Best Expression of the Mundane 2007 | Craft Dallas' Swiss Chard | Best of Dallas® 2020 | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Dallas | Dallas Observer
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Best Expression of the Mundane

Craft Dallas' Swiss Chard

It's a gangly, lowly beast with a thick crunchy stalk and curled, rippled leaves. It was once honored by the Greeks and Romans for its medicinal attributes, a weed that calms with spinach essence even as it teases with a pungency followed by a fierce, if tiny, lick of salt. In the hands of the Craft magicians this natural militancy is wrung out and somehow coaxed into harmony. Have it sautéed. The leaves are blanched and chilled before they're heated in olive oil in which garlic has been sautéed. Leaves are cooked until the leaf edges are slivery crisps. This is compelling simplicity, a kind of nourishment that if finished as a child earned you dessert with two scoops. At Craft, eating it is its own reward.

Best Fancy Restaurant

French Room in The Adolphus Hotel

Despite its title, there is very little French in the French Room—save for the furiousness of its kitchen technique. It's more of an Italian-New York mash deliciously henpecked with Asian pinches and California thumbprints. The glory of it, aside from the paunchy flushed cherubs romping among the ceiling clouds and the gilded arches and explosive floral formations teasing the chandeliers and the greenish marble floor, is how the plates launch the senses into transcendence. Steam coiling and licking from the plate is enough to make you drool. Every thin smear of coulis or gastrique, every smudge of gelee, every emulsion stain, is of the perfect texture and temperature. Every protein—fish, scallop, fowl, meat and the decadent-and-soon-to-be-banned-at-a-PC-automaton-restaurant-near-you foie gras is as impeccable and ample as the cherub love handles in the cloud puffs. So you know the service will knock you dead. But you're in heaven. So it's OK.

Best Foie Gras

Craft Dallas

You may likely encounter a different version of this embattled dish (foie gras has been banned in Chicago and California) as the Craft menu is a living document. Our fowl liver delicacy was roasted and rested in gooseberry gastrique, ornamented with tiny crouton-like cubes tumbled across its surface. It's served in a dual-handled metal roasting implement with the lobe occupying the center. Berries and a few bright green herbs are strewn here and there. It's packed with glory, delicate and texturally perfect with a slightly leathery veneer embracing the velvety cream within. The slight sting of the gooseberry cuts and eases the weight of the richness, scrubbing the palate for the next forkful—all of this from a lowly filtration organ that spits bile. The beauty of Craft foie gras is that it has none of the cumbersome culinary baubles and blings often used to dress up this gland—the heavy fruits and thick port reductions, the mounds of greens that bury it, the thick brioche or potatoes. It's just there in a pot, stark naked, hiding behind a few berries, the garden of culinary Eden before the politico snakes began to attack with their numbskull prohibitions.

Best Fried Catfish

Alligator Caf�

The whole fried catfish at Alligator Café never ceases to inspire envy in other diners who didn't have the sense to order it. First, it's large. The breading is perfect: fried golden cornmeal so fresh and crisp the meat inside is still steaming. Dip each yummy piece in cocktail sauce, tartar sauce or alligator sauce. Just when you think you've gotten all the juicy morsels, you discover there's a whole 'nother side o' fish to tackle. The catfish basket comes with crispy French fries too. If you are really feeling frisky, go on Friday or Saturday night when the Alligator Café has live music. Close your eyes and you could be in Lafayette Parish.

Best Fried Chicken

Celebration

We know: You like Bubba's, and they're great and all. But we just can't love a place that once somehow charged us $1 per organ for an order of chicken livers. What were they fried in, rendered unicorn fat? So give us Celebration. For around $11 bucks, we get fresh bread and muffins, all we can eat of juicy-not-greasy chicken, plus three sides or the freshest veggies available. The coating is crispy but not oil-sodden and we swear they must either marinate or brine, because the taste of herbs comes steaming out of the meat. All this is served in a comfy warren of wooden booths and tree-shaded patios by some of the friendliest servers in the city. (Scary friendly, sometimes. Really, can anyone be that cheerful on a Sunday afternoon after the post-church rush?) Compare them to the surly bunch occasionally found behind the counter at other chicken shacks. The folks at Celebration seem like they're actually celebrating something, or maybe they're just glad they're not the ones standing over the fryer.

Best Fries

The Oceanaire Seafood Room

They retain just enough heat from the hot oil. Piled high into a berm, these are thin fries, house-cut, desperately crisp; some golden, some bronze, some with mahogany tips. Sea salt covers them like scalp flakes on Brooks Brothers. You pick up a little tuber sweetness on the attack, but it's quickly cleansed by a gentle whoosh of vinegar that invigorates the palate, resetting it for more. Hence the addiction. That little vinegar trounce is also why they mate so well with fish—fish and frites. They go well with oysters too.

Best Greasy Spoon

Barbec's

Barbec's may have cheesy décor, but you gotta love a non-chain restaurant where you can eat breakfast any time of day. There's not really anything low-fat or healthy here, but what's that old saying, "Eat breakfast like a king"? Well, we figure that still applies, whether breakfast is the first or fourth meal of the day. The beer-batter biscuits are a must, but hey, scoop a mess o' eggs and ham on there too, wouldya? We still have some unclogged arteries.

Best Greek Restaurant

Ziziki's

An original pick this is not; our readers anoint Ziziki's just about every year, and that's because it feels and tastes like upscale Greek, with attention lavished on top-notch ingredients, inventive touches, a warm atmosphere and polished service. This isn't your stereotypical Greek joint with gyros—they aren't even on the menu here—and laminated travel posters on the wall. The Preston Road location is our favorite, with its warm browns and yellows and sleek but non-stuffy décor. Lamb is the way to go here: The rack of lamb, grilled and nestled in a pool of red wine-and-oregano-accented gravy, is possibly the best in town. Super-tender, gently flavored lamb can also be found in the souvlaki and stuffed lamb loin, a special. Ziziki's has modestly upscale prices as well. So if you're looking for traditional favorites prepared the usual way, pick someplace cheaper. This is Greek cuisine for the gourmand.

Best Hamburger

Burger House

We've been to 'em all: Snuffer's (every one), Scotty P's (Plano location, legendary), Chip's, Twisted Root, Adair's, Who's Who, Balls, even Perry's, since a honest-to-goddamned steakhouse is where a real man oughta get a burger every now and again. And on any given night, any one of them's the best in town; hell of a place we live, where someone's best burger is a legit contender from any corner. But some of us old farts around here are feeling nostalgic, surrounded as we are by newcomers for whom "classic" is an imported Steak & Shake, so we're digging out a classic here, a 56-year-old institution where son and father and grandfather can bond over a $3.70 double cheeseburger, a basket of the special-seasoning fries (best in town, till death do us part) and a "real" cherry coke. The Burger House, we call it "Jack's," 'cause we've been around, has five locations now, one in Austin (no foolin'), but the Snider Plaza location is our fave. Meat just tastes better in Highland Park, most likely.

Best Handcrafted Food

Twisted Root Burger Co.

We were sad to see that the elk sausage and fried mac 'n' cheese were off the menu on our last visit to Twisted Root, but you can still get a buffalo burger and sweet potato chips (with a dusting of cinnamon), which are tops on our list. Pretty much everything is handmade here, including the mustard and ketchup. And if you're adventurous enough to drink cinnamon banana root beer, they've got that too (they change the root beer flavor on a regular basis). And don't be offended if they call you Hugh Jass or Dr. Evil—they're just letting you know your hot-off-the-grill burger is ready.

Best Of Dallas®

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