The Original New York Joe’s Pizza and Pasta
9070 Research Blvd Ste 303
206-0555
http://joesitaliancuisine.com
Lawrence’s comments: This is a very solid Italian place. I thought the calamari and mushrooms were above average, while the pizza was pretty good and cheaper than average. I do think they’re a bit understaffed, as it was harder to get refills than it should have been.
Worth a try if you’re in the area.
French Quarter Grille
13000 N IH 35, Ste 600
(512) 832-9090
If there has been any dropoff since Dave Gore took over what used to be Mama
Roux until the tragic and untimely deaths of Yoli and Michael Amr, it’s not readily apparent to the naked tongue. Pretty much all the food we had was excellent.
I started with a cup each of the crawfish gumbo and etoufee, and both were excellent. I also liked the crawfish beignets (which were really more like corn fritters) and even the fried green tomatoes, which isn’t something I would normally go for.
They even had a crawfish cheesecake as an appetizer. It was very interesting, and I’m glad I tried it, since I’ve never tasted anything quite like it. But, by the same measure, I doubt I’ll ever order it again.
My entree was Salmon Fish Ponchartrain, which lived up to the billing, very tasty and a nice serving size.
Service was constantly quick and attentive, and we got out in about an hour and a half (compared to three hours for me fellow diners at Trulucks two weeks before).
One difference between this and the previous incarnation: Even though we made reservations, it was still possible to get a table at 6 PM on a Saturday night. Take that as a hint, since French Quarter Grille deserves your support.
Chang Thai Thai Cuisine.
13000 N I-35 (just north of Parmer, in the same center as Wal-Mart).
491-6904
30.41153° N, 97.67578° W
Pepper grinder rating: 0
Men’s room rating: 2.
Honestly, I hated this place more than is justified by the food (which is pretty average.)
My hatred probably isn’t 100% rational, but I guess I feel like: when you’re serving tom kha soup, a dish that in my experience traditionally does not have tomato, your menu doesn’t mention tomato in the detailed ingredient list, you bring the soup out to the table, and it has big chunks of tomato swimming in it…that’s one.
When I order fried rice, your menu doesn’t specify tomato on the extensive ingredient list, you bring it out to the table, and it has big chunks of tomato in it…that’s two.
We don’t get to three.
Pass.
Sagra Enoteca Trattoria.
1610 San Antonio St.
535-5988
30.27984° N, 97.74352° W
Pepper grinder rating: 0.
Men’s room rating: 2. (You go to all that
trouble to redecorate the place, and then leave a rusted, pitted waste bin in there?).
WiFi: Yes.
Small and kind of pricy. I liked my wild boar osso bucco at first, but
after a while the dish became sort of a chore to get through. I found
myself wishing I had ordered the scallop special, until the person who did said they thought it was skimpy.
I can see this as being a place I’d take a date to, but I’m more likely
to go back to Gypsy Italian Bistro instead.
Sagra is obviously aiming to be an intimate, upscale Italian place near
downtown. And as such it’s more or less fine. But there are caveats.
First, the inside is pretty small; you have to be careful of bumping
into people behind you when you slide your chair back to get up.
Second, the food is decent, but what I had wasn’t good enough to justify the overhead. The best thing we had was the calamari, which very nice, with a light, crispy, well-seasoned batter. Unfortunately, as usual, it still didn’t dethrone reigning champ The Clay Pit. This is not an inconsiderable problem, given that the Clay Pit is all of two blocks away.
My entrèe was the Rigatoni alla Bolganese, which struck me as underflavored. The sausage I had on the side was much better, so you might opt for the Penne alla Arrabitta that contains it instead. For dessert I had the Gatto di Formaggio (read: fancy-ass cheesecake), which was…interesting. Not bad, but tarter than I expected. It’s probably a bad sign that I regretted not skipping that and stopping at the TCBY three blocks away instead. Service was a bit iffy at first, but got better as the meal progressed.
Third, there are the prices, with everything being just a bit more than you expect it to be. After the meal, there was that disheartening moment when all of us had put in what we figured we owed for the meal…only to discover that we were still considerably short of the total. There are a number of less expensive entrees on their extended menu; unfortunately, none of them actually seem to be available during the dinner hour.
Combined with the lack of any traditional “hearty” Italian entrees, I can’t really recommend Sagra over competing Italian offerings.
2525 W. Anderson Ln., Ste. #260
300-2660
30.35596° N, 97.73332° W
Pepper grinder rating: 0.
Men’s room rating: 2.
WiFi: No.
Dwight’s comments:
The one nice thing I can say about The Veranda is that they did a good job of accomodating us. Of course, that wasn’t hard, since the restaurant was virtually empty.
It makes me sad to know that so much money and time and talent has been invested in a place that turns out such average food. Cajun blackened pork tenderloin: good idea. But the sauce wasn’t terribly spicy, and the pasta served with the dish was basically plain boiled bowtie pasta: there wasn’t any attempt at a pasta sauce (or enough sauce on the pork tenderloin to cover the pasta as well). The appetizers are reasonably priced, but I didn’t find any of the six we got particuarly interesting. Even the location is depressing: is there anything more pathetic than a dying mall?
Sad. Just sad.
Lawrence’s comments:
Questions, questions, questions. Dining at The Veranda leaves me so many questions.
The (non-flaming) Bananas Foster dessert was nice, the calamari was good, the escargot were fairly cheap (but needed more garlic), and the fries were decent. However, none of the other appetizers stuck out, and my crab-stuffed-salmon was woefully under flavored; while not “off,” it was bland enough that I wondered how fresh it was. I can well believe other dishes might be more interesting, but I didn’t hear any reports of such from my many fellow dinners. (10 in total; a big crowd this time.)
Really, A. T. nailed it when he said that there was nothing here you couldn’t have whipped up better versions of at home.
Frankly, Northcross has been a Mall of the Living Dead for almost a decade. (Dwight and I have often joked that all they need was a Scotch Tape Boutique to complete the ambiance of pathetic desperation.) Even though I don’t generally shop at Wal-Mart (they seldom have what I want), unlike certain hippies, it couldn’t help but be an improvement on what’s there now, The Veranda included.
8108 Mesa Drive
853-9480
30.37333° N, 97.75672° W
Pepper grinder rating: 3.
Men’s room rating: 2.
WiFi: No.
Things I liked:
Things I liked less:
Verdict: I’d give it a marginal thumbs-up. It isn’t a sure thing, like Mirabelle across the street, but it’s worth trying if you’d like something different.
Mesa Ranch has a good concept going for it: A high end Southwestern steakhouse with lots of unique dishes. Unfortunately, the execution seemed to fall short of the concept.
Things started off well with a nice free bread basket. However, the appetizers were a bit disappointing. The batter on the fried cactus was quite nice, but the cactus itself was pretty much tasteless. (That may be the case with all cactus, no matter how you serve it, but if so, why bother?) I did not detect any bacon wrapped around the stuffed jalapenos, and both my venison chili and the venison quesadillas were disappointingly bland (and there was almost no detectable heat in the chili). The salad was good.
My entrée was equally mixed. The broiled bison strip (which I had with crabmeat Pontchartrain on top), though very flavorful, was marred by the unwelcome and unexpected presence of a tough strap of gristle along the side; if you need to cook it with the gristle to get the benefit of the fat lying aside it, fine, but this should have been cut off before being brought out. The “ranch fries” were lackluster. My broiled corn on the cob would have been quite good were it not for the fact that it came out cold.
This does not bespeak of a keen attention to detail.
Finally, my Tres Leches cake was good, but not quite up to the standard of other competing offerings from area restaurants. Service was generally very good, and they brought drink refills without my asking.
I don’t know what to tell you. I certainly would be willing to try Mesa Ranch again, but I honestly couldn’t recommend getting any of the particular items I ordered, especially not at these prices. I think more imagination and consistency is in order.
5610 N. I-35 (south of 290 on the west feeder)
302-1366
30.31606° N, 97.70821° W
Pepper grinder rating: 0.
Men’s room rating: 2.
Dwight’s comments:
This practically defines bad TexMex. Unimpressive fajitas, bad nachos, bland sauce: the queso flamedo is okay, though, and the service wasn’t horrible, but those are the only good things I can say: I left about half of my combo dinner on the plate because it was so awful. I suspect most of the customers are more interested in getting drunk than eating.
Lawrence’s comments:
Make no mistake: Baby Acapulco isn’t a restaurant, it’s a bar with a restaurant attached. And as a restaurant, it’s a pretty mediocre bar.
The food aspires to mediocrity, but doesn’t reach those mids. The fajita nachos were pretty close to the biggest nacho rip-off we’ve ever had (I think Jorge’s were worse): seven whole large chips, with melted American cheese. The salsa has a consistency close to ketchup. Likewise, the fajitas were undersized and not particularly tasty. To top it all off, service was iffy at best (we discussed tipping the water boy but not the waiter). And they forgot to bring out the extra chipolte sauce.
With Pappasitto’s, Amaya’s Taco Village, and a Taqueria Arandas all within a mile of this place, there’s no reason for anyone ever to eat here.
825 E. Rundberg
834-9388
30.35654° N, 97.68732° W
Pepper grinder rating: 0.
Men’s room rating: 2.
Dwight’s comments:
This used to be a place called Golden China, which I kind of liked: it was one of the better strip mall cheap Chinese places in town. Then they reconfigured themselves into Imperial Asia, a Thai/Chinese combo, which is just plain weird.
One of the wait persons reminded me of my paternal grandmother, if she were 30 years younger and Asian. The male half of the duo had a habit of laughing maniacally and sycophanticly at just about everything we said: after a while, he was really starting to creep me out.
They also have sushi. Sort of: they have a sushi chef and a sushi bar, but you can’t order sushi by the piece, only in various combination trays, and the selection is extremely limited. However, there wasn’t anything wrong, as far as I could tell, with the actual sushi.
The Thai food is a mixed bag: I liked the soup and the pad thai just fine, but the panang was a little heavier on veggies and a little lighter on chicken and curry than I like.
This is eccentric enough to be interesting: I’d go back and try them again, if I’m in a mood to put up with that. It isn’t so good, though, that I’d recommend it to people who have a low threshold for odd.
Lawrence’s comments:
If you’ve often thought to yourself “Man, I’d really like to served Thai food and sushi by a cheerful gay Asian man with blond hair,” then Imperial Asia is here to answer your needs. We got waited on by the aforementioned, and the grandmotherly woman, and the anglo sushi chef as well. Except for briefly forgetting Chuck’s order, service was very attentive.
And the food? Both the calamari and the Tom Kai Guy were pretty good, and disappeared pretty quickly. Despite asking for it as hot and spicy as possible, yet again my beef panang was pretty wimpy, but otherwise adequate.
Except for a few pieces of Ye Ubiquitous California Roll I spooged off Dwight and Milton, I didn’t try any of the sushi. The presentation was OK, but the inability to order sushi by the piece rather than as part of a combination tray puts it pretty far down the sushi list. Pretty decent wasabi, though.
I do admit that I find the Thai/sushi combination puzzling, if only because Thailand is pretty far from Japan. (Also puzzling is that between this, Oishi, and Kimchi, North I-35 seems to be turning into something of a Discount Sushi Corridor.) And while they seem competent in each, the Thai food isn’t nearly as good as that at Thai Kitchen or even Thai Village, and the sushi can’t compete with Mikado or Umi Sushi. It also doesn’t help that they’re in a Strip Mall of the Damned. I wouldn’t mind visiting again, but I didn’t find anything here really compelling either.
300 Colorado
495-6504
30.26604° N, 97.74509° W
Pepper grinder rating: 4.
Men’s room rating: 3.
Dwight’s comments:
Disappointing.
Aesthetically, there’s nothing wrong with Sullivan’s, except that the wood wood wood steakhouse look is starting to get tired. They have a pretty nice bar, but the extreme sports show on the TV (while fun to watch: especially the spectacular bicycle crash) didn’t really belong.
I thought it was kind of strange for our waiter to start out by pushing the stone crab claws. While I applaud steakhouses that offer some variety for those who don’t eat red meat, the server’s hard sell set the wrong tone.
One of my fellow diners (who had been to Sullivan’s several times in the past) commented that he had better steaks at Outback. I think that’s harsh, but accurate. My steak lacked the tenderness and flavor of those I’ve had at both Ruth’s Chris and Fleming’s: I finished about half of it and tossed the rest later.
I am glad that Sullivan’s does include a (decent) wedge salad in the price of the steak: I wish that more high-end steakhouses would do this. As for the sides, the au gratin potatos were competent, but pale in comparison to Fleming’s kicked-up version. I was unimpressed with the sauteed mushrooms and onions.
It is possible that Sullivan’s was having an off night. But since it also seemed to be prom night, I would expect them to be at their best (unless what they were interested in was hustling the rubes). I might consider a return trip, if I heard better things from people I trusted. But at these prices I’d only give them one more chance.
Lawrence’s comments:
It was time once again for our yearly Big Steak trip, and having sampled downtown’s other high end options (Ruth’s Chris Steak House and Fleming’s), we decided to try Sullivan’s. While it has its virtues, I have to rank it as the least interesting of the three.
As for ambiance, the restaurant is attractive, but doesn’t have the touch of elegance that elevates Fleming’s, nor the Serious Wood Tone look of Ruth’s Chris. Also, while the restroom is better designed than Ruth’s Chris, its overwhelming ordinariness (save for the nice, thick paper towels, which I do appreciate) pales in comparison to Fleming’s swanky water closet. For appetizers, we skipped the hideously overpriced crab claws (did they swipe this idea from Truluck’s?) and instead went for escargot, calamari, and a cajun crab cake. The escargot was very good and quite large, thought it could have used more garlic. The crab cake was also fairly tasty, and a much better deal than that offered at Mrs. B’s. The calamari was fine, but I’m afraid that The Clay Pit’s numinous offering has ruined merely competent calamari for us.
One virtue Sullivan’s has over its competitors is the inclusion of a wedge salad with your steak. Though smaller than the gargantuan field of greens Ruth’s Chris lays out, the price savings makes it worth the tradeoff. I also very much liked my side of hashbrowns (real hashbrowns, not that cubed potato crap lazy restaurants try to pass off as hashbrowns these days). And my porterhouse? Tasty enough, but still disappointing, being neither as generous nor “vertical” as that offered at Ruth’s Chris, nor as flavorful as either Ruth’s Chris or Fleming’s offerings. The creme brulee was very good, but the caramelized topping seemed just a touch thicker than I usually prefer it, leaving Ruth’s Chris the winner here as well.
Service was reasonably attentive but a bit “average” by high end steak house standards. The water refill busgirl managed to slop water on one of Andrew “Simple Minds and Severed Heads” Wimsatt’s fortunately empty side plates while refilling his glass, then walked blithely away. I also had to wait a bit longer than necessary for soft drink refills and ketchup for my hashbrowns. These lapses were small enough that I wouldn’t usually note them (except perhaps for the water; that was a bit odd), but it did provide an unwelcome contrast to the hyper-attentive service offered at other restaurants in this price range.
All in all, there’s nothing particularly wrong with Sullivan’s. While a bit more affordable (“affordable” being a relative term) than it’s swanky competitors, it seems to lack those special touches that elevate the fine dining experience. It lacks sizzle. At these prices, I expect sizzle.
2300 E. “Ceasar Chavez” (i.e. East 1st St.)
472-3872
30.35523° N, 97.71916° W
Pepper grinder rating: 0.
Men’s room rating: 1.5. (Guys, Lilliputian confines, a permanent wet floor sign, a missing top for your toilet tank, and a sink that’s outside both bathrooms do not endear you to me. Take a week’s vacation and get some contractors in to expand the thing. -Lawrence)
Dwight’s comments:
I have heard good things about Juan in a Million for breakfast, and I would be willing to give them another try for that. However, dinner seems like an afterthought, right down to the menus, which are actually the breakfast and lunch menus: there’s no actual dinner menu. Which is okay, because dinner ends up being priced like lunch. But it kind of isn’t okay, because you’re basically getting a lunch portion for dinner.
The other problem was that I didn’t think lunch/dinner (lupper?) was all that great: the chicken fajita plate wasn’t terribly spicy, or much of anything else. Enchiladas Y Mas does a similar plate, but better executed, I think.I did like that the owner came around to check on us: he seems like a pretty friendly guy. If he could just perk up the dinner menu some…
Lawrence’s comments:
I’ve liked the breakfast tacos I’ve had at Juan in a Million, so I was happy to see they were finally open for dinner. I also like the fact that they charge the same for dinner as for lunch. As for the food, well…
First of all, they got our nacho order wrong, and if there was any meat on the plate, it was so small compared to the beans it was mixed in with (i.e, the same beans I told them to leave off), it was all but undetectable. I’ve had worse nachos, but not this century, and I expect a hell of a lot better for $7.
Aside from that, however, everything else was pretty decent. There was less meat on my beef fajita plate than I like, but it was a decent quantity for a pretty low price, and they brought me extra onions and cut peppers (fresh jalapenos) on the side like I asked. And the extra egg and chorizo breakfast taco I had was good.
Service was generally acceptable, a little slow early on but better as the meal progressed. I did like the fact the owner came out to check on every table, a feature you usually see in Italian restaurants more than TexMex places.
Juan in a Million strikes me a only a sliver above the Austin TexMex average, but with the potential to be better. It’s still a much better place for breakfast tacos than dinner, but as long as you avoid the nachos you should be fine.
