Denise De La Cruz, a teacher at Leila P. Cowart Elementary School, has been vending at the State Fair of Texas for over 40 years. Photo courtesy of Dallas ISD.
The State Fair of Texas is underway, opening its doors for the year on Friday, Sept. 25. For Denise De La Cruz, a Stevens Park Village neighbor and Leila P. Cowart Elementary teacher, the Fair brings the family together year after year.
For over four decades, the family has manned vendor booths at Fair Park. The tradition began when De La Cruz’s mother, Benilde Garza, began noticing a lack of customers.
“Mom and Dad started it, and Mother had a restaurant, and all of a sudden during the Fair time, the business was real, real slow, and she couldn’t understand why business got so slow,” she said. “And she asked a customer, and the customer told her, ‘Everybody’s at the Fair.’ She said, ‘What?’ And so she said, ‘Well, if they’re not coming to me, I’m going to go to them,’ and started submitting applications to be a vendor.”
The first item the Garza Family introduced to the Fair was fajitas.
“And 43 years ago, nobody knew what fajitas were, and it was a hit,” De La Cruz said.
Ever since, the family has brought food to the Fair. They have built up a reputation, with multiple finalist recognitions and wins at the Big Tex Choice Awards. The Garza Family has been participating in the annual contest for nearly a decade.
De La Cruz said that she likes to stick with her culture when it comes to the submissions.
Denise DeLaCruz, a teacher at Leila P. Cowart Elementary School, has been vending at the State Fair of Texas for over 40 years. Photo courtesy of Dallas ISD.
The Garza Family first won with the Arroz con Leche, a sweet, crispy rice, for Best Taste (sweet) in 2018. They won Most Creative in 2019 for the Fla’Mango Tango, mango puff pastry with citrus glaze, and in 2022 for the Cha-Cha Chata, a horchata milkshake with a churro straw, mazapán whipped topping, two arroz con leche bites and two galletas de gragega.
This year, the Garza Family entered Holy Flan! Buñueloco, also for the sweet category. The Holy Flan! Buñueloco is a crispy buñueloco bowl filled with cinnamon Blue Bell Ice Cream, including a whipped cream topping and caramel sauce.
The item was named a finalist, and though it did not win, it will be available at the Fair.
With the tradition so ingrained, De La Cruz said it’s hard not to go back each year. The family is now up to four concession stands at the Fair.
“One of the things that Dad always wanted is to provide jobs for people that don’t have jobs or may not have a job at this time, so we’re giving those people opportunity to work, and more than anything, it’s tradition. … I continue to do it, and I’ll do it as long as I can,” she said. “I was pregnant with my first son the first year I did it, and now I have seven grandchildren. So hopefully they can continue the tradition so that I can retire. If they don’t want to, I guess I’ll still be there and continue to provide the flavors that are needed and that people expect from the Garza Family because we have been there a long time.”
