It’s Drinking Week at City of Ate, which means even more stories than usual about our favorite pastime. Check back for more stories about craft beer, killer bartenders and more. I had my first “custom cocktail” about four years ago. I was at new bar in D.C. called The Passenger,…
Dear Steel City Pops, First, I want you to know I love you. On a hot day, one of your fruity pops is the pinnacle of refreshment; I can’t eat it fast enough. An avocado pop, with its creamy tang, would be a treat no matter the weather, and I’m…
Dear Tableside Restaurant Serenade Man, We all have to make a living, I know, but your present vocation is having significantly negative impact on my dining experience. I came out to share a quiet meal with a friend and all I can hear if your incessant thrumming. I can’t recall…
Everyone’s favorite backwards-sunglasses and flaming-shirt enthusiast Guy Fieri revisits DFW this week, sort of, with an hour-long rehash of former Diner, Drive-Ins and Dives episodes that he’s calling “The Legends of Texas” tour, airing all week. As we wrote about in 2012, this means some people’s favorite restaurants, including Cane…
Doritos come in multiple forms and dimensions these days. There’s the two dimensional-like flat chip option, which have been Street Tacoed, nacho cheese explosioned, Tapatioed, and, more recently, contorted into the taco dimension. On the taco axis, Doritos is often filled with “beef” and sour cream and stuff. Now, 7-Eleven…
It’s a tradition as old as pop music itself: A band discovers how much money can be made by crossing over to the pop market and starts crafting softer music accordingly. It has happened to the best of bands. Most of the time, but not always, this occurs when a…
If you haven’t been in a while, there have been a lot of changes at the Design District Thai restaurant Pakpao. Owners Richard and Tiffanee Ellman first got attention when they asked chef Eddie Thretipthuangsin to leave late last year. They said they wanted to make Pakpao a “national brand,”…
Proving that the American workforce is increasingly bored at their desks these days, a $54.75 Starbucks order propelled a Dallas man into Internet fame yesterday. Inspired by a previous unsubstantiated record in which a customer ordered what he called the “Quadriginoctuple Frap,” Twitter user Andrew Chifari strolled into an Uptown…
All week at City of Ate, we celebrate the magic of the taco. Check back for more interviews, essays and maybe a list or two. Or maybe four? If you live in Dallas, you’ve likely shopped at a 7-Eleven, and if you’ve shopped at Dallas’ official convenience store, then you’ve…
It’s that time of year again: Graduations have party-blocked out every May weekend while springtime optimists flock to their favorite blogs to discover soon-to-be summer hits. You know, the kind of hits that stealthily attack radio and multiply like a pop virus. But what about your favorite hip-hop artists from…
All week at City of Ate, we celebrate the magic of the taco. Check back for more interviews, essays and maybe a list or two. Or maybe four? Three or so years ago, when I was driving in a rickety Penske truck with my life’s possessions toward Texas, I knew…
If you’ve never had a Peeps, know this: It’s like eating a tablespoon of sugar lovingly dusted atop a mouthful of your gramma’s cellulite. Pretty sure those are the two main ingredients, just behind yellow dye number gross. This is punishment candy. It’s the equivalent of getting a turd in…
Characteristically, Mad Men bleeds hip-hop. On the surface you may think, “Of course it does, the characters smoke a lot, they drink like there’s no tomorrow, and to them sex is more casual than a handshake.” And while that’s part of the story, it’s a little bit deeper than that…
While Mark Lamster, Patrick Kennedy and others debate how Dallas’ car-centric design is crushing this city, I thought I’d take a brief moment to illuminate how our car addiction is keeping us from what may be the most delicious kolache ever created. Brian Luscher, chef-owner at The Grape, has been…
Pizza Patrón has burned a few more crusts of late. The Dallas-based pizza chain hit a nerve in the nationwide immigration debate with its ongoing pizza-for-pesos program, and grated cotija on the wound by offering free pizza to those who ordered in Spanish, has pissed of puritans from both side…
Earlier this week Yelp published its top 100 restaurants — what it described as a list of “the ultimate, try-before-you-die, food-coma-inducing, so-good-it-makes-you-want-to-slap-your-momma places to eat.” The ranked list seemed to touch on every aspect of American dining, from east coast to west, from downtown to suburban, and from fine dining…
Press PhotoDave Grohl is one of my favorite dudes in the world but he needs to hop off my radar for a minute. I’m a mega Nirvana fan and I’ve always admired Dave for his talent and humor, but lately I can’t seem to get him out of my face…
Thirty years ago this week, The Smiths released their self-titled debut. It arrived at a time when every bass groove, dissonant guitar and echo-ey drum machine rhythm that would become identified with late ’70s and early ’80s post-punk music was at its peak. However, this debut also represented a new…
Electronic music’s recent surge in popularity comes with serious side effects for underground-party aficionados. Suddenly, Daft Punk is winning Grammys, and drunk girls (and guys) are ruining life at 4 a.m. in a warehouse somewhere. By Sarah Stanley-Ayre Take this recent incident: Under a haunting pink hue Dustin Zahn tended…
I’m going to let you in on the secret: I don’t know anything about music that normal adult humans listen to. Avalanches of culture engulf our entire society while I sit in a grubby basement, hunched over a laptop listening to old Motorhead records. However, on occasion, I’m forced to…
Drinks are for drinking, not for chewing. I thought this was obvious. But then I bought a coconut water from the grocery store. “With pulp” it said. “OK, that’s probably like orange juice with pulp,” I replied. I opened the can, took a sip, and that’s when the pulpy can…
Courtesy of the author My parents, three years before I was born.Yes, those are my parents in that picture. Their pet snake, Phallys, is no longer around, and thankfully my Dad has ceased wearing a chain linking a nose ring to his ear. (Click the photo to enlarge it.) But,…
