“Many Texas barbecue fanatics have a strong belief in the beneficial properties of accumulated grease.”
—Calvin Trillin, The New Yorker

“If God dwells inside us, like some people say, I sure hope He likes enchiladas, because that’s what He’s getting.”
—Jack Handey, Deep Thoughts

“Let me tell you about food. Food is brown and white and not crinkly. OK, it’s orange sometimes—if it’s cheese. Maybe maroon—if it’s pinto beans. I’ll give you two kinds of green. Lettuce green—and none of that Bibb or romaine shit—and dark green for green beans, which you cook in lard if you don’t have a ham bone or a slab of bacon around.”
—Dan Jenkins, You Call It Sports, But I Say It’s a Jungle Out There

“Texas does not, like any other region, simply have indigenous dishes. It proclaims them. It congratulates you, on your arrival, at having escaped from the slop-pails of the other forty-nine states.”
–Alistair Cooke, Letters from America: 1946–2004

“Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas without eating a chicken-fried steak.”
—Larry McMurtry, In a Narrow Grave