Cookbook Author and Culinary Anthropologist Diana Kennedy Dies at 99 in Mexico
Throughout her fifty-year career, the English-born cook influenced—and even advised—chefs of some of Texas’s best Mexican restaurants.
Patricia Sharpe grew up in Austin and holds a master’s degree in English from the University of Texas at Austin. After working as a teacher (in English and Spanish) and at the Texas Historical Commission (writing historical markers), she joined the staff of Texas Monthly, in 1974. Initially, she edited the magazine’s cultural and restaurant listings and wrote a consumer feature called Touts. Eventually she focused exclusively on food. Her humorous story “War Fare,” an account of living for 48 hours on military MRE’s (Meals Ready to Eat), was included in the anthology Best Food Writing 2002. Many of her stories appear in the 2008 UT Press collection, Texas Monthly on Food. In 2006 her story about being a restaurant critic, titled “Confessions of a Skinny Bitch,” won a James Beard Foundation award for magazine food writing.
Sharpe has contributed to Gourmet, Bon Appétit, Saveur, and the New York Times. She writes a regular restaurant column, Pat’s Pick, for Texas Monthly.
Throughout her fifty-year career, the English-born cook influenced—and even advised—chefs of some of Texas’s best Mexican restaurants.
Named for the ancient symbol used to ward off danger, the Houston restaurant fuses traditional and modern Israeli cuisine to miraculous effect.
And the two-time James Beard Award winner has brought the same dynamic Southern fare that made the Grey, in Savannah, a destination restaurant.
After a diversity scandal in 2020, the Oscars of the restaurant industry upgraded its standards. A bar in Houston, a taqueria in Austin, and Texas Monthly taco editor José Ralat are among the first winners under the new system.
With 15,000 square feet, three private dining rooms, and one tequila sommelier, this Dallas restaurant is as lavish as it gets.
“We are just scratching the surface of what we can learn about Texas food,” says Wild Oats chef Nick Fine.
Texas Monthly remembers Jim Darilek, an early art director who helped give the magazine its characteristic look and swagger.
The enterprising duo behind Black Cur honors their late dog with truly sublime dishes.
A popular columnist embeds herself inside the exclusive world of girls’ summer camps.
Restaurants are still struggling, yet new places keep stepping up to the plate. Here are our favorite dishes from the most impressive rookie establishments.
Patio dining has become a necessity during the pandemic. Here are some of the best places to get your alfresco on.
Despite everything, new restaurants are still opening. Here are a few we’re looking forward to this year.
Austin restaurant Birdie’s has perfected the art of serving $32 steaks to patrons who wait in line to order.
The menu at Roots Southern Table in Farmers Branch offers gumbo, fried chicken, and riffs on Italian rice balls and West African street food.
At his latest restaurant, Texas’s most celebrated Mexican chef teams up with close relations to revisit the street food of his youth.
This exceptional Mexican restaurant has expanded into a larger space without shrinking any of its ambitions.
With delta infections surging and local governments unable to enforce mask regulations, restaurant personnel have become reluctant de facto enforcers.
Over a career spanning three decades, Griffith chronicled the evolution of Texas from a culinary backwater to a major player on the national scene.
Rarely does a museum’s restaurant rival its galleries, but this addition to Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts is poised to take its place among the masters.
The magazine honors Fermín Núñez, the chef behind Austin’s Suerte, for the second time.
And he got there with help from family, some encouragement from Anthony Bourdain, and a fortuitous ride on the New York subway.
From South Texas’s simple ocelot culverts to San Antonio’s pioneering land bridge, these passageways can reduce car accidents and help animals thrive.
With a lush setting and a vegetable-forward menu, the showcase restaurant of the Commodore Perry Estate, Texas’s only Auberge Resort, has Austinites crashing the garden gates.
Crispy beef tacos or duck leg confit? The menu at Tony Luhrman’s taqueria is full of surprises.
It took decades of persistence in the restaurant industry for Mexican food to get the respect it deserves, says Mariano Martinez.
Here’s to Mariano Martinez, the inventor of the world’s first frozen margarita machine.
With a new restaurant and farm, Sonya Cote and David Barrow hope to spread their magic a little farther east.
Here are more than two dozen Texas restaurants that we’re excited to try in 2021.
Remembering just a few of the restaurants that have closed across Texas in the past year.
For the 20th edition of Where to Eat Now, we’ve compiled some of our favorite takeout options from places that opened in 2020.
Holt’s partner, Trina Nishimura, who was the beverage director at the beloved ramen shop, shares their story with Texas Monthly.
After her four decades of dining across Texas came to a halt in the pandemic, Pat Sharpe realizes that what makes a meal special goes way beyond the food.
For decades, his elegant flagship restaurant, Tony’s, was the place to see and be seen.
Kevin Fink, Chris Shepherd, and others are lobbying lawmakers to pass the $120 billion grant program that has bipartisan support.
Chefs and owners have had to adapt quickly and nimbly, with takeout, meal kits, booze to go, and reconfigured dining spaces. Will it be enough to survive?
Merlin Tuttle has spent his career dispelling myths about bats. Now he’s defending them once again.
Anvil Bar & Refuge is still in the running for Outstanding Bar Program. Meanwhile, GQ recognizes two Texas restaurants.
Where restaurant and bar employees can get free or discounted meals in Texas cities.
By Patricia Sharpe and Lawson Freeman
Chef Jason Dady, down to two restaurants from six, helps feed laid-off hospitality workers almost daily. ”I wake up every morning at seven o’clock, check the news, and go make thirty gallons of soup.”
From foundations like Southern Smoke to national and local charity efforts, here's a list of resources for an industry crippled by the coronavirus.
By Patricia Sharpe and Jessica Dupuy
A bartender, chef, and owner tell us their stories.
From the team behind Emmer & Rye, this new Austin restaurant is a work of hearth.
The state has a record 39 contenders in the restaurant industry's biggest awards, including 20 for the debut category of Best Chef: Texas.
The 65-year-old Brownsville restaurant specializes in traditional underground pit-smoked cows’ heads.
Where to eat now: At many of the state’s best new restaurants, chefs have turned away from the fusion and eclecticism of recent years to focus on one cuisine (and do it really, really well).
Set in a beguiling bungalow, this meat-centric restaurant makes you feel right at home.
After working at such restaurants as Pujol, in Mexico City, chef Edgar Rico brings his masa talents to East Austin.
After years of successful pop-ups in Dallas, chef Justin Holt opens a spot that’s an homage to these two Japanese dishes.
When eating here, you can do far more with your money than enjoy great food and drinks.
Almost nothing is as it seems at the new Spanish restaurant from the team behind BCN Taste & Tradition.