Tacos of Texas

In today’s episode we’re flipping the tortilla. I’m actually the one being interviewed by El Mero Mero and Jr. Taco Correspondent Samuel Franco. So sit back and relax and get to know a little more about El Taco Journalist Mando Rayo (me!)

The full transcript of this episode of Tacos of Texas is available on the KUT & KUTX Studio website. The transcript is also available as subtitles or captions on some podcast apps.

Mando Rayo: What’s up Taco World? I’m Taco Journalist Mand Rayo, and welcome to the Tacos of Texas podcast, El Cinco, produced by Identity Productions in partnership with KUT and KUTX studios. And we’re back exploring taco culture in Texas through the eyes of the people in the Lone Star state. In today’s episode, we’re flipping the tortilla.

I’m actually the one being interviewed by El Mero Mero and Junior Taco correspondent Samuel Franco. So sit back and relax and get to know a little more about El Taco journalist Mando Rayo. Me.

Samuel Franco: Armando

Mando Rayo: Samuel.

Hello.

It’s great to be

Samuel Franco: here with you, Mando. This is great. Hi everybody.

Mando Rayo: This is a awkward podcast moment interview. It’s awkward, po Exactly. Yeah, yeah.

Samuel Franco: Awkward start to the podcast moment. Um, today we are flipping the tortilla on Mando, and we’re gonna learn a little bit about what’s inside of Mando, what fills his taco.

All right. So I’m gonna be doing, I’m gonna be interviewing Mando. I’m gonna ask you some questions. Yeah, sure. Alright, Mando. Um. So El Paso is a unique place growing up, right? Yep. Mm-hmm. It’s got the Mexican inspiration, it’s got, it’s definitely Texan, right? Yeah. Even though some Texans don’t wanna claim us, but we claim Texas for sure.

That’s right. That’s right. Yep. Yep. And it’s definitely part of new, uh, it’s got a New Mexico vibe, right? Yep. It’s like very, very southern New Mexico at times too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s a whole mesh of Cultura and then Mexico.

Mando Rayo: Mexico, exactly.

Samuel Franco: You got Mexico right there too. So there’s a whole mesh of cultura, of flavors, of all sorts of things going on.

How has that kind of like that landscape of everything coming together, how has that influenced your passion for cooking or your cooking style? Let’s put it that way.

Mando Rayo: Uh, well, I guess I would say that I didn’t grow up cooking. I definitely was around food a lot. And so whether it was my mom. My tio, my ts, my abuelos and you know, thinking about everything like, you know, we just, like flour tortillas was a, was a thing that we grew up with.

There was always flour tortillas. There was always like Chile, uh, like salsa for you. Non El Pasos we call. Salsa Chile Chilis Not true. It’s right. That’s right. I never thought about that. Yeah. Yeah. Everything’s Chile. Yeah. And then, and then, uh, refried beans, there was always fri beans. So that way you have like, you have something to pi, you know what I mean?

And so, but you know, just gonna Juarez and going to eat in Juarez, whether it’s the Flotas or the burritos, um, or the taquitos. And, and then everything that we grew up eating at home, which, which we didn’t go out to a lot of restaurants, to be honest, when we go to restaurants, it was in Juez. Because El Paso was like too expensive for us.

And, and then like this idea around like, okay, um, the enchiladas and the red chilies and uh, the hatch chilies. So a lot of chi there was definitely, I would maybe, I guess what I would say is what influenced me is a lot of chiles, lots of Chile, lots of, you

Samuel Franco: know what I find crazy too about Gu El Paso? Is that like.

For me, everything, and I’m pretty sure it’s probably you too for me. Everything centered around either like the yellow, cheap cheese. Yeah. Or monster cheese. Yeah. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like that’s very much an El Paso thing. Yeah. It’s like you come out here and it’s a whole different style, a whole different flavor of cheese.

It’s very

Mando Rayo: specific. I think it’s a regional thing. It’s the, you know, like if you go to Chihuahua, there was a lot of Mennonite. Uh, and so there’s that German influence, I would say. Ah, and that’s kind of, you know, it was a kind of that light melted cheese, uh, the monster cheese perino. I mean, I grew growing up, uh, in the barrio growing up in, in the projects.

I mean, there was always the, the cheese line, you know, and I was like, I was, I, I always hated that. I was like, ugh. You know, I gotta go to the cheese line, that’s a thing. And I’m like, you know, it was, it, you know, it helped us. It helped me make like, you know, appreciate everything that I’ve had and, and for some time too, I kind of rejected kind of like my own Mexicanness identity and then I kind of brought Got it back.

Yeah. Yeah. I think

Samuel Franco: that happens to all of us board at some point. Yeah. Yeah.

Mando Rayo: So,

Samuel Franco: yeah. Yep. Yep. So we all know you’re a storyteller. Yeah. A good one at that.

Mando Rayo: Maybe.

Samuel Franco: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um, and you often say you were born with a tortilla in your hand. That’s right, I do. Because that whole unique blend of cultures.

Yeah. Growing up Mexicano, um, how has that influenced your storytelling? How has growing up in that border region mm-hmm. Amongst different cultures, different styles, different, different, uh, ways of thinking, how has that influenced your storytelling?

Mando Rayo: I mean, I think it’s, for me, it’s all about kind of honoring the roots and where I come from and honoring the people.

And so, you know, this idea around like, you know, when we got together, we just like sat around, everybody sat around, say we was at, you know, my TIAs and my TIAs and we’d all gather in a circle and tell stories to be honest. Literally. Like there was like, oh, remember when we did this? And remember when we did that?

Oh, did you hear the story about this? Or whatever. Or maybe it was, maybe it was the chief man, right. You know what I mean? Yeah, exactly. But yeah, so I think, you know, we, when we did that, it was like, you know, everybody. When we got together, everybody, you know, uh, participated in bringing something and then we all shared it.

And then after that was the story, story part, story element. So, you know, it’s funny ’cause I hadn’t thought about that, but yeah, we used to do that all the time. Whether we, whether when we were kids and we were just playing and trying to outdo or outsmart each other. And we used to play this game where like, if you lost.

You have to drink a glass of water and then like, so then like the more that you lose, then you have to go to the bathroom. I know it’s a good thing. I don’t know. All right. Anyway, I sure I never played that game, but over consumption of water in, in El Paso we’re have a lot of kids playing the water game.

I think the water game, there was water game. There was Lalo with beans. You know, C one,

Samuel Franco: C one, scene one. Well, speaking of stories, dude. Um. You know, you’ve traveled, you traveled the entire country when doing, doing work, telling stories. Mm-hmm. Telling the narratives of folks. Yeah. Um, this is kind of a two part question.

Number one, why do you feel it’s so important to highlight some of these stories? Number one, uhhuh and number two, I wanna know what’s, what’s kind of that one that sticks out in your mind and you say, man, that was an amazing quinto. You know? Okay. That’s just a great story. I’m so proud of. Yeah. So happy to have shared that with the world.

Yeah. I love

Mando Rayo: it. Love it. Yeah. No. Um, first of all, I don’t do two part questions. Your mind doesn’t work that way, so, so repeat the first question. Okay. Okay. Now we know. See, now we know what really what’s inside of Moo’s mind. You’re like one of those where you’re like, you know, you raise your hand and Oh, it’s a two part, and everybody’s like, oh man, is Yeah.

Yeah, sure. You’re smart. Second.

Samuel Franco: Oh

Mando Rayo: yeah, that was,

Samuel Franco: that

Mando Rayo: was hard.

Samuel Franco: Okay. Yeah, mano. So, you know, going back to the storytelling, um. Why do you, why do you feel it’s important to, to highlight some of these stories and cover some of these mm-hmm. These stories that are not necessarily always being told, especially in the mainstream media, right?

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Mando Rayo: Um, well, I think it’s important because, uh, we need to humanize, uh, people and in a time that we, we live, that we, you know, we can eat all this great food, but, but treat people like, you know, um. Other othering people like, like they don’t belong or they don’t even exist in our, in a community.

So to me it’s super important, um, to allow them to tell their stories and understand kind of, you know, what’s their journey and what’s the hardships, but also what’s the joy. That they get right out of, you know, their, their journeys. Um, and I would say, you know, like, you know, obviously try been, you know, doing the podcasting but then also had the previous shows.

And, and for me it was super important to like try to get, uh, to the stories that, that, that maybe I was familiar with, but maybe, you know, people outside of my circle weren’t and, and humanizing like say the immigrant story. We always hear, oh, is this American Dream? But we don’t know like the details of, of what happens.

And so I wanted to share that. And you know, when we did the show, the United Tacos of America, um, we went down to Brownsville and uh, we, we, we got together with this group that basically made breakfast tacos for, um. Uh, for immigrants coming in. And so we got there, we got at the bus station. They were there waiting.

Uh, and then we went to another, um, uh, to Catholic Charities and they actually were feeding, um, a lot of, um, immigrants that, you know, they just kind of crossed over and some of ’em hadn’t eaten for days. You know, and so, so those are the, the stories of like, the hardships that you have to do, uh, what you have to sacrifice to help your family, you know, and then, and it’s hard.

It’s hard ’cause, you know, people run away from, they’re running away from some, from hardship, from violence, from, you know, uh, uh, just a lot of things that, you know, all they’re trying to do is, is make their lives better here. Right? Yeah. Those are the stories that we needed that we need to hear more of.

Yeah. Um, because what it does, it humanizes and it allows compassion to really, um, to thrive in a sense. Because if we have compassion, uh, for who makes our food, who picks our food, right? Who’s gonna be taking care of our children or, or, or, you know, anything else, um, you know, we’re, we’re gonna be, you know, better humans for it.

Samuel Franco: Yeah. No, that’s, that’s, you’re super right about that. Um, just compassion all the way. So in doing my research on you Yes. And by research I mean in knowing you for the past 10 years. Oh, okay.

Mando Rayo: I thought you chat

Samuel Franco: GBT, Mando, who is Mando? I did not, the interview, the interview was always like. Well, after reading your book or in doing my research Oh, yeah, yeah.

And doing my research on Newand though, um, you know, I’ve gotten know you and I just gotta say, you know, I’ve, you know, told me the stories of how you grew up, you know, growing up in UND Mario. Mm-hmm. Which, you know, is a beautiful, wonderful, culturally historic, historically beautiful part of El Paso.

Mm-hmm. But it’s also not. It still isn’t necessarily the most socioeconomic, right. Yeah. From that perspective. Yeah, for sure. And then going, moving from that into, you know, government assisted housing, which if I remember correctly, you live in the Kennedys. Yeah. Which, you know, growing up as a kid Yeah. I remember we were always scared to even drive by the Kennedys.

Yeah. Because it was not the easiest place. Yeah. It

Mando Rayo: was hard. It was definitely hard.

Samuel Franco: Um, you know, touching on that, I think there’s a lot of other things that people don’t know about you, and I think, uh, that, you know. We see a lot of folks see you as, as the taco guy, but you do much more than that. Right?

Right. Yeah. You do much more than that. You’ve co-founded the new philanthropists. Yeah,

Mando Rayo: yeah,

Samuel Franco: yeah. Let’s talk a little bit about that. Yeah.

Mando Rayo: Well, you know, I think, uh, my upbringing I think has influenced a lot of who I am. You know, it is kind of funny. There was, um, uh, what was that? That, that, that Cheeto movie.

What Cheto Wood. Yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was like, I got, I’m a, I’m a PhD Manhattan. No, yeah, yeah. Ti I got a PhD. I’m poor. Um, hungry. Hungry and determined. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s how we work. You know, we lived, uh, in UND barrio and half a block from, from the Puente Re Right, like the bridge right there.

Yeah. That crosses in the international bridge. We live in an alley. And that was part of my childhood. You know, we lived in an alley and, uh, you know, and you know, for me, like I was just a kid and I didn’t, you don’t know what you, what you don’t know, right? Yeah. You don’t know what you don’t know. Yeah.

Samuel Franco: And so, but we had, uh, you didn’t know that mustard cheese wasn’t like the best cheese to put on your tacos.

True. That’s We had not

Mando Rayo: then. Not yet. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Samuel Franco: We didn’t know yellow cheese was what it was, you know? Yeah. I get you. I get you. And

Mando Rayo: then, and then, you know, obviously, you know, living in the projects, uh. You know, and Los Kennedys and, and, uh, and, and thinking about, you know, just everything that we had to do, everything we had to sacrifice, uh, like, you know, not knowing that, you know, just like sometimes we would be like, oh shoot, we gotta wait to have a good, solid meal, like at the end of the week versus the beginning of the week.

So, um, so a lot of that, you know. And, and then, yeah, it was hard. There was a lot of even violence within that and, and um, you know, just the surrounding the environment. And then, and then, yeah, so there, there’s just, uh, there was a lot there, but for some reason I was like, you know what, uh, maybe it was probably my experience that informed me like, you know, I need to do, I need to figure out how to live differently.

And so, I mean, I think from there I was like, you know what? And then may, maybe that was part of like my, my exodus. It would say from, from culture, you know, Mr. Old Testament. I know, right? And I was like, and, and then I’m gonna part the, the, the Rio.

But then thinking about like, okay, what, what can I do to not only improve my life, my family’s life? How do I, how do I kind of go on beyond that? You know what I mean? Yeah. And then com family and community has always been part of that. And um, yeah, I just like, you know, just, you know, a lot of times it was me and my older brother just doing, trying to do something better than what we had.

And so that’s kind of like where I, you know, to be honest, I grew up in Austin. Then in my, you know, in my twenties, I feel like I, that this is kind of where I grew up. Um. And, and, and started a family, and then build a community and, you know, I think just, you know, not remember remembering kind of those hardships and, and, and where I come from probably has definitely, um, it, it kept me rooted, you know what I mean?

Yeah,

Samuel Franco: yeah, yeah.

Mando Rayo: For sure. And then, yeah, and then, and then, and then working in a nonprofit. For sure, like doing grassroots organizing. Um, and I think that’s what I bring to, to the Taco podcast, you know, to understand where people, you know, hardships come from. But then how, how do, how do we really look at ourselves as a, as a samia, you know, you know, like that, that, that quote is, uh, you know, um.

Uh, they try to bury us, but we didn’t, you didn’t know that we were seats

and, uh, yeah. And then, you know, uh, and then starting, you know, thinking about like, how can, what can I do? How can I pull up for my community? And, um, and, and then make it grow from there. And then that’s kind of where a new philanthropist kind of sprouted. Well, yeah. No, no.

Samuel Franco: And you’ve, and you’ve done much more than just your community, right?

Like Yeah. New philanthropist is expanding into Houston. Yeah. Yeah. Houston and, um, it’s all over. It’s all over

Mando Rayo: Travis County. Yeah. Yeah. All over Central Texas. And our, our goal for that is to bring more representation to nonprofit boards. And then, and then create those culture shifts that, that need to happen at the board, at the board level.

Because, because of, you know, who’s getting impacted by the work of nonprofits, it’s predominantly people of color, right? And families and children. And so we need that representation, um, at that leadership level to ensure that, you know, that, that, that each nonprofit fulfill their mission through, through, uh, the insights of.

You know, whether it’s black, brown, indigenous, I mean, you name it, uh, our, our, even our counter allies, everybody has a role to play in there as long as we all work together to build ourselves up. And especially in hard times, right? Like, like in 2025. Mm-hmm. Uh, and that’s super important.

Samuel Franco: Yeah. Yeah. When I think of you, I, I do think of those words.

I have that, you know, I have several new philanthropist t-shirts, I’m not gonna lie. Oh yes, I have several. They’ve ended up in my car somehow and I’m like, ah, keep this one. I like the color. Don’t tell Paulina. Don’t tell Paulina. Yeah, exactly. Shh. Paulina’s our executive director,

Mando Rayo: by the way. She’s

Samuel Franco: amazing.

Executive director. Amazing. Really, really good. Does a great job.

Mando Rayo: Sister from another mista.

Samuel Franco: But what the, the shirt, you know, the, the, the words in that shirt say representation matters, uhhuh. Right. That’s, that’s y’all’s tagline. And I really think, you know, at least from my perspective, when I think of Mando, I think of those two words, right?

Mm-hmm. It kind of weaves through in, in everything that you do, whether it’s telling the stories of underrepresented cultures or underrepresented, uh, founders mm-hmm. Or, or cooks through identity productions. Mm-hmm. Or through your taco journalism. Yep. But also in the, you know, nonprofit leadership.

Mando Rayo: Yeah.

Samuel Franco: Um, you really live by that mantra of representation matters. Yeah,

Mando Rayo: yeah, for sure. And, you know, but at identity productions, you know, me and, and Dennis Dennis, our, you know, creative producer over there, Dennis Burnett, shout out to Dee, you know, uh, you know, we wanted to create an, a production company that, that invites people to the table.

Right. That is inclusive. That creates a space for, for, for voices, different perspective, different voices, and, and you know, I feel that, you know, um, we’ve done that and we can we’ll continue to do that, whether it’s through this podcast or, you know, other, other content that we build.

Samuel Franco: Yeah. I was gonna ask you this question, but I think I already know the answer.

Okay. You know, how does food serve as that, as that cultural medium, right? Yeah. For, for getting into, into spaces and representation, right? Sure, sure,

Mando Rayo: sure, sure. Yeah, no, I mean, we always say we use, we use tacos as a Trojan horse. Ah, no. Yep, yep. Right. It’s a good setup. Good setup. I like it. Yeah. Uh, so, you know, this idea that like, hey, you know, you know, let’s, let’s talk about like this food culture around tacos.

And explore that, right? But then from that you kind of peel away, you know, the layers, right? Layers around where people are coming from, understanding their communities, community issues. And then, and then, and then explore that because we’re not just one thing, right? Uh, around our identities. We’re all complex people.

And so once you start, you know, pulling away those layers of a, of a good Voya. You know? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Then you get to the heart, you know, of, of people. Of people and, and what they believe in, and, but we, we start that, you know, through breaking bread or, or tearing off a

Samuel Franco: good tortilla. You know, and so I’m laughing because I’m, I just thought about this little meme that I saw on Instagram where it’s like, if, if, if the Trojan War was around now and it shows a Trojan horse, it’s a ginormous horse pinata, like going over the, the border wall.

I was like, oh, that is so true, you know? Oh, good lord. Yeah. I

Mando Rayo: think, I think an artist did that already. It is hilarious. That was

Samuel Franco: hilarious. Yep, yep, yep. Um. So reflecting back, you know, on your journey from El Paso to where you are now, right? Mm-hmm. From the storytelling, what is one of those things that stands out, uh, as like one of those pivotal moments when you’re like, you know what, man, this is, this is what I wanna do.

This is how I wanna change the world, right? Yeah. Yeah. Whether it’s through storytelling. What was that moment you’re like, this is,

Mando Rayo: this is what I’m gonna do. Uh, well, to be honest, I don’t know if there was one thing, but it was a series of things and one of ’em cannot be meeting me or Dennis. Oh, okay. Okay, okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, no. It was getting into a fight with my rooster, actually. Just kidding. No, no. It was a series of things. To be honest, I think it was when we did the Tacos of Texas book, because that’s when we really went out. We went out to small towns across Texas. Sure. The big cities, but also small towns and little places like, you know, uh, the Taco Mile in far Texas.

And I had to explain to folks like, like it, this, this is a real thing. We’re actually. Writing a book on tacos, right? Yeah. They were probably surprised. They was like, nobody cares about us. And it was the first of its kind in Texas, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, um, so this idea around going into people’s homes and backyards and having, having, you know, them having the vulnerability to trust us, you know, with their recipes and, you know, their, their experience, their lived experiences.

I think that really kind of like, at first I was, you know, we were, you know, going a hundred miles an hour, but then when we sat down and talked to folks and, and, and being present with them, uh, that’s kind of where, you know, it was a series of those conversations where it was like, wow. ’cause, ’cause at first people didn’t believe they’re like.

Who are you and what do you want? Like, you know, we went down to, to Vera’s, uh, backyard barbacoa in, in Brownsville. Like I had to basically, uh, get there. Like we got there like at maybe four or five in the morning, and I had to talk to Armando. It was my Tocayo there. Uh, he was sitting there with, uh, with um, I don’t know if it wasdo or um, brother-in-law, whatever, and talked to them for like two whole hours before they said okay.

Before you, you had to warm ’em up. Yeah, for sure. You gotta warm ’em up because you gotta be present there and you gotta, and then, and so it’s like that trust, you know, and the, the vulnerability of having those conversations and, and being, you know, open to having those, that conversation. So for me, it really impacted me all these different stories that we had learned along the way and connected with so many people.

And a lot of people that probably, you know, they haven’t been asked like, you know, what’s your take on your culture and, and your experience? So it’s kind of like the ation, compilation, accumulation allegation, bro. It’s allegation. It’s, it’s the whatever, Asian, it’s an accumulation. It’s, it’s one of those things that, that, that, it wasn’t like one thing, but a, a series of things.

And later I was like, oh, wow. We talked to a lot of folks and Yeah. And they open up their homes to us and, uh, you know, and we gotta, we gotta respect that.

Samuel Franco: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So looking ahead, mano, um, you know, season five. Hopefully Cinco. Cinco. 5, 5, 5. Uh, hopefully there’s like season 50. Who knows, man, we could be, this could be longer than the Simpsons, right?

But, uh, but, uh, what, what, what do you, what are your, uh, aspirations for, for this work in storytelling? Sure. For this community engagement, what do you want to, what do you want the future to look like?

Mando Rayo: Yeah. I mean, you know, I think we need to keep asking these questions, keep asking these questions around like, you know, yes.

Around your favorite foods, but who, who? Who, who, who, who gets to eat the food, right? And who’s afforded the food, and how do you like, uh, honor the people that make the food as well as the food. You know, we got a long ways to go there. So until we kind of start, you know, understanding and, and being part of this.

Uh, space of, of the United States, of Texas, and the United States. We have a long ways to go. Right? So for me, it’s like telling, continue, telling these stories, going obviously national, we’ve done national programs, but now we’re, you know, we do a lot. We have a, I mean, Texas is a big state, so we, you know, there’s definitely plenty of stories to tell, but, but this idea around, you know, coming back and respecting people’s lived experiences and, and.

Uh, and honoring the culture is, is where it’s at. And, and I would say we just have a long ways to go. Yeah. But we’re, we’ll, we’ll get there. One taco at a time.

Samuel Franco: One ta at a time. One taco at a time. All right. Mano, let me ask you a question. Yeah. Last question. Okay. On, uh, season two, I believe it was. I was, I was baptized as the junior taco correspondent.

I did, I did baptize you as the Junior Taco Co. That’s right. I think I even got like an I mdb credit or something. I don’t know. But I don’t know about that. Yeah, I dunno. But, uh, hi Mano, have I, have I made it? Have I made it? Can I, can I mand the grill? Can I, can I shave that pin now? Mano, what do you think?

Well,

Mando Rayo: you have gone from like swatting away the flies to

Samuel Franco: manning the grill.

Mando Rayo: All right. I’ll take it. I’ll take it,

Samuel Franco: man. I’ll take it. All right. I appreciate you. This has been flipping the tortilla with Mando and somewhere.

Mando Rayo: That was good. I like that. That, thank you. Yeah.

Samuel Franco: Yeah.

Louise Min: The Tacos of Texas podcast is presented by identity Productions in partnership with KUT and KOTX studios. Our host and producer is Mando. Our audio is mixed by Nicholas Weden. Our story producer is me, Louisa, Vanessa, and our creative producer is Dennis. Burnett Music was created by Palosa in Austin, Texas, and King Benny Productions located in the Quinto Barrio of Houston.

This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.