Nestled behind Hop & Sting Brewery in Grapevine sits a white food truck, surrounded by picnic tables and emblazoned with a skeleton cowboy. This is Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q.
The brainchild of Arnulfo “Trey” Sánchez III, the food truck began as a pop-up shop at an Exxon gas station near his house in 2018. In the four years since then, Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q has been featured in “Texas Monthly,” on the Cooking Channel’s “Man, Fire, Food” and has attracted fans from all over the state and the country.
Though Trey never imagined he’d ever be back in the restaurant industry, Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q weathered the pandemic, business is booming and growth is on the horizon.
THE PITMASTER’S BEGINNINGS
Born in Dallas and raised all around the Metroplex, Trey got his barbecue start working at restaurants around DFW.
“I did Dickey’s [Barbecue Pit] for a while,” Trey says. “I worked at a little place called Smokestack in Richardson. I was about to take another job, and that’s when my dad called me and said, ‘Hey, don’t take that job. We’re opening a restaurant.’ So I did that from ‘89 to ‘99.”
His dad’s business was a full-production catering company, which meant they were in charge of completely setting up an event with props and decor. They even occasionally served as the entertainment as well.
“A lot of times, we would be doing Old West gunfights and stuff prior to service, and then we’d serve in full gunfighter attire,” Trey says. “It was good. I enjoyed it.”
But after nearly 10 years in the business, Trey decided it was time to get out.
“I decided that’s not what I wanted to do,” Trey says. “I started teaching in ‘99 and taught for 14, 15 years.”
Trey taught art at Pope Elementary and Spanish at McKinney Boyd High School while simultaneously coaching cross-country and soccer. He stopped teaching in 2016 at Hale Elementary in Arlington when he took on his next big job — taking care of his kids.
“It was one of the toughest jobs I’ve ever had,” Trey says about being a stay-at-home dad. “One of the most rewarding jobs I’ve ever had too — the most rewarding.”
Meanwhile, Trey’s wife started her own business, leaving a corporate job in the process.
“I’m staying up late at night not able to sleep, thinking of all these new bills, these loans and the lack of the corporate income that was there,” Trey says. “[I was] just stressed out.”
At the same time, a gas station owner down the road recommended that Trey bring his barbecue pit, gifted to him by his father-in-law, to the station.
“I figured I’d just do it on the weekends and supplement,” Trey says. “So that first day… we sold out in an hour and a half. So I doubled the food the next week and sold out in another hour and a half.”
After two years as a stay-at-home dad and despite leaving the restaurant industry nearly 20 years earlier, Trey was back in the barbecue business just like that.
LAUNCHING VAQUEROS TEXAS BAR-B-Q
When Trey opened Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q at the Exxon gas station, it was a two-man show: Trey and his oldest child, Tyler, who was a teenager at the time.
“He would run the register and help me set it up,” Trey says. “That was it. It was just the two of us.”
Serving up both classic Texas barbecue and tacos, Trey cooks what he likes.
“That’s kind of how it started back in ‘89 with my dad’s spot. We like tacos, and we like barbecue,” Trey says. “It’s just pairing two things I grew up with and I like, and that’s just kind of how we’re doing it.”
Pete Mata, who lives in Southlake and is a Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q regular, first met Trey during his Exxon pop-up shop days.
“I’ve tasted barbecue all over the state,” Pete says. “His barbecue is so good compared to other places.”
Trey worked his Exxon pop-up through almost the end of 2018. After he learned the gas station was going to be sold, Trey began taking Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q to various breweries around town like Hop & Sting Brewing Co. and Four Corners Brewing Co.
Working like that for over a year, those pop-ups, coupled with catering orders, helped grow Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q like never before.
HITTING A STRIDE
After hopping around different breweries, Trey decided to permanently set up shop at Hop & Sting about a year ago.
“I would go around to a few different breweries, but Hop & Sting was always kind of the preferred spot,” Trey says. “You know, it’s home too. And the guys here are great. So we just kind of rolled with that.”
COVID-19 hit shortly after their partnership was solidified, so Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q shifted to delivery and pickup orders. Trey also collaborated with Hop & Sting for things like pre-ticketed sales and beer and barbecue to go.
“[We] had to switch to a single vendor to fulfill COVID restriction requirements,” Hop & Sting’s general manager Andy Yelton says. “Picking Trey was a no-brainer. He was the only food truck that actually had his own following because his barbecue is so incredible.”
As difficult as the year was, 2020 had some bright moments for Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q. Not only was it featured in “Texas Monthly,” but it also got highlighted on the Cooking Channel’s “Man, Fire, Food.”
Part of that exposure can be attributed to a dish that was somewhat of an accident: the barbecue birria tacos. Birria, a dish that originated in Jalisco, Mexico, is typically stewed lamb or goat meat seasoned with chili peppers.
“I came back from Jalisco wanting to do birria, but I never really had time on the weekends since I was always doing something, to play around with lamb or goat to do a traditional birria,” Trey says. “I was doing a pop-up one day, kind of the end of service… so I’m just making up some tacos for the crew.”
Making birria tacos out of brisket, a customer saw what Trey was doing and wanted to buy them. Several customers followed suit, so the next week, Trey decided to just roll the tacos out.
And they were a hit. Just around three weeks after introducing them, Trey received a call from the Cooking Channel, interested in featuring the birria tacos.
“So we filmed ‘Man, Fire, Food’ here and then the Cooking Channel released them on another show called ‘Man’s Greatest Food’ as a top 14 cheesy bite in the United States,” Trey says. “And then ‘Texas Monthly’ also put them on a Top 20 Bite of 2020 list. They just kind of caught fire.”
After that exposure, Trey upgraded his trailer to a food truck, and customers began coming from all over to try Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q. Trey recalls one couple that had planned on going on a cruise for their anniversary, but had to forgo the trip because of the pandemic.
“The next thing they wanted to do was fly out here to have my food,” Trey says. “They flew out from Atlanta for their 20th anniversary. It’s crazy.”
Trey says people come to Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q from all over, whether it’s out-of-state destinations like Los Angeles or closer cities like Waxahachie and Decatur.
“It seems like every weekend people are coming — whether it’s [from] East Texas, Arkansas or up to three hours away — because they’ve heard about us or saw us,” Trey says.
Ironically, despite his success and exposure, Trey says a lot of his neighbors still don’t know about his business.
“There’ll be something on the Nextdoor app, ‘Hey, where’s the best barbecue in Grapevine?’ and we’re not getting anything,” Trey says. “But all these other people are coming. I don’t know, it’s just kind of funny.”
THE FUTURE OF VAQUEROS TEXAS BAR-B-Q
With just about a year of having the food truck under his belt, Trey is already thinking about what Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q will look like in the future, possibly inside a brick-and-mortar location.
“That’s kind of where things are leaning towards,” Trey says. “We were talking about that pre-COVID, so it’s kind of coming back around. We’ll see. It may be around the corner.”
Pete, who watched Trey grow from a two-man show at a gas station to owning his own food truck, loves the success Trey has had — even if it means a longer wait time.
“It’s great because he definitely deserves the success,” Pete says. “And I don’t mind waiting in line for it.”
Andy says it’s been fun to watch Vaqueros Texas Bar-B-Q’s growth and success at Hop & Sting.
“[Trey has] easily doubled or tripled in volume since he first started,” Andy says. “It’s been interesting to watch the transformation as he’s adapted to the challenges of growing so rapidly.”
From being open one day a week to now being open every Thursday to Sunday, the interactions he has with other pitmasters and his customers are why Trey loves barbecue.
“When I got into it, I was shy and didn’t want to talk to anybody,” Trey says. “Because of barbecue, I’ve met some of my best friends in life and so many good people because of it.”
Trey says unlike in the past, barbecue is now more of a close-knit community to him.
“Now everybody knows everybody and everybody is cool with everybody,” Trey says. “Everyone helps everyone. That’s the fun part of it.”