“I could tell you, ‘Oh, it was difficult,’ but it really wasn’t,” says Milton Rodriguez, co-founder, along with his wife Rachel Rodriguez, of Taco Vegana, a vegan Mexican restaurant opening soon at 1004 Oakwood Avenue in Church Hill.

Rachel was vegetarian when the couple met. Milton was not. Rather than prepare separate meals, Milton suggested they try veganism together. The couple began figuring out how to make vegan versions of the recipes Milton grew up cooking with his family in Baja, Mexico.

Rodriguez found that go-to meat substitutes — including tofu, seitan and mushrooms —adapted well to Mexican dishes when combined with traditional marinades and condiments.

Learning to make meat-free recipes may not have been difficult, but the path to Taco Vegana’s opening has involved years of work.

“I got my first job in the industry at 30,” Rodriguez says. He had gone to college for business in California, and was working in finance operations in Austin, Texas. He knew he wanted to open a culinary business of his own someday, but before that, he wanted to know what each position in the industry was like.

He started bussing tables at a wine bar in addition to his day job. “I made a lot of good friends, and I learned a lot about the challenges that they experienced or what they enjoyed about the job,” he says.

Pursuing an ever-expanding variety of interests, Rodriguez became a sommelier, a cicerone, ran a kitchen and managed a Belgian beer bar. When he and his family moved to Richmond and could not find any restaurants dedicated to vegan Mexican food, he decided it was time to apply his years of study to his own restaurant.

For Taco Vegana’s menu, getting as close as possible to the flavor, texture and appearance of meat in traditional dishes is important. “We’re celebrating that original recipe, that original dish,” Rodriguez says. “I’m not trying to give you something that wouldn’t be traditional. I’m bringing traditional dishes, or some dishes that I grew up with, and veganizing them.”

Taco Vegana’s version of carne asada (typically beef) will be made from a combination of seitan and oyster mushrooms.

“Seitan gives you a little bit of the density that you find in some parts of the meat, but also it’s very easy to manipulate in terms of the marinade. And the mushroom gives you a little bit of softness,” Rodriguez explains. “With meat, you get some hard parts, you get some soft parts, parts that are a little bit juicier, and they’re all combining in one bite.” Combining ingredients mimics meat’s textural variety.

For birria, traditionally made with lamb or goat meat, Rodriguez will combine oyster mushrooms with jackfruit. “Jackfruit gives you the stringiness of the birria, but the oyster mushroom gives you that meatiness as well,” he says. The menu will also feature burritos, enchiladas and tacos of many kinds, including Baja tacos with beer-fried cauliflower florets in place of fish.

Rodriguez says the menu is influenced not only by his childhood in Mexico, but also by the places he has lived since, and the food that he enjoyed there.

“I didn’t want to just celebrate my Mexican background, because I’m not just Mexican from Mexico with those traditional dishes, now. I’m also an immigrant,” Rodriguez says. “The reason why I mentioned the places where I’ve been, and where I’m from, is that all of these dishes that I’m bringing in are part of that experience.”

Taco Vegana’s menu celebrates Baja, Mexico and also California. It draws on the long-established Tex-Mex food traditions Rodriguez enjoyed in Austin, and also on the shops started there by recent immigrants, serving traditional recipes from the various regions of Mexico they came from. The restaurant brings these varied traditions and innovations to Richmond.

Overlooking the intersection of Oakwood Avenue, P Street and Chimborazo Boulevard, Taco Vegana is designed to welcome people in. From the door, you can see down the long bar to a mural of Frida Kahlo on the far wall, or look past the teal tile behind the bar into the open kitchen. The menu will incorporate locally grown produce and local craft beer.

Rodriguez thinks the design of the restaurant, as well as its thorough beer and cocktail menu and the quality of its food, will make it a place that people in the neighborhood will enjoy visiting whether or not they are looking for a meat-free meal.

He notes, “If you’re not into to vegan food, well, chips and salsa and guacamole will always be vegan. I’m not changing the recipe. You can have chips and salsa, have some beers, and maybe by the third time you come, you’ve had the same thing, you’ll be like, you know what? I’ll try a few tacos this time. Give it a try.”

Follow Taco Vegana on Instagram for any updates about their grand opening. They plan for a grand opening at 4 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 14.