ADRIAN — Customers at Brenda’s Little Taste of Texas in Adrian will probably find it a lot easier to find a place to sit at their next visit. The Tex-Mex restaurant recently moved from its previous Adrian location at the corner of North Main Street and Toledo Street to the Crossroads Plaza on South Main Street in Adrian. The restaurant is run by Brenda Rodriguez and her daughter, Kristy.
The reason for the move, Brenda said, was to increase the amount of space available for seating customers.
“Our place was 500 square feet,” Kristy said. “This place is 1,600 square feet.”
The increase in square footage means an increase in the number of customers who can be served at the same time, from 12 to 50.
“I only had 12 seats down there and I just couldn’t accommodate people,” Brenda said. “It made people upset that there was never anywhere to sit.”
“I couldn’t bring in big families or groups,” she continued. “A lot of people wouldn’t come because I couldn’t accommodate larger crowds. I needed a bigger space.”
Moving to a bigger space means more than an increase in the number of customers that can be seated. It also means an increase in staff, from just three employees at the Toledo Street location to about 20 people at the new location on South Main Street.
Although the location has changed, the Tex-Mex offerings on the lunch and dinner menus have remained pretty much the same. The cuisine is something Brenda brought from her home state of Texas when she moved to Adrian in 1997. After working at the Lenawee County Courthouse for 20 years, she retired in 2009 and followed her interest in working in the food industry.
“I’ve always enjoyed cooking,” Brenda said. “I used to work at the VFW and I sold tamales, and just did a lot of stuff there cooking-wise, and I just kind of decided to go out on my own.”
The original location for Brenda’s Little Taste of Texas was on East Beecher Street and offered takeout-only service. She then worked at the VFW in Adrian for six years, and the Eagles in Adrian for three years before opening her own restaurant. She also worked from a food trailer in between.
The menu at Brenda’s Little Taste of Texas is not solely traditional Mexican food.
“I have always told everyone ‘I do not do Mexican food; I do Tex-Mex,’ ” Brenda said.
“Tex-Mex is a combination of Texas food and Mexican food,” she continued. “It’s a whole different style of cooking. It’s a little more Americanized.”
The one big change to the menu is the addition of breakfast to the regular menu. In addition to the lunch and dinner menu that includes tacos, burritos, nachos, enchiladas, fajitas and other Tex-Mex specialties, Brenda’s Little Taste of Texas now serves a full breakfast menu on weekdays and Saturdays. On Sunday, the menu is mostly breakfast items during regular business hours, but a few lunch menu items are also available.
Brenda said that what makes Brenda’s Little Taste of Texas unique is the way the food is prepared.
“I do all the cooking,” she said. “I don’t have other people that come in and cook the food. I prepare all the food in small batches all day long.”
Brenda’s Little Taste of Texas is located at 1416 S. Main St., Suite 390, in Adrian. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Sunday from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. More information is available on Facebook at facebook.com/BrendasLilTasteOfTexas, or by calling 517-662-1268.
