Jaymes

Buy the very best ingredients - and there IS a difference. My earliest "cooking years," thought that one supermarket chicken is like all chickens; one can of tomatoes is like all cans; salt is salt is salt - that kind of thing. But then began figuring out that is so far from the truth as to be laughable. An expensive and inconvenient revelation from which there is no recovery.

Wow. THIS is impressive. Eh, Varmint???

It's show biz, Folks. And the 'stars' of the show, the ones that can keep the audience entertained, always make more. The BOH, for the most part, is just work. The front is show biz all the way. All three of my children at one time or another worked summers as waitstaff. And after I explained this truism to them -- and we worked on their 'acts' a little -- their tips tripled. Fair or not. That's what it comes down to. (In fact, isn't there an old joke that goes, "An elderly waiter was asked by his family if he was EVER going to retire; and he said, 'What, and quit show biz??!'")

My favorite summer treat, too, is a 'mater sammich. In fact, back when I was preggers, there were months at a stretch when that was all I was interested in eating. Funny, isn't it, how something so good was considered to be poisonous for so long. Thank goodness that nightmarish hell is over!!

Miracle Whip?

I say take some vodka and the fixin's and turn it into a lively pre-meal libation... Like a Bullshot, or add tomato juice and make a: Sitting Bull - 1 1/4 oz Vodka - 2 oz V-8 - 2 oz Beef Broth To Taste: - Celery Salt - Tobasco - A-1 Steak Sauce - Worchestershire Sauce - Pepper (fresh ground)

Excellent question. I buy my bread at CM, but am also interested in this. Also - I like the bolillos at Fiesta.

Marinade - a lot of this depends on how long you'll have here. If you only can do one 'cue place - I'd suggest Smitty's. But other greats are Louie Mueller's in Taylor and City Market in Luling. Cooper's in LLano has always been one of the best, but lately folks say it's gone sadly downhill - a victim of its own success. And good suggestion, NYT, about the Driskill. The Hotel, the bar, and the Grill will certainly be prime places to congregate. And high praise indeed for David Bull to be named one of the Top Ten Best New Chefs in the US by Food & Wine. That's at the head of my list for places to try, for sure.

I read your post about Latin food on the PA board, and in Austin, one place I really think you should check out is Fonda San Miguel. Like any restaurant, the quality varies from year to year as the staff and/or focus changes, but this place has been mentioned as being one of the best examples of "interior Mexico" food in the nation. With your obvious interest in Latin cuisine, I'd put it at the top of your "don't miss" list. Another place I really enjoy is the Cafe at Four Seasons. For one thing, I just love that hotel. It's not really huge - and in fact has an intimate feel, I think. They've made an effort to "localize" the place - so that when you walk into the lobby, you don't feel like you're in just any Four Seasons anywhere. The bar right off of the lobby will be a gathering spot for ACL attendees, as it always is for Austin entertainment conferences and visiting celebs. That's where Brad began romancing Jennifer Anniston, so we locals were all "in the know" even before Gweneth realized Brad was hers no more. The Cafe is downstairs, and it is always at the top of the "best local restaurants" lists. It is a beautiful location, too, right by the river. The patio out from the Cafe is an excellent place to watch the bats fly from the Congress Street bridge - another Austin "don't miss." I've had many excellent meals at the Cafe - but two things stick in my mind. The Lobster Bisque is heaven in a bowl; and the Mixed Hill Country Grill - a selection of meats native to the Texas Hill Country - was outstanding, and that's the only place I've ever seen it offered. Of course, the menu offerings rotate according to season, so don't know what they'll have at any given time. Another good place to look for information, I noticed, is on eGullet under the "NY'er in Austin" thread. That person hit some of our real top spots. Including Lockhart. You just must, MUST go to Lockhart for BBQ. And regardless as to which of the Lockhart "big three" (Smitty's, Kreuz's, Black's) you choose for your meal, at least go to Smitty's to walk through the building. Don't know how much you know about BBQ in Texas - so I may be telling you old news - but the best 'cue in Central Texas started with German immigrants years ago. These men missed the smoked meats and sausages of their homeland so they went into the business here - establishing meat markets and butcher shops in the little towns where they settled. Texas, of course, is now and was then cattle country, so it wasn't long before they were smoking beef along with the sausages and other pork products. Because they were meat markets, they just sold meat - no BBQ sauce, no sides. But workers would come in from the fields and order a pound of smoked brisket or sausage or whatever, and they'd get it just like you'd expect to get it from a meat market - sliced, unadorned, laid upon a piece of butcher paper. The workmen would take the meat and sit outside under the trees and eat it, usually accompanied with some crackers and bottles of Tobasco or Tapatio or other hot sauce. These places were not restaurants. They didn't offer potato salad or cole slaw or beans or sauce or plates or knives or forks. Just meat. They saw it as a huge advance in customer service to have a basket of crackers available at checkout. One of the most successful of these old markets was Kreuz's in Lockhart. There was a family squabble a couple years back, and the son that had inherited the Kreuz's family business and name got into an argument with the daughter that had inherited the Kreuz's family building. The upshot was that the son built a new building and moved the business into it, and the daughter remained in the old building, renaming it Smitty's. Walking through that old Kreuz's Meat Market building, now Smitty's, is like visiting a holy temple of BBQ. So whatever else you do, you should go there. Park in the back - in the gravel parking lot. Walk in through the back door (everybody does). It's like walking into history. Absolutely not to be missed. And for good "local, downhome cooking," we've lately discovered Tony's Soul Food. We've all decided it's better than Hoover's and Threadgill's. But since you're in the music biz, I have to say that the original Threadgill's, on Lamar, is an interesting place. And Wednesday is still "open mike night" for local musicians. I always take my out-of-town company there. As I've said elsewhere on these boards, history and ambiance count for me. And that restaurant used to be a gas station on the old Dallas Highway out of Austin. In the late 30's and early 40's, my dad would stop there to fill up his car with "good Gulf Gasoline" on his way north to Dallas to court my mother. We are having an Austin eG get-together in September, but it's probably going to be around the first of the month and as I recall, the ACL festival is more toward the end, so that undoubtedly won't coincide. Austin has a small but very lively and extremely knowledgeable bunch of eGulleteers. You'll get lots of good info!

All right. I'll admit it. My name is Jaymes and I like the Salt Lick. Yes, it's a stop on the Tourist Bus trail. Yes, it's probably gone downhill since it began focusing on quanity rather than quality. Is it on my "Top Three"? No. "Top Five"? Maybe. I like it. Just shoot me now why don'cha.

Will do. But, you really should post something in the Southwest Forum about your upcoming visit! It'll get all of us Austin EG'ers totally excited. Of course, we excite easily.

Wow. What a post. Sadly, not my part of the country, but still... Good job, Marinade!!

Although maybe you COULD work it into the golf tournament somehow... Perhaps a special prize for a "hole in one"?

Jas - Re the "wish it had been a little spicier" thing... When eating Mexican food, just ask for some salsa or sliced jalapenos - that's how the rest of us control the "picante" to suit our personal taste. And thanks so much for letting us know how it went. It's so discouraging when you give advice to folks and never hear a word!

THAT sounds interesting, Can you provide more back gound? Are we talking aged and concentrated beefy texture? Mexicans tend not to age beef, so this could be a big-time find. "Cecina" is not so much "aged" beef, like we think of it; but rather, dried beef, just as Sibley says. Often, after the drying process it is shredded, whereupon it is called "machaca" and used for tacos, enchiladas, etc. In Tucson, there are several Mexican restaurants that specialize in this kind of dried, shredded beef and as you approach the restaurants, if you look up you can see the cages on the roof where the beef is hanging - drying in the sun.

I'm making these tomorrow, after I hit the Grand Mart today. Thanks Jaymes! Terrific! If you don't care for them, please PM me and we can discuss it. But if, on the other hand, you're just crazy about them, please feel free to brag on me right here!!

Again, I'm no expert and hope that you are correct and I am incorrect, but I believe that in fact he moved to Spain, primarily because the majority of the French treat him so poorly.

Wow. Twinkie Tiramisu. That'd be worth a lot just for the name factor alone!!

And I know exactly why.... But you're not talking about how you want to prepare live lobster for YOUR dinner party - You're trying to help your buddy sell his frozen lobster. So I'd go with (as I said) en casserole types of things. Like Lobster Thermidor and Lobster Crepes, etc....

For that market (and given the quality of frozen lobster), I'd go with one of the "lobster in casserole" types of dishes - Lobster Thermidor comes immediately to mind.

Never mind. What's up with you? I didn't say I was gonna get it on with every woman along the way. Okay, well then REALLY never mind.

I used to live in Tucson - about 40 miles west of The Thing. So it amused me to give people, who were driving from the east to visit me, directions from The Thing. As in "after you reach 'The Thing,' go 38 miles to exit #122, then right...etc." Tickled me no end. Omigosh, The THING!! Jaymes and mcdowell, I thought my two sisters and I were the only people who would openly admit having stopped there! Amazing. My first visit, I fair to collapsed on the ground in a sodden heap of laughter -- and that was on the walkway lined with fantasia wood animal sculptures, before we even got inside the, er, um, The Thing. X (if I may call you that) - Do you remember some years back when there was this kind of short dumpy woman and she was married to this 6'5" glangly guy - typical tall skinny dude, big hands, big feet, big Adam's apple - And they both decided to get sex change operations at the same time. So they wind up this world-class-weird-looking couple - funny short dumpy rather feminine husband, and giant crane of a wife, still with the big feet, big nose, enormous Adam's apple... Well, they were all over the news at the time - magazines, papers, TV - everything. They were from Benson, home of The Thing. So they're interviewing one of the locals and he says: "Oh great. Like Benson needs this publicity. First The Thing, and now THIS!"

Never mind.

I buy it at Central Market. They only have one brand, Coronado, and one style, quemada, but that's fine - it's one of my favorites. Although I do see it at the Fiesta here as well. And I know where you live, girlfriend. Mexico ain't that far. You could always drive over there for the weekend and load up, you know. When I lived in Galveston, I drove to Laredo to spend a coupla days at least once every other month or so. So I just checked and you could be in Progresso (which I now like better than Laredo) in 7 hours. So you get on the road about 8 am Friday morning, and you're sucking down the Margaritas by 3pm. Shop and party and party and shop until noon on Sunday, and you're home, all snug and cozy in your little casa gringa by 8pm. Pantry stocked with cajeta aplenty.

Varmint (and Katherine), after lots of thought, I'm not going to be able to make it. I'd really like to get there and meet everyone and have some good eats - and maybe help tend the pig - and meet Jaymes too. But... in May I traveled to Blacksburg in southwestern Virginia to attend my daughter's graduation. Western Virginia is beautiful and I'm glad I got to see it. It was getting from here to there that got to me - and it would be the same getting to your place. There follows part of an email I sent to my daughter after I got back to Maine - ".... I think it was culture shock what with leaving Maine and all. It's okay to go to NH and Vermont, but once I get down into the craziness further south on the interstates, I lose it. So many people, driving so many cars. It's like the human species is way out of control." That's gone into my thinking about why I can't come. It predominates my thinking about why I can't come. If it weren't for all the stuff in between, I'd be there. Maybe other people that have their roots in the country will know what I mean. Oh fer crissake all RIGHT! I'll come get you.