Pat’s Pick
Pat's Pick
Pat's Pick
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HORSING AROUND My latest favorite spot for a cheap date is Pegaso Café Mexicano y Taquería, a bustling eat-and-run place in the heart of Dallas' downtown financial district. At breakfast and lunch, this retro-hip creation of local restaurateur Monica Greene is all business. You line up, place your entrée and drink order with one of the efficient counteristas, pay with a ten, and—likely as not—get change back. Then you settle in at one of the nifty aluminum-topped tables or at the long bar spanning the front window. In less time than it takes to check the condition of your portfolio in the Wall Street Journal or on your Palm Pilot, a runner shows up with your food. Given that Pegaso—named for Dallas' beloved city symbol, the winged horse Pegasus—is a sibling of Ciudad, it's no surprise that the food is stylishly presented. The shrimp cocktail came in a cool parfait glass brimming with small bay shrimp in a lusty red sauce, a twist on the classic Vuelva a la Vida (Return to Life) mixed-seafood cocktail. Pungent green olives and capers boosted the tomato sauce on sautéed tilapia filets a la veracruzana. I'll try Pegaso's new dinner menu the next time I fly up to Dallas. PATRICIA SHARPE
Season's Eatings
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FIRE AND ICE Autumn will arrive on September 23 and fall fashions have been in the stores forever, but as usual, the thermometer might as well be hanging in a sauna. What to do? Have the season-spanning drink known as an affogato—a shot of espresso poured over a scoop of gelato. This Italian treat can be found in Austin at Babbo's, a new centrally located spot with a fireplace on its shady patio. In the clean-lined interior, you can get coffee drinks from Italian and American artisan roasters as well as some 35 homemade gelati and sorbetti (we're hooked on the chocolate truffle and the lemon). At Talenti, in Dallas, sip and dip on cushy leather sofas while looking out on a walking trail that skirts the Highland Park neighborhood. For extra voltage, try this new place's javatini, made with milk, coffee-flavored gelato, and a jolt of espresso. Houston's Nundini Farms supplies that city's best restaurants with its excellent Italian ice creams and coffees; it will supply you too at its no-frills Nundini Food Store in the North Shepherd warehouse area. If the word "affogato" doesn't ring a bell, just explain and they'll make one pronto. PATRICIA SHARPE
Word of Mouth
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A GOOD SIGN After preparing for an academic career, Houston native Scott Tycer decided instead to do what he loved: cook. He set his sights on owning his own restaurant by age thirty, a feat he accomplished by thirty and a half. Three years later, Aries is thriving in Houston, and Tycer is garnering acclaim: Food & Wine recently named him one of this year's ten best new American chefs. (David Bull, of Austin's Driskill Grill, was also honored. See Texas Monthly, August 2003)
What drew you to haute cuisine?
The craftsmanship in it. In literature there are layers and layers of meaning that you pull from the words. It's the same with a dish or a menu. The ingredients and seasonings are like words; they're the building blocks. But you've got to really think about how the dishes relate to each other and the season of the year. That's how you compose your menu.
You once worked with Wolfgang Puck at Spago in Palo Alto, California—what did you learn from him?
That the real cooking is done in the chef's head. I hadn't worked in such a disciplined kitchen before, and in that environment, you can't do things randomly. You have to plan. That's 98 percent of what cooking is about. The appearance of the dish when it goes to the table—the colors and rim garnishing—that's maybe 2 percent.
Why did you name your restaurant Aries?
My wife, Annika, and I had a list of about three hundred potential names, and every time we'd agree on one, five minutes later we would hate it. But it turns out we are both Aries, and we've always liked those kitschy little horoscope descriptions of what an Aries is—energetic and focused and a little bit stubborn, in the sense of insisting that things be done a certain way. And I think that describes the restaurant perfectly. STACY HOLLISTER
My Library
