At the nether-regions of Congress Avenue, there’s a Mexican restaurant called El Borrego del Oro, or "The Golden Ram." It had some decently priced gorditas (or "little fatties", yes I am a Spanish genius). They came half-wrapped in paper as if they were hamburgers from a car-hop.
I seem to recall that these were lengua and chicharron.
At a Sunday morning breakfast at Mi Madre’s (which I always want to call "Mis Madres," Spanish genius, remember?) I had their burrito that came with the creamy green salsa. Can you tell what is particularly special about this burrito?
It’s filled with French fries.
In a similar vein, maybe you can figure out what makes this bowl of noodles from Thai Noodle house so special.
It’s garnished with potato chips!
The Maru Japanese restaurant on Burnet has an appetizer called the J-bomb. A deep-fried ball of tuna and cream cheese.
Here’s a taco cart that I’ve been meaning to visit for a while. It’s behind the Target in Capital Plaza. The name is El Zapatista.
I should have got a picture of the zapatista rebel painted on the side of the cart.
When I was in Leander I picked up some snacks from the Mexican grocery. These Obleas are a little like communion wafers that are stuffed with goat-milk caramel.
There’s nothing like a candy that tastes a little like a goat smells.
Also from Leander, this Kranky.
They’re like Whoppers that someone sat on. Do you get a cognitive dissonance from the cheerfulness of the Kranky ‘K?’
I read that you can train your immune system to ignore food allergies. It just takes a small dose of the allergen on a regular basis. That’s why I got this powdered shrimp.
I’ve been putting a quarter of a teaspoon in apple sauce. Within a year I’ll be eating whatever shrimp are left after BP is done with them.
Julia (my food-frakking deputy) and I ate at this East Side place called Blue Dahlia. After looking at the menu, I ordered a roast beef sandwich. The menu listed a number of items that sounded very much like ordinary sandwiches, but they were called "tartines." I thought this was just some weird French word for sandwich. Apparently there was more to it than that.
I guess you could call it an open-faced sandwich? I could have slapped the open-faces together and made two sandwiches out of it, but I gave the tartines a chance. Even though they were totally just open-faced sandwiches. You will also notice that there is a little cup of grapes on the side. Julia had an actual sprig of grapes on her plate. I suspect that mine were in a cup because they came from the bottom of the bag.
I ate at the new dim sum restaurant. It’s a little odd to have a dim sum restaurant that does nothing else. Dim sum is supposed to be something that is infrequent and hard to find. You need to be in the know, otherwise it’s just a bunch of appetizers. This place had hardly any customers while I was there, which is a shame because it was pretty good.
The rolls and dumplings were steaming hot and tasty. I liked how I had to open a scorching hot bamboo container to find an extra set of dumplings.
It was a little like getting a present.
Jeremiah invited me over for chili the other day. He made the chili by stewing the meat in coffee.
My own contribution to the dinner was Korean popsicles. The outside layer was a green-tea icecream, and on the inside was sweetened red beans and crunchy chunks of ice. Yes, actual ice, like someone had taken a hammer to a sweetened ice-cube.
Jeremiah seemed to like it.
