The tacos from Valentina’s Tex Mex BBQ are highly rated. See here, here, and here. We were in Austin recently and stopped by. Here’s how it went.
I ordered a pulled pollo taco and a barbacoa taco. I’ve read in other places that barbacoa is only available on Sundays, so I had to try it. The meat in each taco was excellent, especially the chicken. It was juicy and succulent. Garnished with guacamole and a habanero salsa, each bite was top notch. The barbacoa was also great; it was smoky, but–somewhat shocking to me–I rank Valentina’s barbacoa slightly behind Taconazo. The purist in me assumes that coming off a smoker, the barbacoa at Valentina’s would automatically be better. And it did have an excellent smoky flavor, but Valentina’s barbacoa was less fatty and tender.
But the smokiness and quality of the meat was evident. Inside the truck, I saw a rack of shelves with a variety of foil-wrapped meats. A new brisket was unwrapped while I ordered, and I nearly changed my order. It had a thick, beautiful dark bark, and there’s almost no way the brisket I saw wasn’t delicious. I’d love to try Valentina’s other meat preparations.