Vaqueros Cafe & Cantina — Restaurant in Lakeway

we’ve come here several times and love love love this place. we especially come for the sunday brunch after church because of the great selections of food and the wonderful servers of the buffet! HOWEVER this time we had family in town with us and wanted to share the amazing place with them. we had 7 people in total. When we were seated we were told our server was in the bathroom (which isn’t really what you want to hear right before you eat) the hostess then setup our table and then a few minutes later asked if we were wanting the buffet. we said yes but not all of us were going to eat and she said “ ok yall can go” we had five of us go to the buffet and get our plates. the buffet servers dished out huge servings which isn’t terrible however if you’re wanting a variety of food it’s likely you won’t eat all the serving size. after my first plate(which i didn’t finish) i went to get another one. because we all got multiple plates and had seven people we didn’t have lots of room. my mom (who was in front of me) didn’t have a plate and had space, so i put mine in front of her. because i didn’t eat all of it she started picking on it (otherwise it would’ve gone to waste). my grandmother did the same with my grandpa because he couldn’t finish all of his serving but wanted to try other foods. when it came time to pay we told her five buffets and she said ok but when we got the receipt (which wasn’t itemized) we were charged $224. that sounded wrong for just five buffets so i asked for an itemized to see what we were charged for. we were charged for seven buffets and there was a large party gratuity charge as well. i told her we only have five and she said she had to get her manager which we waited about 10 minutes for. a women came up to us and asked us how we were and we responded “good” because our food was pretty good and we still enjoyed the place. (not knowing she was the manager because she never introduced herself) we then waited again however we were ready to leave so i asked the hostess that we were waiting on the manager in which she spoke over the radio for her ( pretty rudely and with no reply to me) a few minutes later she came ( again not introducing herself) and we told her we were overcharged. she replied with “the server saw everyone eating.” i told her my grandma ended eating all my grandpas leftovers so we don’t mind being charged for that but that my mom never ate. she replied with “we’re not going to take that off” i then told her about the gratuity and that we wanted that off because we did all the work and our server didn’t even serve us. she also explained that because we had take home boxes that’s why she wasn’t going to take the extra charges off. no where is that posted that we weren’t allowed for take out boxes. also if we weren’t allowed to… why were we given them. we’ve always been able to take boxes home. i told her we didn’t know that and that we were sorry for breaking that rule we really just didn’t know. overall the place was a good vibe until it came to the bill and we probably will never go back because of the coldness of the service. and the lack of explanation. we didn’t want the big portions of food we were served to...

We finally went to Vaqueros in Steiner Ranch after months and months of waiting. I sincerely hope this place succeeds. Folks in Steiner Ranch desperately needed another local casual dining restaurant and would could be better than Tex-Mex? We arrived early hoping to beat the Friday night crowd. At 4:30 we were seated immediately, although there were no tables for two outside. Since the restaurant was meat-locker cold that would have been my preference. By the time we left about 5:45 there were more than a dozen people waiting for tables, so the demand is clearly there. Our server was pleasant and knowledgeable. Our drinks came fairly quickly and the food was also brought in good time. Unfortunately when it came time to order another drink she was very busy and it took a while to get her attention. Apparently the bar was also busy by then because the drink was finally delivered as we were paying our bill. She gave us the option of declining it or taking it with us, so we took it—one benefit of the pandemic is takeaway cocktails. Overall the food was pretty good. We ordered the Vaqueros plate and the Mariachi plate, which are both huge. I was only able to finish about a third of mine. There is a sweetness underlying the spiciness of the salsa and the Ranchero sauce that is not my preference. Similarly the skinny Mexican martini was too sweet for our taste, but we asked for extra limes which helped. I guess I will have to try a different sauce to see if there is something more to my liking. The queso was just OK. It would be nice if there were some a la carte options on the menu for those who don’t want a huge meal. Also, there was no drink listing on the menu and none was offered, but we didn’t ask for one. The restaurant building itself is very attractive. Unfortunately the acoustics are terrible, and by the time the place had filled up it was impossible to carry on a conversation with the person next to you. I realize that hard surfaces are easier to keep clean but it is frustrating that so many restaurants fail to consider acoustics in their planning. Dining out should not involve shouting to the person you are with. We were happy to be greeted warmly by Isi, the manager. We have known her since we were regulars at Tres Amigos on 360, probably at least 15 years. We are happy that she has this opportunity and know that she will work hard to get this place running smoothly. It must be a huge challenge to start from scratch with all the staffing and supply issues these days. Vaqueros has some room for improvement but has the potential to become a huge success in our neighborhood. Best of...

We went to the Steiner Ranch location. Izzy (or Izzie?)The woman in charge of guest seating was super unprofessional and rude to me and many guests. The Restaurant was working with reservations on Mother’s Day so we made one weeks in advance. We asked the hostess (a young blonde woman) if we could swap tables because the table they gave us was right underneath a vent and it was freezing. She said we could, but then Izzy comes over and loudly says, “NO, YOU’VE GOT TO GO BACK TO YOUR TABLE BC WE’RE WORKING ON A RESERVATION SYSTEM!” People around us were staring and it was so awkward. She didn’t say please or thank you she was just gross about the whole thing. Almost as if she was raised in a barn with a pack of feral wolves.

Anyway, we said, okay fine, (honestly we were just stunned by her lack of grace or kindness) but The WAY Izzy told us to move was abrupt, brash, and down right ugly!

We were really looking forward to Mother’s Day brunch. But this Izzy woman put a damper on everything. She clearly needs some training on guest relations and professionalism.

The table next to us was a large party and they experienced something similar. Apparently Izzy told them they had to leave bc the next reservation arrived and needed their table. The guests at that table hadn’t even been there for an hour! I spoke to one of those guests and told her that’s it’s not her/her party but rather it’s Izzy’s awful behavior and reckless disregard for guests.

The food was great but the setup was really cramped and logistics were poor bc the waiters were switching out pans of food and had to lift them over our heads. I saw someone get bumped in the back of their head.

Thankfully our server Brie was wonderful but God forbid there was a fire bc no one would be getting out. It was too crowded and cramped.

And, obviously Izzy needs some training on kindness and grace as well as professional etiquette especially if Vaqueros values their guests’ dining experiences.

All in all, the food and server were good. But overall it was not up to par so avoid that place especially...