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Over pizza, a friend in the Dallas food world recently pointed out to me that I should be sending links to my writing out to this newsletter. I told her I feel like I’ve been too busy making content to share the content I’m making most days. That’s true once again this week, as I’m on the road in Houston to write another hit list for the Infatuation. So, rather than my musings this week, I am going to run you through some of the articles I’ve published in the past few months, with some behind-the-scenes thoughts and details.
First, I want to thank Brian Reinhart at D Magazine, who has so kindly accepted many of my pitches and given me a few assignments. It means a lot, and D is about as close to the voice and type of coverage I did at Eater as I can get in the Dallas food media landscape, so it’s also a pleasure.
Most recently, I covered the change in ownership at AllGood Cafe that saved the place. Robin Gill and John Pedigo, who are partners in real life and now partners in business, heard that Mike Schnider was going to retire and there was no one to take it over, and decided to become restaurant owners. I found out about it pretty quickly because Gill is a personal friend; we play mahjong together (that’s her, actually, in my photo on top of the restaurants with the mahjong games story I did at Eater). We did an interview in their living room, and now I have to insist you all make a plan to go eat at AllGood and support its continued existence!
In addition, I covered the shitshow after Dallas funded a new code enforcement nightlife task force, which promptly started shutting down restaurants that charged a cover for music. Several city council members are working on finding a solution to that problem, but it’s far from solved. I am keeping an interested eye on it. I also wrote a piece on how Sushi Kozy came together, which is a great and slightly charged tale of a committed chef/owner with exceptionally kind landlords and a challenging relationship with his CDC, who is also a well-known Dallas chef. We got it published just before Michelin gave the place a recommendation — love to be right.
Just this week, I made my debut on Serious Eats, a venerable food publication where I’m thrilled to be a contributor. My editor there wanted a take on the beef tallow conversation that’s raging around the internet, but to make it smart and focus on its use as an ingredient as much as on its health effects. The first person I called was Dallas chef Jacob Williamson, who had a beef tallow rendering program at the Saint. Yes, had — sadly, Williamson has parted ways with Hooper Hospitality, and will not be part of the Saint in its new location in the Design District or the soon-to-open Night Rooster, which the group should be opening up any second now. Williamson replaced butter with beef tallow in most dishes on the menu, and what he had to say about it, along with his snickerdoodle cookies made with tallow, was super interesting to me, the food scientists, and a nutritionist I subsequently interviewed for the piece.
And then there is the Infatuation, for which I’ve been writing about Houston food. I evaluated the city’s barbecue in October, and this month I’m back to update its hit lists on Tex-Mex and coffee shops. These trips are a bit brutal on my constitution — in October, I ate at 10 barbecue spots in three days (don’t do that), and now I’m going to hit up 10 Tex-Mex restaurants and six coffee shops in five days. I may die, but at least I will be eating nachos.
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I’m working on a few other things, too, that I can tell you more about later — some of them are still secrets. One that is not (so much) is a documentary podcast about indie rock in the 2000s. If you don’t already know this about me, my first job out of college was working at MTV, where I moved into the music programming department and became the “indie rock whisperer.” I was the liaison for all things MTV and bands like Death Cab for Cutie, the Shins, Vampire Weekend, Interpol, Lykke Li, She & Him, Spoon, Feist … oh god, too many to even name. I actually wrote a book of music essays a while ago, and yes, you can get yourself a copy.
Going back to interview several of those folks and relive the days when we first met has been a lot of fun, and now I’m trying to jam together episode scripts so we can drop a trailer in December and launch the show in February. If that’s up your alley at all, I will be telling you how you can sign up early to hear it very soon!
In the meantime, I hope you’re eating good.