An Episode In Which We Gorged Ourselves

After Sedona, Dan and I flew to Austin, Texas.  We wanted to go visit one of his friends and his wife, and it seemed like great timing given that it was Labor Day weekend, and we were already in the Southwest.  They live in College Station, which is about 2 hours outside of Austin.  Dan and I knew we wanted to split time between Austin and College Station, so we spent Friday and Saturday night in Austin, and then drove to College Station on Sunday morning in time for brunch (sous vide eggs, goat cheese bread, great coffee and really good Bloody Mary’s, thanks J^2M!).

When we checked into our hotel we found out that the Texas Association of Magicians (really) were having their annual conference at the hotel.  We were hoping to see some magic shows, but didn’t see any sort of schedule posted.  Bummer.  But there were lots of weird people all over the hotel, which was fun, as well as lots of people who looked surprisingly normal.

Dan and I ate our way through Austin, which was bad for our waistlines, but still fantastic!  Several people recommended Chuy’s for Tex-Mex, so we went there for dinner on Friday night.  The margaritas were good, the salsa was spicy, and I basically wanted to bathe in their ground beef taco.  After our huge meal we needed to walk off the food, and we wound up walking back to our hotel – with a quick stop in a bar to have a root beer float martini and pick up a gigantic piece of tiramisu.  Everything’s bigger in Texas.  Except our pants.

It just got worse on Saturday.  We slept in to the ridiculously late hour of 9:30 (do you remember when 11am was early?  I do.).  We tried to go to Jo’s, but arrived too late for breakfast tacos (they start selling them at 8am until they run out, we were there by 10:30).  Instead we got a great cup of coffee, and headed over to Flip Happy Crepes, one of Austin’s famous food carts.  Oh. My. Goodness.  Dan had the Cuban (shredded pork, hot sauce, pickles, etc.), and I had a vegetarian crepe with tarragon mushrooms, caramelized onions, spinach, tomatoes, chives and goat cheese.  There was a long wait (roughly 45 minutes), but it was worth it.  We hung out in a parking lot, drank our coffees, and did a crossword.  When we got back in the car I promptly told Dan that we needed to learn how to make crepes, and also recreate that crepe filling.

We ran an errand or two, and then decided to head out to The Salt Lick for some barbecue.  It’s been on a few TV shows – I think Bobby Flay might have featured it on one of his bazillion shows.  We know it’s tourist-y, but it was worth it.  The meat was very lean (a big plus for us), but also very moist and tender.  We got a plate with brisket, sausage and a pork rib.  I’m a brisket fan, and it was really tasty.  Sausage was fantastic.  The rib was also really good – even Dan was a fan (and he generally doesn’t like ribs).  We ate outside – it was a 1.5 hour wait for a table inside with the pit.  As an alternative, they allow you to get food “to go” and you can sit in their outside picnic area and listen to a band.  It’s BYOB, because it sits in a dry county, and we saw a bunch of people dragging in massive coolers full of beer – they clearly intended to stay for a while.  We bought water and a Big Red.  Big Red is a red creme soda.  It tastes like Robitussin.  Not awesome.  Apparently it’s a big thing in the south.

We’re not barbecue connoisseurs, but we’re hoping to learn a little bit more on our road trip, as our second stop is in Kansas City!

After barbecue we intended to check out Barton Springs, but frankly, we needed a nap.  We headed back to the hotel and vegged for a few hours before venturing out for dinner.  We decided to food cart hop.  Austin’s food carts are a big part of the local culture (they’re really more like trailers, not street carts like in NYC), and Dan and I were really psyched to try them out.

Our first stop was Odd Duck.  They have a “farm-to-trailer” ethos (get it?), and Dan and I had 3 small dishes: a soft-boiled egg on top of goat cheese grits, with mushrooms and squash; a pork belly slider with a mustard aioli and sauerkraut; and a grilled half of a quail with texas rice, apple and cheddar.  Mmmm.  Dan’s favorite was the quail, but I’m pretty much a sucker for runny eggs, cheesy grits and mushrooms, so the combination of all three had me furtively licking the bowl.

Next we decided to get dessert at Gourdough’s.  Dan and I are not dessert people, but we scarfed down “The Puddin’” a huge freshly fried donut covered in cream cheese icing, bananas and vanilla wafers.  It’s Texas.  Go big or go home.

At this point, any rational person would have stopped eating.  Not us.

Our next stop was Man Bites Dog.  We split a chicken sausage dog, with pesto mayo and fresh tomato.  This was the disappointment of the evening.  I hate to say that, because the guy at the cart was so nice and the concept sounds great, but it was very bland.  I hope their other dogs are more flavorful.

Our last and final stop was Torchy’s Tacos.  We split the Democrat.  It was so good, but we couldn’t finish it since we were stuffed.  It was at this point that I really began to regret the dog, because I felt like a kid who was told they couldn’t play with their just-opened Christmas toys.  At this point we went home.  We couldn’t finish a taco that we were sharing.  It was time to give up.

On Sunday we got up early, drove out to College Station to see our friends and their adorably vocal cat.  We had the aforementioned brunch, which was really good and interesting.  Sous vide eggs are like egg soup (completely cooked, but not even close to scrambled), and we sopped it up with some fresh bread from the farmer’s market.  And it’s Texas, so we had bacon.  Which was awesome.  Everything’s better with bacon.  Pork is the biggest impediment to me becoming a vegetarian.  Can you be a vegetarian and still eat bacon?  Like a pig-atarian?

We got a tour of College Station and Bryan, which was surprisingly varied in the types of entertainment it offered.  There were cute coffee shops, wine bars, restaurants, and a bar that puts on drag shows.  Yes, really.  I expect that in New York, but was definitely surprised to see it in the middle of Texas.  We then met up with our friends’ friends, and Dan learned to waterski.  He looked pretty good, but apparently he was also objectively pretty good.  Yay Dan and your core strength!  Then it was back to our friends’ house for some drinks, sous vide beef, Israeli salad and some awesome squash soup that I definitely need the recipe for.

We had a great time catching up, and Dan’s friend agreed to officiate our wedding for us!  Well, actually, he jokingly offered, and then we very seriously took him up on it.  Dan and I had decided ages ago to ask him to do this, and since we knew we were taking the trip to Texas we decided to wait to ask him in person.  If you believe in vortexes and all that shit, all the stars aligned.  We are super psyched that he has agreed to do this for us.  Thanks J.

We are looking at our schedule to see if we can swing by College Station on our trip back to the East Coast.  It may or may not happen, but we definitely had a great time in Texas.