How To Shuck Oysters Like a Champ

Oysters may be nature’s most perfect food. They’re rich and sensual and best served with little intervention: freshly opened and raw, with a few drops of liquid sunshine from a lemon. But April is here, and while oysters can safely be harvested in northern waters year round, Texas oyster season…

Union Bear Brings Farm-to-Table to the Bar

If you’re perched at the outdoor section of the bar at Union Bear on a warm spring day, you may just catch some sunshine on the nape of your neck while you sip on an Anchor Steam draft. Or perhaps a crisp Albarino is more your taste: The Spanish grapes…

An Ode to Chinese Pastries (and a Place to Get Good Ones)

When you think of Chinese food, you think of General Tso’s Chicken, Kung Pao Beef, Pork Fried Rice and a Cinnabun for dessert, because you are most likely in a food court. You don’t, however, think about pastries. Unless you’re Chinese. Growing up, my Chinese mother would always tuck into…

Here’s the Rangers’ $26 Hot Dog

Remember when Oscar Mayer came out with the “bun-length” hot dog? They ran a series of commercials featuring white-bread Americans at cook outs wondering what to do with that bit of bun remained after they’d taken the last hot dog bite. This will not be a problem with the new…

Meatless Monday At Freebirds Is Highly Stressful

I was out running errands in the Old Town shopping center at Lovers and Greenville when I found myself hungrily eyeing the guinea pigs on display at Petsmart. Alarmed by my newfound taste for small domesticated mammals, I checked my watch and realized it was 4 o’clock and all I’d…

Rice Bowl’s Menu Writes Checks Its Food Can’t Cash

Rice Bowl Express, 11419 Garland Road, is fast and cheap. How could Cheap Bastard not love it? By eating there, unfortunately. Times I was like, “Is that a hooker? Yes. Is that also a hooker? Yes.”: 12 Trucks in the Fiesta Mart parking lot next door count: 21 I’ve driven…

Years Later, Sea Breeze is Still (Lobster) Rolling

The first lobster roll I ever ate was purchased in a run-down seafood restaurant on Route 12, 60 miles outside of Boston, in a town called Fitchburg. I’d seen the sign on my way to a wedding in New Hampshire: “Lobsters, $3.99 a pound,” it read, and it sat next…

Tei-An’s Ramen Is My Favorite Bowl Of Soup

I have no excuse for taking so long to write about this glorious ramen bowl. The soup had been recommended to me numerous times, but the chatter only got louder when I laid into Private Social’s version a whole back. So I ducked in Tei-An for a late meal after…

Dairy-ette Is Like Stepping Back to 1956, Only Not as Uptight and Boring

(This week, Cheap Bastard hits Dairy-ette (9785 Ferguson Road, 214-327-9983) and finds something better than Sonic and Whataburger. For that kind of digging, we’re thinking of moving her to investigations.) Ceiling leaks: 2 (size large) People actually reading the whole newspaper: 3 Dairy-ette is like a Sonic. Only better. Their…

A Visual Guide to a Proper Irish Breakfast

Mark Cuban has caused me to completely rediscover St. Patrick’s Day. Gratuitous party-givers with no strings attached plays well into the whole theme of “friendliest day of the year.” So I tracked down my favorite Irish lass, Theresa Magee, earlier this week to have her show me how to make…

303 Bar and Grill’s Psycho Burger

While the big restaurant money continues to flow north toward Highland Park, Preston Hollow and Uptown, Dallas’ most interesting restaurant scene continues to slowly grow and diversify on the other side of the river. Lucia brings five-star Italian and Campo offers ravioli stuffed with brains. Hattie’s updates Southern comfort, giving…