Outback Steakhouse was an odd choice for my dad’s birthday dinner last Friday. It’s one of those restaurants we, the millennial set, pass all the time but never think about unless we grew up eating there. It’s not a trendy restaurant of the month but a pretty typical casual dining…
Dear Paul, This isn’t easy for either of us. I just want to write about delicious food and where to find it; you just want to enjoy a lucrative public career without the media reminding diners that you allegedly once got high and slammed a woman into the wall in…
Sometimes you make a huge impression when you least expect to. Such was the lesson learned by Dallas indie rock band Motorcade when it ventured down to SXSW in Austin last month. The band’s performances didn’t go as well as its members had hoped — “We thought we were dreadful,”…
David Wilson, sound engineer, venue manager and talent buyer for Double Wide, has always joked about teaching a class on stage etiquette. Hopefully, enough people will read this, and he won’t have to. “Don’t piss off the sound guy.” It’s a pretty common mantra in nearly every music scene. Most…
Jack White, who has two upcoming shows at The Bomb Factory, is one of the few musicians implementing stricter phone policies in their live shows through the services of Yondr. Yondr, a company based in San Francisco, uses mobile cases to lock the phones of audience members as they enter…
Titus Andronicus has been specializing in punk solutions since 2005, but an entirely different punk rock experience is in store for listeners Friday night at the Ridglea Room in Fort Worth. At the beginning of the year, Titus Andronicus surprised fans with the announcement of a new album, A Productive Cough,…
If you ever find yourself drunk in a tattoo parlor, just stop. Take a moment and stop what you’re doing. Or if you ever find yourself at the mercy as a newbie tattoo artist with an at-home tattoo machine, walk away. Please. Just walk away. These Dallas musicians know a…
I can tell you all about the delicious things I used to eat as the daughter of Chinese-Taiwanese immigrants. I can tell you how deeply comforting they were, and how masterful of a home cook my mom was. I can tell you how our house always smelled of the deep…
It’s been three months since Dallas’ KVIL-FM 103.7 switched formats. Long known as Amp 103.7, the station specialized in Top 40 playlists before a November rebrand turned the frequency into an alternative rock format dubbed Alt 103.7 — “DFW’s New Alternative.” For a listening audience still reeling from the 2016…
Allegations of sexual assault and sordid cover-ups are shaking the American restaurant industry. Mario Batali is facing a reckoning for years of alleged foul behavior toward nearly every woman in his path; New Orleans celebrity chef John Besh faces accusations of fostering a culture of sexual predation; James Beard-winning restaurateur…
When you’re a food critic, a lot of your research involves maps. Every few weeks, I scroll around Google Maps hunting for new restaurants to review, clicking on every orange fork-and-knife icon along the streets of Dallas and its suburbs. Reviews have resulted from Google Maps finds. On Jan. 2,…
This week, an ornate box landed on my desk. Inside was an even more ornate box, a box with heft and gold accents and rich blue velvet lining. Inside that box: a gold enamel stationery set with an enamel invitation to a party at the forthcoming Bullion restaurant. Bullion, led…
Last week, Dallas Morning News food critic Leslie Brenner published an article on the state of Mexican dining in Dallas. It’s a worthwhile read and, in part, I agree with it. After all, the basic thesis is: “Wouldn’t it be cool if Dallas were a leader in modern Mexican fine…
It all started innocently enough. One taco restaurateur took to Facebook to accuse another of attempting to poach his employee, and the other denied the charge. Then – mostly with light hearts – they issued an escalating series of taco challenges. But of course, Dallas foodies couldn’t leave well enough…
Dallas dining is becoming notorious, but not necessarily for good things. There’s the “fickle 500,” diners who patronize the new and the now only to disappear from dining rooms once a restaurant’s six months of fame are up. We’re famous for jumping on the bandwagon later than other cities; what’s…
If you’re into poke, the Hawaiian marinated raw fish and vegetable dish that is more properly eaten under a beach cabana than in a suburban Texas strip mall, then you’ve been having a pretty good few months. In DFW, the number of new fast-casual poke places is staggering: FreshFin on…
When you approach Nikkei, it feels almost like a secret — nothing but a blue door and a small neon sign to alert you to the entrance tucked next to Coal Vines in Uptown. As you walk up the stairs into the restaurant, your eyes follow colorful walls adorned with floor-to-ceiling Japanese-inspired…
We’ve already celebrated some of the best tacos, best burgers and best food in general that we ate in 2016. But not every meal was so happy. As cosmic payback for having the coolest job on the planet, food writers occasionally have to eat things that are truly terrible. From overcooked…
If you’ve found yourself in a Chili’s dining room, hopefully you took the opportunity, first, to reevaluate the string of life choices that led you to your seat at the wobbly high top or in the sinking seat in a booth. Then notice that the restaurant chain is involved in…
Backyard on Bell opened this month, doubling Denton’s combination bar/food truck park options. Located on the corner of Bell and McKinney (formerly Ken’s Produce), Backyard on Bell offers a few things Austin Street Truck Stop lacks, mainly green space and the overall sense that you’re eating a convenient meal under…
The biggest news of the day is that H-E-B, the beloved Texas grocery chain, has purchased six Sun Fresh Market stores, The Dallas Morning News reports. It’s not clear yet whether the independent grocery chain will open full-blown H-E-Bs or stick to Central Markets, the expensive gourmet offshoot that’s already peppered…
After the humble taco stand Trompo was named one of Bon Appetit’s 50 Best New Restaurants in America, a Redditor named Thrill_of_life turned their nose up at the $1.85 cost of Trompo’s tacos: “Too expensive in my opinion, bet they’re also going to raise the price.” Another Redditor, signel, agreed:…
