The Cowboy's Taqueria — Restaurant in Town of Cobleskill

Visiting Howe Caverns and decide to venture into Cobleskill for something to eat. Cobleskill it turns out is a funny place when it comes to dining. Probably 3/4 of the restaurants are closed on Mondays. Go figure. Place we had in mind when we got there was closed. Now what? Looked pretty bleak as Main Street seemed barren. Then we noticed some outside canopy umbrellas and I went to take a look. Wasn't sure if it was a restaurant since the signage isn't great. We were so hungry we didn't even Google the place to see it's rating. Here goes nothing was our mantra. Turns out it was nothing to worry about. Nice little family run place. Took awhile to get served, but more on that later. First up was a nice fresh serving of chips (they were oven fresh). The salsa was spot on. Not too spicy, not too bland. Perfect. I ordered a chicken empanada platter, which I have to add was bargain priced. A bit of a surprise when it came as it was the largest Empanada I've ever seen or eaten. Platter portions that also included rice and beans were similarly generous. Portion size means nothing if the food is tasteless. Not the case here and everything was tasty. Had a Coke and it was the kind that is from Mexico. Glass bottle and sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup. Nice. I can taste the difference and brings back memories of how Coke used to be. My grandson ordered a cheese quesadilla. Once again a generous portion. He thought it was very good. My wife got a house platter (chicken) that she thought was very good, but a little too spicy for her liking. I tasted it and didn't think it was all that spicy. If fact I really liked it and offered to trade our meals, but she declined. As a side note we sometimes tease her that she thinks vanilla ice cream is too spicy (lol). She did note the lemonade she had was really, really good. So far, so good.

Now the somewhat bad thing, which you have to put in context. It took a long time to get served. However, I didn't ding them a star like I would if this happened at an upscale restaurant like Tavern On The Green or The Russian Tea Room where they have a ton of staff. The place was packed we we went. Total staff was a cook and our waitress, who was also the cashier and busboy. She was running around like a chicken with it's head off. She was apologetic about the wait and was friendly. Not like some places that are aloof and fail to acknowledge you have been waiting an inordinate amount of time. To expedite things after we finished, I went up to the cash register in order to make things easier for our waitress/busboy/cashier. She was genuinely apologetic once again for our wait. No, I'm not going to be an unfeeling jerk and ding a star. Other than the wait everything was great. Sat outside which was super nice. From what I could see inside everyone was having a good time. Nice crowd, not boisterous, just people having pleasant conversation. Decor was welcoming and tasteful. Glad...

I am posting this review with some hesitance. I have seen the owners response to some negative reviews and I am not excited to receive response back.

That being said, my family of four ventured in here one day because we were exicted to see menu options that my one child could safely eat with his food restrictions.. I am happy to report that he did not have any reactions to the food here, which is fantastic. If you have to live the gluten free lifestyle - the food here DOES appear to be safe. I was excited to see authentic soda bottles, it added nicely to the aesthetic.

Unfortunately, that is the extent of our satisfaction here. The host we had did not seem very warm and welcoming. We felt a bit like we intruded or were a bother when we walked in. They brought out table chips, which was a small basket with a small serving of salsa. As a table of four, I believe we each had two chips each before they were gone. I had ordered empanadas, we also had two people order tacos and one person order the carne asada. The portion sizes were small. All of our meals came with rice and beans in addition to the main order. Rice and beans are so so cheap to make. I was surprised when it was just a cup or so of prepared rice and 1/4 of a cup or so of beans. Especially since the serving size of the main meal was small as well. The rice was very bland and wet, it did not taste fresh. My empanada did not taste fresh at all. In fact the flavor was off putting at first. Almost like tuna, but it was filled with chicken, crunchy onions and tomato. It came with a single empanada, which was not large by any stretch. The person who ordered the carne asada had a single piece of very thin steak (like milasa) about the size of a 5x7 photo. It was not seasoned. He said it tasted boiled, and a few tortillas. It was not hot when it arrived - the tortillas were though- that was appreciated. The tacos are street style sized tacos. Which is fine, but two certainly wont fill most people. If the rice and beans were a more substantial serving - the main course being so small wouldnt have been so noticable.

I was very exicted to try this place, we eat a lot of mexican food, spanish food and puerto rican food, it is a substantial part of our lives. I was underwhelemed by the flavor and agree with other reviews that stated it was bland and that the servings are small.

All in all we spent 80 dollars and had to go get food elsewhere later because it just...

The food was excellent. However, no prices listed for menu items. And I had to look up items i wasn’t familiar with. No sampler platters here. Sticker shock was pretty intense when I checked out. I can’t say I won’t eat there again, because I did really enjoy the meal and there isn’t any other genuine Mexican restaurants in the area. But they do need to post their prices. I expected to pay $15-$20 less than what I was charged, based on past experiences at other authentic Mexican restaurants for the same items. Not saying I wouldn’t pay what they ask, but would have scaled back a bit. I hope they’ll offer sample platters in the future. I’d hate to get a very expensive full plate if something I really didn’t end up liking. But I hope they last in the area. We have almost no good restaurants here. They did not bring the bill though we waited 20 minutes after requesting a box for take home items, then waited at the register 10 minutes more before being noticed. So service needs drastic improvement. I did not ring the bell as I had the time and wanted to see how long before they checked on their customers. The place was not busy at all, so a bit baffled as to why it took so long to get noticed...