100 Favorite Dishes, No. 82: Rhubarb-Avocado Huarache at Flora Street Cafe

Leading up to September's Best of Dallas® 2017 issue, we're sharing (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes, the Dallas entrées, appetizers and desserts that really stuck with us this year. Flora Street Cafe, the Arts District’s bold venture into a modern Texas cuisine, has spent 2017 dialing into...

By Brian Reinhart

May 30, 2017

Flora Street Cafe serves a spring salad of rhubarb and avocado, plus creamy salsa verde, all on a huarache. Brian Reinhart

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Leading up to September's Best of Dallas® 2017 issue, we're sharing (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes, the Dallas entrées, appetizers and desserts that really stuck with us this year.

Flora Street Cafe, the Arts District’s bold venture into a modern Texas cuisine, has spent 2017 dialing into the local flavors of the season. One springtime dish that captures that philosophy was an appetizer of lamb belly that appeared in early April. Seared until ultra-crisp on the outsides, still juicy throughout, the lamb was a heck of a morsel of meat.

But maybe more indicative of the creativity that drives chef de cuisine Peter Barlow and his mentor/boss, Stephan Pyles, was what came with the lamb. It’s a miniature huarache, the sandal-shaped Mexican masa base commonly topped with beans, meats, onions and cheeses. (For a pretty good traditional take, try Tortas La Hechizera or Mi Lindo Oaxaca.) At Flora Street, this seasonal treatment arrived with morsels of avocado and rhubarb, plus a thicker, creamier spin on salsa verde made with spring peas. Sound strange? Maybe. But the fruits and savory salsa formed a refreshing spring salad with just-off-the-farm flavor, and the huarache added the crunch needed to keep things grounded.

The dish is probably gone now. On the other hand, its replacement, whatever that might be, stands a good chance of being just as satisfying.

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Brian Reinhart has been the Dallas Observer's food critic since spring 2016. In addition, he writes baseball analysis for the Hardball Times and covers classical music for the Observer and MusicWeb International.

Contact: Brian Reinhart

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