It started with Sunday dinners. Nati Venalonzo began making quesadillas and sharing them with her Parker neighbors. The rest, as they say, is history.
Renting a house with multiple family members right off Mainstreet, Nati says, “I started cooking quesadillas on the weekend, and I grew the zucchini on the patio, and they got big with a lot of flowers. My neighbor said, ‘What are you doing cutting those flowers?’ and I said, ‘I’m making quesadillas.’”
Before long, she offered them to the neighbors. “I said, ‘Do you want to try my quesadillas?' They [the neighbors] said, ‘This is amazing and so delicious!’”
Together, the family started making more food, like tamales, tacos, and burritos, and selling it around town. It was hard work, but quickly became a family affair.
“Everyone [in the family] was doing it,” Michelle, Nati’s daughter, chimes in. “It was like an assembly line.”
It would take years of food trucks and other jobs until, in 2022, Nati would suggest to Pako, a longtime chef and one of Nati’s 14 siblings, that they should try opening a restaurant. Together, they came up with Venalonzo’s Tacos to honor their family name.
Lana Paggen, Operations Manager, Nati’s longtime friend, and Pako’s wife, shares, “We believe restaurants have the power to build community one meal at a time.”
And so Venalonzo’s did just that with the soft opening of their first restaurant in Centennial on Father’s Day in 2022.
“On Father’s Day, my uncle was like, everyone come to the restaurant, and I’m gonna make everybody breakfast,” Michelle explains. “So everybody’s at the table eating, and then people start walking by because we obviously left the door open…we’re like, come sit down and give us your opinion. So that was like our soft opening.”
It wouldn’t be until the next week that they opened for real, but those people ended up choosing the top salsas they use today.
Nati laughs, “I had 5 stars on Google before I opened!”
Now, with the Parker location, which opened in November of 2025, and their newest location in Lone Tree, Venalonzo’s is creating a space built on tradition and family.
Lana puts it perfectly when she says, “As we continue to grow, one thing will never change: our commitment to serving authentic, scratch-made Mexican cuisine with integrity, investing in the communities that have invested in us, and treating every guest like family.”
The community’s love for Venalonzo’s is showcased by the accolades the restaurant has received. They were named best birria tacos by Westword Magazine's readers and Yelp’s Top 100 Places to Eat in Denver.
In addition, Nati won a Who’s Who award for her work in the community. Unable to attend high school herself, Nati works to pay it forward for kids, ensuring everyone has a chance at an education. They recently sponsored a ladies' night out for the non-profit organization, Shield Our Schools, which raises money for additional school security.
Michelle explains, “When people come in and need a food donation, we always try to do it. My mom always says, ‘When I needed help, I always found someone, and I told myself that when someone came to me that needed help, I was going to be there.’”
Proud members of the Parker Chamber of Commerce and serving on the Latin Committee, Venalonzo’s Tacos recently participated in the inaugural Fiesta Parker event celebrating Latin culture within the Parker community.
“Watching families from every background gather to celebrate food, music, culture, and community reminded us exactly why we love calling Parker home,” Lana says.
Coming to another country and seeking better opportunities in the wake of her father’s tragic death forced Nati, who was only a teenager at the time, to grow up quickly. Despite facing many difficult situations, she discovered how passion, creativity, talent, hard work, faith, and, most importantly, family can help someone persevere through anything.
For the Parker community, our taste buds and hearts are forever grateful that Venalonzo’s has welcomed everyone so graciously to their family’s table.
Lana Paggen, Venalonzo's Operations Manager, says, "As a brother and sister duo, we founded Venalonzo's with one simple goal: to create a place where people could gather around authentic Mexican food made the right way. Our scratch kitchen is the heart of everything we do. Every salsa, every sauce, every batch of our award-winning birria is handcrafted from fresh ingredients using recipes inspired by our family's heritage and prepared under the direction of our award-winning chef. We believe extraordinary food isn't created by shortcuts. It's created through passion, patience, and the pride of serving something you'd place on your own family's table."