Food and Cooking

How Malai Kitchen's Chef-Owners Keep Looking for, and Finding, Inspiration

For most chefs, the flavors that dominate their cuisine come from a very personal place, like a decades of mom's home cooking or a few years of intensive training at a French culinary school. For others, though, that passion for a cuisine develops in relatively unexpected places. Braden and Yasmin ... More >>

DFW Chefs Are All Over Your TV Right Now, Including on Food Network's Kitchen Inferno

If you needed any other reason to believe that the time for Dallas' varied and unique dining scene is finally starting to have the day in the sun it so deserves, turn on your television. Many of the city's best chefs, including Roe DiLeo, Patrick Stark, and (of course) John Tesar, are trying their h ... More >>

And Now, the Uber of Restaurant Reservations

Since Lucia first opened, the Oak Cliff Italian restaurant has been honing its reputation as Dallas' toughest reservation. Diners who want the opportunity to twirl a forkful of David Uygur's cacio e pepe have to call the restaurant a month in advance to book a table. Prime slots are consistently gob ... More >>

Chipotle Brings Sofritas to Dallas, Proves Even Vegetarian Burritos Can Be Way Too Big

Chipotle needed a better vegetarian option. Until recently, the only thing a meat-adverse diner could order in the restaurant was a set of tacos or a burrito stuffed with black beans and a mix of grilled onions and bell peppers. The results were filling (everything at Chipotle is filling) but obviou ... More >>

Nine Band Brewing Co.: A New Craft Brewer Coming Soon to Allen and a Tap Near You

Every couple days this summer, people pulled into an unfinished parking lot near Prestige Circle in Allen and asked whoever would listen when construction would finally be finished. "The city of Allen is behind us," says Keith Ashley, owner of the Nine Band Brewing, soon to be Allen's first craft ... More >>

Where Chef Danyele McPherson, of Grape and Remedy and Top Chef Fame, Eats In Dallas

When she's not busy planning her new restaurant, Remedy, Chef Danyele McPherson likes to focus on the parts of her life that aren't just in the kitchen. "Food is my passion," says McPherson, "but I also like to do other things, too. I like to ride bikes around Dallas and have beers with my friends l ... More >>

The Happy Hour at Joyce and Gigi's Is Killer, and So is Dessert

It's 9 on Wednesday night when I drag my friend out to Joyce and Gigi's in East Dallas. She's in nursing school and should be writing a paper that's due the next day, but fortunately one of us has her priorities straight: half-priced drinks and dessert to share. The restaurant's two-year anniversary ... More >>

Six Awesome Food Events in Dallas This Weekend, October 23-26

Lactobacillus fans, this one's for you. As part of their Super Sour Power Week, Strangeways has 35 different sour beers on tap through Sunday, October 26. So what are you waiting for? Make like a wild yeast strain get at it. What it be: Super Sour Power Week When it do: Now through Sunday, Oct. 2 ... More >>

How the Slow Bone Smokes its Sausage

In "Shigging," we ask barbecue experts to give us some specifics about how they smoke their meats. In the spirit of barbecue secretiveness and competitiveness, they're allowed to lie once. This week, for Shigging, we're switching meats. For the moment, we're moving on from brisket, and we'll be ask ... More >>

The Six Best Condiments in Dallas

We get it: You're too good to put sauce on your barbecue or ranch on your pizza. Us? We like our food better when it's wet, especially when these condiments are involved. Have a condiment you like better? Dip your laptop in it or something. These are better. The BBQ Sauce at Slow Bone (above) Cool ... More >>

Chef Danyele McPherson Is Ready for Her Next Culinary Close-Up (Interview)

Danyele McPherson has been waiting for her turn in Dallas' culinary spotlight for some time. After a stint on Bravo's Top Chef and working in the kitchens of Stephan Pyles and The Grape, McPherson has finally landed her own soon-to-open restaurant on Lower Greenville. The highly anticipated Remedy i ... More >>

Henry's Majestic, Chef "Roe" DiLeo's New Restaurant on McKinney, Is Now Open

After well-received stints at two Dallas institutions and her currently-airing appearance on Gordon Ramsay's Hell's Kitchen, Rosanne "Roe" DiLeo is seemingly up for anything. This time, Chef Roe won't be dodging pans slung by a cursing Englishman or setting a new standard for bar food at The Liberti ... More >>

Ten Dallas Restaurants You Should Be Eating at Right Now: Fall 2014 Edition

For the past few months we've been nibbling like rabbits on vegetables while visions of ourselves in bathing suits flicker on the projector screen in our brains. But now there's a snap in the air, and skimpy clothes and frail fabrics will slowly take the back seat to wardrobes with bulk. You could h ... More >>

The Improbable Success of the Texas Veggie Fair

It's pretty impressive if you think about it: Gathering 7,000 vegetarians and otherwise curious omnivores together to celebrate meat-free living might be hard enough, but to do it in Dallas? Texas is a land that celebrates steakhouses, where smoked beef brisket is its own food group, and where beans ... More >>

Dallas' Burger Boom Is Over, Thank God

I've been poring over local-restaurant news while trying to lay out my restaurant-review plan for the rest of the year, and the list I've compiled is strangely void of burger restaurants. I couldn't be happier. Don't get me wrong. I love burgers. (Especially this one.) But there are only so many fe ... More >>

Some of Dallas' Best Chefs Will Pair Their Food with Beer at the HopChef Competition

Craft beer is more popular than ever, which means that chefs have been as interested in creating dishes that pair beautifully with an IPA or witbier as they were previously in cooking to suit fine wines. Local gastropubs and fine-dining restaurants alike are bulking up their beer selections, and the ... More >>

Stay Up Late With the Art

Dinnertime at El Fenix Is Tex-Mex Heaven

Follow the Cheap Bastard as she scours the city, looking for a good -- or at least non-lethal -- lunch for less than 10 bucks. Grandpa and grandma double-date count: 4 Praline count: 7 One could go to El Fenix at lunch. But it's much more fun to go for Old Lady Dinnertime (OLD). It's in the 4:50-5 ... More >>

Cold Beer Company Found Out "Local" Is Harder Than It Looks, Especially in Dallas

It seems like the only people who don't romanticize opening their own restaurant are people who have actually opened one. Home cooks are lulled into the fantasy by guests who gush over dishes that have been slaved over for a day. Diners see mistakes they're sure they could fix with the wave of a spa ... More >>

Knife Is One of America's "Best New Restaurants"

For all of the fit-throwing, cursing, and discussion about food critics in Dallas, we've kind of lost sight of the fact that John Tesar is actually an incredible chef. The controversy surrounding you-know-who's three-star review of Tesar's second Dallas restaurant Knife may have died down, but the h ... More >>

Bohemian Cafe, the New Kolache Restaurant on Lower Greenville, Is Now Open

The first thing that becomes immediately apparent when walking through the front door of the Bohemian Cafe is that every employee, all the way down to the dishwasher, is exceptionally nice. Customers are greeted with warm, genuine thank-you-for-comings, guided to the Kolache counter and coddled unti ... More >>

The Best North Texas Music Venue Beer Selections

Let's face it: Going out to catch live can be about a lot more than just the music. A lot of the time, it can also be about spending time with friends. Or it can be about having a quality drink. (Oftentimes, both.) There is of course a time and a place to have whatever sort of cheap swill to drunk o ... More >>

Dallas' Five Best Italian Restaurants

Any restaurant that turns out a lasagna like the one pictured above has got to be jockeying to be the Best Italian Restaurant in Dallas. And it turns out Carbone's, the Italian restaurant responsible for that plate up above, won just that award in our recent Best Of Dallas feature that celebrates ex ... More >>

Proof Pantry Will Now Serve Lunch; Leslie Brenner Still Probably Not Invited

As if we haven't heard enough about Misery Loves Company's spanking-new restaurant in One Arts Plaza, Proof Pantry over the weekend announced that it would be expanding the extremely limited lunch options starting tomorrow. Owner Michael Martensen hinted to the Observer in August that the restau ... More >>

If You're a Woman Waiting Tables in Dallas You're Probably Getting Sexually Harassed

Like any other job, being a server comes with its share of shittiness. Working all day on your feet is exhausting, patrons can be dicks, and you have to work really, really hard to earl that $2.13 an hour plus tips. And on top of all of the usual stresses, a new report shows, women who wait tables ... More >>

How Dallas' Young Chefs Are Remaking its Dining Scene, in Their Own Words

The Dallas of 20 years ago exists only on the margins of the current culinary climate. There are more restaurants in this city than ever, and the focus of the chefs who run its best restaurants has shifted dramatically in the last five years. No longer is Dallas known for its decadent-but-boring ste ... More >>

Dearest Leslie Brenner: Here's How to Make Friends with Proof & Pantry

Hey Leslie Brenner! I don't know you. I'm Alice. I don't know what you look like, but lots of chefs in town tell me they know what you look like, and that you're never truly dining secretly in their restaurants. I imagine that you look like the above illustration that took me one hour to draw. You' ... More >>

You, Too, Can Eat Like a Cheap Bastard at Stephen Pyles' Fancy-Ass San Salvaje

Follow the Cheap Bastard as she scours the city, looking for a good -- or at least non-lethal -- lunch for less than 10 bucks. People saying "Ooooooh" at their food: 14 Times I wondered why there was a full-length mirror next to the shitter in the ladies' restroom, angled so that one could watch on ... More >>

Casa Rubia Is the Best Restaurant in West Dallas' Hit-or-Miss Trinity Groves

"Dinner in Trinity Groves?" It's a question that so often sends my potential dining companions running for the hill country, a trail of withering dust the only evidence they ever existed. This restaurant empire, rising from the clay of West Dallas, isn't the only destination that has given me troub ... More >>

If Proof Pantry Really Wanted to Avoid a Morning News Review, its Plan Backfired

Like everyone else in town, we've told you already about Leslie Brenner's recent visit to Proof Pantry. The dining critic at the Dallas Morning News visited the restaurant last Thursday in preparation for a review, and the meal went as most meals do until owner Michael Martensen raised a stink riv ... More >>

Chef Kyle McClelland Ditched Brooklyn for Dallas and Isn't Looking Back (Interview)

The ascension of Dallas' culinary scene has been a curious thing to watch from the sidelines. As a diner, Dallasites have more restaurants to choose from than ever, helmed by some of the country's brightest up-and-coming chefs. At the same time, this progress has been slow-going, and Dallas has been ... More >>

The Park Cities' Front Room Tavern Has a New Look, Chef and Menu, but Will It Stick?

The change has been a long time coming. The Front Room first opened in 2012 in Hotel Lumen, with Scott Townend serving as executive chef. Back then, the restaurant was branded as a Park Cities diner, with a dressed up but casual menu that seemed well suited to the Park Cities. But the soups, sala ... More >>

100 Favorite Dishes, No. 3: The Pork Chop at So&So's

For last week's Best of Dallas® 2014 issue, we've been counting down (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes. If there's a dish you think we need to try, leave it in the comments, or email me. When I first read about So&So's in Uptown, and even first walked through the doors, I'll admit I ... More >>

Malai Kitchen is Basically Dallas' Only Brewpub, and It Deserves our Love

Last summer, Texas laws governing alcohol sales changed slightly -- not nearly as much as they should have -- allowing a brewer operating under a "brewpub" license to produce more beer and, most importantly, sell it outside of their own establishments. This is why we're seeing a rash of new microbre ... More >>

100 Favorite Dishes, No. 4: Dry-Aged Burger At Neighborhood Services

For last week's Best of Dallas® 2014 issue, we've been counting down (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes. If there's a dish you think we need to try, leave it in the comments, or email me. Remember the Off-Site Kitchen burgers we highlighted way back in the 80s? The patties were svelt ... More >>

The New Dallas Farmers Market Is Getting Some Promising New Restaurants

In the process of revamping the formerly-meh Dallas Farmers Market into something that at least marginally represents local growers, the private operators who bought the Market from the City of Dallas have made some serious changes, like kicking the parking spaces out of the produce sheds and tighte ... More >>

Chef Blythe Beck Started Cooking Her "Swanky Southern" Food Last Night at Kitchen LTO

If it seems like we're always talking about Kitchen LTO, the Trinity groves "permanent pop-up" restaurant, it's because it's hard to ignore a restaurant that completely changes the concept every four months. Some chefs' short-lived tenures are more exciting than others, but no one's start have been ... More >>

100 Favorite Dishes, No. 5: Bacon Egg and Cheese at Start (With Optional Juice)

For last week's Best of Dallas® 2014 issue, we've been counting down (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes. If there's a dish you think we need to try, leave it in the comments, or email me. We're really in the home stretch, now. And I thought we could use something wholesome as we get ... More >>

Herrera's Is Moving to West Dallas

Signs of life from Herrera's, the much-loved Tex-Mex chain that left Maple Avenue not long ago, was recently spotted by a tipster in West Dallas on Sylvan Avenue, not far south of the river. I called owner Nora Ontiveros but she didn't answer. Maybe she's busy, you know, resurrecting an entire resta ... More >>

First Time's The Charm

100 Favorite Dishes, No. 6: Pulpo a la Plancha at Casa Rubia

For last week's Best of Dallas® 2014 issue, we've been counting down (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes. If there's a dish you think we need to try, leave it in the comments, or email me. Any fan of chef Omar Flores' cooking at Driftwood would expect an octopus dish after he transiti ... More >>

Komali Chef Abraham Salum Knows What Dallas Wants, Knows It Will Change Next Week

When we talk about the burgeoning culinary scene that exists in Dallas today, it's sometimes easy to forget about the chefs who spent years trying to convince us that great food was worth a little extra cash. Abraham Salum's eponymous restaurant Salum has been a fixture of the Dallas food community ... More >>

Does Dallas Really Have the Most Restaurants Per Capita? And If So, Who Cares?

"Dallas has the most restaurants per capita of any city in the U.S." Have you heard this one before? The statement is as pervasive here as "Hey, where is the valet stand?" and "I'll have my steak well done." Usually, it's issued as a sort of bragging right. Dallasites who are proud of their city b ... More >>

Where Kitchen LTO's New Chef Blythe Beck Loves Eating in Dallas

Unlike the last chef at Kitchen LTO who was brand new to Dallas, Blythe Beck is intimately familiar with the food scene. Which is not surprising, considering that she worked in some of the city's best restaurants before moving away for a few years to pursue consulting opportunities. Now that she's b ... More >>

Five Seafood Restaurants Not in Our Best of Issue That We Feel Bad About.

Picking the best of anything can really lead to some stress, if only because there are so many great restaurants and food businesses in and around Dallas. And since we're in the middle of a dessert here, you might think there may not be too many seafood restaurants to choose from either, but that's ... More >>

100 Favorite Dishes, No. 9: Tacos at La Ventana

To prepare for this fall's Best of Dallas® 2014 issue, we're counting down (in no particular order) our 100 Favorite Dishes. If there's a dish you think we need to try, leave it in the comments, or email me. If you're used to getting your taco fix at a taqueria along Harry Hines Boulevard, you nee ... More >>

Cashing in on the Good LYFE's

As health-conscious diners turn to kale, a California-based chain steps up.

VH Oak Cliff Opens Tonight in Oak Cliff

This past weekend I was on my way home from a relaxed evening in the Bishop Arts District. It was late and I was tired, but not so tired I couldn't have been talked into staying out a little longer. As I rounded the corner of Beckley Avenue and stepped on the gas I noticed the old Outpost space was ... More >>

Drink Beer and Without Feeling (Quite as) Bad About It

Beer is one of those paradoxical liquids that can make one feel both supremely good and devastatingly bad. In our never-ending effort to help them imbibers of Dallas maximize their good-vibes and justify their wrongdoing, we've compiled this list of local craft beer companies that make a point of gi ... More >>

Dallas' 10 Best Bowls of Ramen

Thanks to a seemingly-unstoppable food trend, ramen is no longer those disgusting packets you subsisted on in college. Iterations of the Japanese staple dish have been showing up on menus across Dallas for the past few years, especially as chefs like David Chang drove the dish to national prominence ... More >>