Good news, those of you whose New Year’s resolutions have expired, this Wednesday is National Pie Day! Not to be confused with Pi Day, which is on March 14, or 3.14 for you nerds out there, Pie Day is the day in which we celebrate the miracle of pie. Pie…
The Dallas Observer’s 2010 Readers’ Pick for Best New Restaurant, Mextopia, has closed. Leslie Brenner got the details in a voice mail from owner Ricardo Avila. The plan is to reopen somewhere else with a new concept. Avila cited road construction near his restaurant as part of the problem…
Tom Thumb has been touting a new line of cookies lately, displayed in evil temptation just before the produce section. For weeks now, the faddish bags have been on sale for just 250 pennies. The deal with the cookies is they’re wafer thin. Almost chip-like. They’re small enough to pop…
In a small, fenced parcel, presumably somewhere in Texas, two perfectly dressed cowboys wrestle a young calf to the ground. They use their knees to pin the animal to the dirt while a third cowboy holds a thick length of metal in the smoldering coals of a fire in the…
Where does this bridge even go? Why does it have so many names? Is this how I get on the bridge? Why is it so fancy while being a portal to the middle of nowhere? What the hell is the speed limit? Is this a freeway, or a bridge? These…
When Campo in Oak Cliff opened in back November of 2011, the creative modern cuisine at the hands of chef Matt McCallister was widely praised. Yet, three months later when Scott Reitz learned that the Stephan Pyles-trained chef already had his eye on his own project, Retiz asked the question…
Nearly every chicken-fried steak I’ve been served in Dallas has committed a single, fatal sin. Nothing is more upsetting than plunging your fork and knife into the crunchy exterior of a breaded and fried steak only to have the coating slough off in a sheet. See also: – This Week’s…
After my earlier (somewhat sarcastic) rejection of all of Memphis barbecue, I felt I should probably try somewhere that wasn’t Red, Hot and Blue and aim to be remotely fair. As luck would have it, during a New Year road trip we passed through Memphis for a day (en route…
Stephan Pyles latest concept, Stampede 66 (1717 McKinney), opened in early November as an ode to southwestern cuisine from the creator himself. Pyles also helped create much of the Dallas dining scene with an honor-roll of students that studied in his kitchens; like Tim Byers of Smoke, Jeana Johnson of…
Ellen’s Southern Kitchen and I got off to a great start. Sitting at the bar, I had a nice conversation with what seemed like half the restaurant staff. I drank an ice-cold beer while waiting for my entrees and was alerted to the stuffed jalapeños the kitchen was working on…
I’ve been searching for this for quite some time. One of the greatest beverage combinations in the history of mankind (better than both chocolate added to milk, and beer added to hot sauce), is a nice pint of Guinness doctored with a freshly pulled shot of espresso. The flavor combination…
The Loon is a drinker’s bar. Walk in at noon and there will already be a handful of barflies perched on stools and muscling their way through their first stiff drinks — some may even be on their second. A guy to my right during a recent visit pulled a…
Our resident Englishman stumbled across an article in a popular UK newspaper that aimed some snark at what the paper called current food trends. Gavin, who at his present rate of Americanization will soon own an AR-15 and a pickup, took exception to the article’s outlook. An Open Letter to…
While working on my review of Cook Hall, I kept wondering if the restaurant would draw the consistent crowd that eluded Craft. Craft closed earlier this year because of slow sales and a concept that didn’t really suit the neighborhood. Cook Hall swept in to counter these problems with a…
I did an article about various area chain restaurant options a few months back because I was intrigued, as a stranger to these shores, by all the fanciful and mysterious options available to me. I still go to Waffle House all the time, and I don’t care what people think…
Every once in a very long while I like to make believe I have a little something called willpower. And like most other folks on this planet, I get a surge of confidence in my nonexistent willpower right around January 1. See also: Our Best of 2012 Winners Now, I…
It’s hard to sit at the bar at Cook Hall and not feel at least a little disappointment. On its surface the new restaurant, which slipped into the W Hotel earlier this fall, solved many of the problems of its predecessor. Craft was a beautiful place with stunning food. Through…
Not upscale, not pretentious, no cute food. Rodeo Goat’s tagline fits it quite well, even if it does nothing to describe what the restaurant actually is. The Fort Worth burger joint opened at the end of November at the hand of Sam Wynne, the man behind the Meddlesome Moth and…
When our web editor, Nick Rallo, asked me to put together a list of the best food photos I took this year I jumped on the opportunity. “Piece of cake!” I said to him, or maybe that was in my head, but either way I was stoked. I didn’t realize…
This week, out resident smoke-addicted Englishman Gavin visits Fat Cow BBQ and ends up writing about sex, which we notice is cropping up more and more in his posts. Frankly, we’re getting a little concerned about what all this barbecue-love is doing to him psychologically. Luckily, if he ever returns…
Another busy month has come and gone and with it a handful of restaurants have opened. Read on for the full list and be sure to share tips about new and/or dead restaurants in the comments section below or at dish@dallasobserver.com. Openings: Ascension Coffee (1621 Oak Lawn Ave.): The new…
If you want to eat authentic Mexican food, certain aesthetic concessions may be required. The heart and soul of Mexican cooking is built on ground corn and guts. And while some restaurants put up a quaint facade and a freshly painted dining room, if you want to find the best…
