Today we’d like to introduce you to Alana Webre.
Hi Alana, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I come from a long line of chefs and artists and it seems inevitable that I would just eventually combine the two and get creative with food. My fraternal family side has restaurant owners and chefs back several generations, which continued with my parents, my brother, myself and my cousins, while my mother’s side contains multi-generational professional visual artists. It created this perfectly right-brained disposition for myself to help create creative culinary businesses and marketing that I’m blessed to say have panned out. I am degreed in both culinary and fine arts.
I have helped to create several brands that landed on store shelves with the most recent being a business created with my business partner, Alexandra Worthington: Culinary Cowgirls. We are a national brand of natural Texas dips that began with the world’s first real dairy queso that won HEB’s “Quest for Texas’ Best”, seeking the best new products in Texas. It’s now in every Texas HEB, Sam’s Club, Kroger, and other fine grocers in other states as well. We have expanded into cold dips and salsas too! It’s so good that we sold a million dollars in HEB alone in our first year, and ten million within 5 years! People could not get enough and we became one of HEB’s top 3 Texas brands from the jump, and they gifted us with a diamond belt buckle and put our brand on the HEB truck. (It can be found in the dairy aisle at HEB and the deli aisle in most other grocers). We have been featured in several magazines including Forbes and named Austin Woman Magazine’s “Women To Watch”, twice.
We needed a place to make the queso and it began in a cute little shop on the historic town square of Lockhart, TX. We outgrew that our first year and now have “The Culinary Room” alone in that space, a gourmet market run by myself and my other business partner, Vanessa Ramirez, who is also now the head chef. The Culinary Room quickly became famous for a banana pudding recipe that is like no other (it is so thick and creamy that you can turn a bowl entirely upside down without one drip!). I’d made my recipe for years for friends and family and Vanessa made it even better, It has been featured in magazines from Food and Wine Magazine, Southern Living Magazine, Smithsonian Magazine, to Texas Monthly and more. Like our queso, it just skyrocketed to national popularity. In the BBQ Capital of Texas (Lockhart) it is the perfect pairing.
Since The Culinary Room—our culinary goods and gifts retail shop–took off on the square, Alex now heads up our queso and dip factory in a massive 20,000 sf Culinary Cowgirls factory off of 183 in Lockhart and we have divided and conquered in wonderful culinary ways while Vanessa and I head up The Culinary Room serving locals and tourists our fresh treats in a shop surrounded by local and exotic gifts, across from the historic courthouse.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I read a quote once that said that what actually determines success is your ability to tolerate discomfort. Can you be rejected repeatedly? Can you be uncertain for years? Can you be criticized publicly? Success is simply sustained discomfort. Most give up. But there are those who believe so fully in an idea, a concept, a recipe, or themselves–that they do not tap out at the discomfort stage.
There were far more people in my life that were positive this was the road to loss rather than success. And they said so before we even got the commercial kitchen finished out. People who tried to convince us to take a different route, or change the queso container, or the logo, or the location. I worked three jobs when Alex and I started. And honestly I still do because we have two divisions plus catering. I consider that the world’s biggest blessing rather than anything to whine about. Outlook matters. I am surrounded by great people who share the passion. I was so blessed to find Chef Vanessa Ramirez, for example, because she has the same passion…she’s become family to me and her talent at The Culinary Room is well known. We have to find great people to keep us sane as we do grow.
My father taught me extreme work ethic and the phrase “Do what you love and you will never work a day in your life, then the money will follow.” He taught me not to work for money because when you begin any business you will rarely have that…but I sure have worked more when we needed growth…but if you are waking up and loving what you do, others will love what you do too…passion is what is infectious. And there have been many days when a new idea or recipe wasn’t working the way I wanted it to, or when someone said “no” when we were certain it was the right fit, or when I was working until exhaustion wearing too many hats for sanity, or even when Alex and I wanted to run over each other with our cars rather than drive home. LOL. We kept going and we loved the mission and success followed.
…But it’s the belief in the BRANDS that make the product become like your children…you oversee them like a protective parent. It’s hard to go on vacation. It’s hard to have balance. It is hard to even WANT to delegate… But that is out of LOVE…and when you love your ideas or brands, people get so excited when they hear you talk about it and then they talk about them too…and the struggles are NOTHING to the feel of success when it finally hits. Oh, the addiction of that feeling when everyone finally sees what you saw when you first had a mere idea! It’s like your kid winning the pageant. WE DID THAT!
As you know, we’re big fans of Culinary Cowgirls and The Culinary Room. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
Culinary Cowgirls: While queso has been made since the 60s with oil-based block “cheese food” and canned tomato and peppers, at a tailgate party, Alex Worthington and I said surely “someone had created an all-natural real dairy queso?”….and we set out to find it. We found out that not only was there not one in Texas, no one had ever invented one. With Alex being the driven cowgirl foodie that she is, and never giving up, and me being the commercial chef and creative, there was no stopping us. It took us years, but we created thre first real dairy queso with freshly roasted peppers. And boy did we hit the ground running! And thus it was named Culinary Cowgirls, after its two founders and owners. It can be found nationwide in your favorite grocery stores now. And then we made more queso flavors and grew the product line.
The Culinary Room: The Culinary Room began as a cute little shop with gourmet brands in front of our tiny queso factory. Once Alex and I needed a full factory to keep up with that demand, as well as expand our product offering, we expanded the offerings at The Culinary Room and moved the queso out of the production there. There are literal lines out the door every single weekend for the Banana Pudding now at the Culinary Room, served from the World’s First Fresh Pudding Bar, that has become literally “world famous” with people who have heard about it in other COUNTRIES and come, but we also showcase other products, gifts, and have a full bakery and the only Amy’s Ice Creams counter in Caldwell County with rotating craft flavors. The Culinary Room began as a sidenote to the Culinary Cowgirls line, but is now the twin sister in popularity. Two famous culinary brands that went viral; it’s a dream.
Where do you see things going in the next 5-10 years?
The culinary field is not an easy one and we learned just how volatile it can be during Covid. The price fluctuations of key ingredients killed many other brands. Alex studied dairy pricing futures in order to buy in huge bulk supply when she knew something was about to increase in price for us at Culinary Cowgirls. She has an incredible brain for numbers that I do not possess. Most small brands do not have the ability to buy in bulk and even get the information that she did, and in all honesty we still could not prevent LOST money on one of our products for years during the pandemic. It was so scary.
Additionally, food flavors trend the same way clothing and colors do and if you do not diversify; a popular item that is merely a “trend” can ride from success into a fad quickly. We created the first Roasted Poblano and Pickle dip this year because pickle is the biggest food trend of 2025-2026 for good reason, but next year we will have to study the trend again to stay on top of things at Culinary Cowgirls.
At The Culinary Room, people try to find out our banana pudding recipe on a daily basis. it’s one of the top search terms for our store! Only Vanessa and I have the recipe for that reason…there is literally no other banana pudding recipe on the internet or in any cookbook that matches it and it’s insanely addictive and it went viral for that reason…That is why everyone who walks into our store gets a free sample. It is not the boxed cloyingly sweet artificial yellow pudding most know, nor the soupy creamy custard your grandma may have made from scratch. It is pure thick housemade creamy addiction with freshly sliced bananas and we sell SO much that Vanessa makes huge fresh batches every day throughout the day…so the bananas always stay fresh. Every customer gets it right after it was made, because it is being made all day long. We have competitors try to bribe, look into the kitchen, ask our suppliers, and more…to get this recipe. It’s now simply done by memory and not written down anywhere!
Even though all recipes from both companies are locked down, we still have to reinvent new things every year to stay relevant. We currently have a new program about to launch at the Culinary Room with a new product that we are so excited about and fully compliments our offerings and, as usual, only Chef Vanessa and I know as we get ready to launch…but it will be a very exciting summer!
Every January I get antsy brainstorming how to grow bigger in the new year. One can combat trends, changes, and customer boredom by never becoming complacent in offerings, and being very creative…that is where my artistic and culinary background shine.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.theculinaryroom.com and www.culinarycowgirls.com
- Instagram: @theculinaryroom @culinarycowgirlsbrand
- Facebook: The Culinary Room Culinary Cowgirls All-Natural Queso
