearing that fajita sizzle at a restaurant.
Texas Standard spoke with Mando Rayo, host of the Tacos of Texas podcast, about vaqueros, fajitas and of course tacos.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: On a recent episode of your podcast, you spoke with an author and writer about the vaquero. Who was she, and what she say about the history of the vaqueros?
Mando Rayo: I talked to Katie Gutierrez, who’s a writer and author, and she came on the podcast and we talked about the history of vaqueros. And you just mentioned, right – before Texas was Texas, Texas was Mexico. So before there was a cowboy, there was a vaquero. And where did the cowboy learn how to do a dally or use a lariat? They got it from the vaquero.
And so she talked to us about the roots of that. And starting with the Spanish conquest and horseback riding and teaching Indigenous people to ride horse. And then their offspring became the first because it was the mestizaje, right, between the Spanish and the Indigenous people that became the Mexicans that we know of today.
And then they carried on that tradition, you know, going from northern Mexico into Texas because of the rough terrain and the land, they had to learn how to maneuver the land and the cattle and the horses. I think part of that history is understanding kind of where we came from, the roots of that.
I understand y’all also talked about the origins of vaquero food, right?
Yeah, we did. When you think of breakfast tacos or tacos here, you know, the Indigenous people were already making kind of what we now know as corn tortillas. But because of the introduction of wheat flour through the missions, then became, you know, what we now enjoy with our breakfast tacos is flour tortillas. Definitely pan de campo as well.
Fajitas … and barbacoa – those two were considered the throwaway meats by the ranchers. But the ranch hands who happened to be vaqueros said, hey, we cook everything from the barba to the coa. So now, you can get them at Chili’s. You can find them at your grocery store. So, yeah, there’s a lot of roots of the food there.
I think that that’s really important because, you know, over the years, as food that is associated with Texas has become more popular, a lot of folks have said, oh, that was created by some, you know, American kitchen. No, no, no. Let’s get back to the roots of this stuff. I know that you also spoke with Miguel Cobos, who’s co-owner of Vaquero Taquero in Austin. Tell us how he got started.
Miguel and his brother Danny Cobos from Vaquero Taquero – very appropriate name for the topic – a couple brothers from the Valley, and they came to Austin and didn’t really see what they wanted.
I first saw them with a little pushcart. What they did is they transformed it a little paleta cart and made their tacos in there. They started selling them right outside Mexic-Arte, right downtown Austin. I knew that for them, it was more than just the food, but it was the culture.
