At the Main Street Garden Park, Dallas, Texas. I don’t know why they were giving out free tacos.
Tag Archives: food
What I learned this week, October 26, 2012
13 Reasons You Should Start Biking To Work
The ponds at Huffhines.
Since I wrote this blog entry, the weather has cooled off a bit and now I’m able to ride both to and from work. I shoot for about two to three times a week. Now, though, it’s getting dark sooner and pretty soon it’ll be dark when I leave for work and dark when I come home. I have put lights on my bike but I’ll have to think hard about fighting rush hour traffic pre-dawn and post sunset.
Alice Munro is about to have a new book of short stories come out. I’ve always said I think she is the unquestioned master of the form. Her writing is beyond language.
You can read one of the stories, “To Reach Japan” – Here.
This clip is a few years old; I remember the good old days when this is the biggest problem we had to worry about.
Call Me Ishmael
Joe Queenan on how a harmless juvenile pastime turned into a lifelong personality disorder.
TEXAS Tells UN Poll Watchers: Don’t Even Try It
Sheaffer Inlaid Nib
Notes about Notes
Fountain Pens
A surprising number of very technical people have recently re-embraced the fountain pen for everyday writing. They’re drawn to fountain pens not from nostalgia or from a desire for expensive jewelry, but because they enjoy the way the pen feels in their hand — or the way their writing looks on the page.
Sheaffer Triumph Nib
Sheaffer Dolphin Nib
It’s nice to see an Oak Cliff Restaurant, Smoke, get this sort of attention. Nice burger too.
Best Bacon Burgers in the US – Dallas – Smoke
ONN’s Presidential Debate Gives Average Americans Totally Unsupervised Airtime
Opening Bell
From an article That Jerk? C’est Moi in the Wall Street Journal:
The problem with writing in coffee shops is that everyone hates the kind of people who write in coffee shops—especially the kind of people who write in coffee shops. You see the guy in the corner hunched over his laptop and you think (forgetting, for the moment, that you are also hunched over a laptop): “For chrissake, get an office.” As someone who writes in coffee shops for a living, I have wrestled with this paradox for much of my adult life.
One book of essays on writing (I don’t remember exactly which one – if you know please comment) said that a sure sign of a failure at writing is someone that writes in coffee shops. He took that as a sign of being non-seriousness, of being a hipster doofus, of being twee. I totally understand where he was coming from, but I think he missed an important distinction. I write in coffee shops not because it is cool but because I go to coffee shops sometimes and I write wherever I go. In other words, I go to coffee shops for coffee… well, not really… the coffee I make at home is better than any coffee shop coffee (Fresh ground beans, French Press in the way to go)… I go to coffee shops to get out of the house and I write there because I am there.
The New York Times, of course, has an non-serious, twee, hipster doofus take on the thing… Destination: LAPTOPISTAN
JUST after 4 o’clock on a Wednesday afternoon, as a dozen people clicked away on their laptops at the Atlas Café in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, half of a tree broke off without warning less than a block away. It crashed into the middle of Havemeyer Street, crushing a parked car, setting off alarms and blocking the street. A deafening chorus of horns rose outside Atlas’s window as traffic halted. An 18-wheeler executed a sketchy 10-point turn in the middle of a crowded intersection before a pair of fire trucks made their way through the traffic jam in a blaze of red. Chain saws roared, sawdust flew and the horns built to a peak. It was New York urban pandemonium at its finest.
Inside the warm confines of Atlas, separated from the chaos by only a thin wall of glass, not a soul stirred.
There are dangers, of course. From Coffee shops are ruining creative writers
Fiction writers are using coffee shops as settings within their works because they’re writing in coffee shops. And that’s why coffee shops ruin creative writers.
I am guilty of this – at the Pearl Cup one afternoon, I wrote a short story about a guy (not me, a mob hitman) sitting in the Pearl Cup. I thought I had put it up here as a Sunday Snippet… but I can’t find it. There was a robbery and people died. Only once though; I can live with that.
I live in Dallas – purportedly the un-hippest city in the world (no longer true) – but there are a few nice independent coffee places here tucked in between the barbeque, strip joints, and Baptist Churches. There was even a list – Get your morning buzz: The top 10 indie coffeehouses in Dallas.
The list, with my notes, starting with the ones I’ve been to:
The Pearl Cup Been there many times – attended some author readings there too. It’s a great place, but often too crowded to get a table. I’m excited because they are about to open a branch in my neck of the woods.
White Rock Coffee Been there many times. Cool place not too far from where I live.
A cool piece of wall art at White Rock Coffee
Espumoso Caffe – Been there a few times, really great place.
Through the door of the Espumoso Caffe, Bishop Arts District, Dallas
Oddfellows – Never had the coffee there, but love the place and the food. Wrote about it here.
The bar dining spot at Oddfellows – a wooden bench, metal pipe for a backrest, and a log for a footrest. Our waitress has my wheat beer and Candy’s wine.
These are the places I haven’t been:
Antonio Ramblés listed a few too – Anywhere but Starbucks – but only one The Corner Market wasn’t on the other list. It’s on Greenville and McCommas, where I used to live (a long, long, long time ago), so I’ll add them.
So now I have a list, and I need to work my way through it. Today, Opening Bell. It’s in the Southside building in the Cedars, an area I have been getting familiar with for no particular useful reason. It’s right across the street from the fabulous NYLO hotel with its SODA bar – one of my favorite spots in the Metroplex. It’s been on my list for a while.
So I took the DART train down to the Cedars Station and tried out Opening Bell.
It’s in the basement of Southside on Lamar – an urban living complex built inside an enormous old brick building that used to house the Sears offices and warehouse. It’s not surprising then that it has a local feel to it – catering especially to the thousands of folks living overhead. A lot of folks wander in sleepily, getting a fill of their personal cup or thermos. It’s full-service, selling food (I had a huge and excellent chicken salad sandwich), beer, and wine in addition to coffee, chai and tea. There is a little stage for their evenings of live music (have to check that out some time). The refurbished warehouse space is adequately funky and cavernous, the voyage to the restrooms an industrial adventure (and I mean that in a good way). The coffee is good, both espresso and brewed (refills on the latter – yay!). The proper urban doofus artwork adorns the old industrial brick (local art, posters for Hendrix and Townes Van Zandt, an old accordion perched above the barista).
I did drink too much coffee. I knew it was bad when the barista asked me what kind of coffee I wanted and I replied, “I don’t care.”
The music they play is excellent (among the Dallas coffee spots second only to Espumoso… so far, and so, so much better than the crap they spew out over the speakers at Starbucks). Wifi is fast and reliable, service is friendly, and customers are interesting.
So no complaints – another great spot to move from the “going to visit” list to he “got to go back to” list.
Corny Dog
There’s more than one way to eat a Corny Dog. At the Cottonwood Art Festival, Richardson, Texas.
Eating Insects in the Rain
Back in the spring, I tracked down a Food Truck sponsored by Dos Equis. Billed as “The Most Interesting Taco in the World” – they had hired a well-known local truck, Rock and Roll Tacos, reskinned the outside, and sent it out to give away interesting tacos. They called it “Feast of the Brave.” I had shark and iguana tacos… and they were so good, it wasn’t even brave to eat them.
Dos Equis is doing the promotion again, this time with the Nammi Truck, which usually serves Banh Mi sandwiches. They’ve made up some sandwiches with Jellyfish, Quail, and Silkworms. The silkworms are billed as “Soy Silkworms” – but that means they were fed on soybeans… they are the real thing. I have always wanted to eat some insects, so I decided to track them down.
Today I had a long bicycle ride planned, but the weather didn’t cooperate. The streets were very wet and the rain spitting down. I’ve done some work and have replaced the spokes on my ancient Raleigh Technium 460 road bike so I took it out around the neighborhood. It worked great, though I was nervous with the narrow tires on the slick tarmac.
So, I had the day and had to make new plans. A quick look at the Internet and I discovered the Nammi/Dos Equis truck was down in the Arts District outside the grand opening of the new City Performance Hall. I grabbed my stuff and rode the DART train downtown.
I didn’t think of an umbrella and by the time I walked up to the truck I was drenched and probably looked like an idiot. Four women and one guy in costumes were huddled outside the truck when I walked up and said, “Can I have a silkworm sandwich?”
“Oh, you want to go for it right off?” said one woman as she handed me a sandwich in a paper tray.
Until the moment that I looked down at the food I never really thought much about actually eating silkworms. They were brownish, obviously segmented bugs, and bigger than I had imagined. I guess it is the pupae stage of the silkworm that is edible… they were almost the size of the last joint on your little finger. There were plenty of them in a sandwich.
I walked over to a little table that had an umbrella (intended for shade… the rain water poured through it) and tucked in. The worms were, not surprisingly, crunchy. They had a bit of a nutty taste… though, really they tasted like… well, bugs.
While I was eating a couple walked up to me. We talked about the various other food trucks lined up. They did a good job of holding a normal conversation with a stranger that was shoveling insect pupae into his mouth. The guy had been to Vietnam and talked about the sandwiches and how they weren’t really sure about what was in them, but they were good.
Now, I was finishing my order. I love the Nammi Banh Mi – they are more expensive than the usual Vietnamese sandwich – but they are very generous with the meat (the pork, of course, is the best). A bunch always falls out into the little tray and you get the extra enjoyment of finishing off the spicy filling along with whatever vegetables have also fallen out.
So now I looked down at the little tray and there, true to form, was a little pile of Silkworm Pupae along with some daikon, cilantro, and shredded carrot. Should I eat the worms?
I did. It was a little harder to eat the little buggers bare like that – without benefit of the sandwich bread concealing the fact that I was eating insects… but I figured if I’m up for it, I’m in. Like most from my generation, I have always felt a compulsion to finish my plate.
Insects consumed, I headed into the performance hall for the opening day festivities. But that’s a story for another day.
The Nammi folks trying to stay dry.
They were all in costume for the Dos Equis “Feast of the Brave” food giveaway.
Here’s my silkworm sandwich.
Proof I ate it – only a bite left.
While I was eating, a rugged group on bicycles, braving the rain, came up for some food.
What I learned this week, July 20, 2012
Editorial: Finding Lost Dallas
Cities should be dynamic places. The corner of Commerce and St. Paul streets, where the building that once housed the hotel still stands, is a great place to see how this works over time. When it opened in 1956, the Statler Hilton was a marvel to behold. It was home to the largest convention facility in the South. Some of the hotel’s amenities — music in elevators, a rooftop pool and televisions in every room — were trendsetting and the height of luxury.
It was also the first glass-and-metal hotel in the nation. As such, it was a precursor to the Modern movement that defines the Dallas skyline. The buildings that now seem so familiar to all of us rose from the remnants of the old downtown. When you see footage of Dallas a half-century ago, what strikes the eye is how little of it seems to be left.
LOST DALLAS
.
Help me, I’m melting!
.
Shane Pennington, the artist that did the ice sculptures down in the Dallas Arts District that impressed me so much that I visited them day after day, as they melted:
– I found a cool article about his show in Berlin – “Leaving the Shade.”
.
The two human form sculptures, what is left of them
.
Not much ice left
.
How 8 Sci-Fi Gadgets Are Becoming Reality
A Modest Proposal: Nasher vs Museum Tower
Howard Jacobson’s top 10 novels of sexual jealousy
The 50 Best Rolling Stones Songs (in case you were forgetting….)
.
.
A while back I wrote about a Foodtruckapooza event at the remains of the old Valley View Mall. It was such a success the mall owners are trying to bring in a little business by making it a regular thing.
New Valley View owners hope to park food truck test kitchens in vacant food court stalls
It’s a fascinating story of urban devlopment, timing, and the death of a mall.
A few weeks back, the Becks rolled in more than two dozen food trucks for a fest that filled the parking lot — first time that’s happened at Valley View in a long time. Said Scott last night, the traffic jam brought in ’round 12,000, which is why the Midtown Food Truck Fest becomes a regular event beginning July 20 and scheduled for the third weekend of every month, with an indoor component that will include a beer garden.
Concurrently, they’re partnering with Jack FM to create food truck “test kitchens” in the seven empty food-court slots once populated by the likes of Sbarro, Chick-fil-A, Sonic and McDonald’s.
In two months’ time, the Becks hope to fill empty food-court spaces with food truck test kitchens.
“You will have your favorite food trucks in one location,” says Scott Beck, who notes that’s about two months off. “We won’t make those spot into national or regional vendors. We’ll have food trucks who want test kitchens for a month. They will rotate in and out — and be right there in the food court. Every food truck wants to be part of that. They think it’s interesting to do a test kitchen, because there are only so many things you can make in a food truck. This gives them the chance to do more items in an area that’s promoted.”
I think I might head down there after work today.
Some very interesting editorials about the future of energy in the US.
The Energy Revolution Part One: The Biggest Losers
Energy Revolution 2: A Post Post-American Post
Energy Revolution 3: The New American Century
While the chattering classes yammered on about American decline and peak oil, a quite different future is taking shape. A world energy revolution is underway and it will be shaping the realities of the 21st century when the Crash of 2008 and the Great Stagnation that followed only interest historians. A new age of abundance for fossil fuels is upon us. And the center of gravity of the global energy picture is shifting from the Middle East to… North America.
Sail on Silver Girl, Sail on By
The coolest part of the Dallas metroplex- the place with the hottest scene right now – is Oak Cliff. I am so happy about that – for decades I’ve loved that part of town and am happy to see that it is finally starting to have its place in the sun. There is the Bishop Arts District already well-established and now to the north, the area that the new Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge is serving looks poised for a new Renaissance.
When we were coming back from the Belmont not too long ago I noticed some construction going on along Fort Worth Avenue – about a long block east of the hotel. Looking it up I discovered it was a complex started by the folks that gave us Smoke – and it was a combination beer-garden style bar and a restaurant. The bar was “The Foundry” and the restaurant “Chicken Scratch.” I put a visit to that place on my list of things to do.
Then, this week, I noticed that Holt and Stockslager would be bringing their Simon and Garfunkle tribute stylings to The Foundry stage on Friday night. I had seen them first downtown at one of the Patio Sessions and had loved their show. We also saw them at the Dallas Zoo when they warmed up for A Hard Night’s Day. I was up for a third show.
I looked up the address for The Foundry on Googlemaps and saw pictures of a big sprawling auto repair business. When we drove over I was impressed to see the transformation. It’s a huge space, made with repurposed shipping containers. Giant bulk fluid containers sit up on the roof, lit from within at night to give a colorful techno-retro glow. There’s plenty of seating, from the air-conditioned bar, to lines of picnic tables, to old couches under the tin roof. It’s an interesting place, lots to do, and a lot of attention to detail.
It was warm, but the once the sun set it was comfortable enough. The place is lousy with fans and misters to fight back the summer heat.
We picked up some rotisserie chicken at Chicken Scratch – I was happy to see they offer Collard Greens as a side. The food was really good – they also offer fried chicken if that is more your style. The bar is not a hip martini mixology joint – but their beer selection is impressive and delicious. We sat at a picnic table shared with Holt and Stockslager. Not too many music venues let you eat chicken with the talent before the show.
Holt and Stockslager did not disappoint. I love the stage -built out of old wooden pallets arranged into a big oval cave. The crowd was talkative – the beer-garden atmosphere lends itself to socializing. It would be a great place to go with a big group. Still, looking around, I saw a few folks that were there for the music, mouthing the words to the familiar tunes.
Near the end, they brought out the keyboard for Bridge Over Troubled Water. Stockslager did some stretching to get ready and then he wailed into it. Really, really good. Afterward he advised, “Don’t try that at home.”
Interesting construction from recycled materials.
Chicken on the rotisserie.
Our chicken, my collard greens, and Candy’s mashed potatoes. Oh, and the all-important beer list.
Holt and Stockslager singing away.
Review: Chicken Scratch and The Foundry in Dallas
First-Take Restaurant Review: Chicken Scratch + The Foundry
Chicken Scratch and The Foundry: More wow moments from the Bolsa boys
Chicken Scratch Offers Southern Comfort In Oak Cliff
The Foundry is Open in Oak Cliff with Beer, Picnic Tables and, Coming Soon, Fried Chicken
Chicken Scratch, Tim Byres’ New Chicken-and-Tetherball Joint, Opened in Oak Cliff Yesterday
Spicy Asian Tacos!
I have been trying hard to watch what I eat recently… and doing a fairly good job of it. But we live in a world of temptation and I saw publicity for a second Food Truck Festival down in Deep Ellum last Friday. The last one was a big success and Deep Ellum is such a great place for people watching at things like that. I could not resist. So I decided to take the DART train down after work and then simply watch what I ate.
Oh, in checking this out, I came across a bit of interesting information. If memory serves, they said a little over a year ago there were two gourmet food trucks in the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex. Now there are somewhere around sixty four.
Luckily for me, this festival had a number of healthy options. As is my wont, I chose a truck that I had never tried before. The Good Karma Kitchen truck was in attendance. I don’t think I had even seen this one before – they seem to spend most of their time in Fort Worth. They make gluten-free vegetarian food.
I chose the first item on their menu, the Spicy Asian Tacos – “Slow Roasted Korean BBQ’d tofu w/shaved carrots, jalepeno lime cream & ginger pickles.”
Do you think that sounds good? If you do, you are right.
Pizza at the Village… and a Whoopie Pie
In the Northeast quadrant of the city of Dallas, about six miles out from the skyscrapers of Downtown, sits a big ol’ apartment development, The Village. It was always a big part of my life the first decade or so I lived in Texas, though I never lived there. A lot of my friends did and I spent a lot of time hanging out in The Village.
When I first moved here The Village was the big Singles Apartment Development. It held about fourteen different apartment complexes with maybe ten thousand residents – almost all of them single. It was when it was still legal to have “adult apartments” that did not allow children. A little pricey for me, I lived a couple of cheaper places in the area and a lot of people I knew had an apartment there at one time or another.
The central nexus was The Village Country Club – a complex of pools, tennis courts, athletic fields, with a large clubhouse right in the center of all the action. They would have parties, live music, or sports leagues there, indoors and out. For a wide swath of Dallas young people, it was the place to be. I felt a little above all of that… preferring the more bohemian downbeat parts of town… but looking back it was a lot of fun. I spent a lot more time there than I thought I was and always had a good time.
All this came to a screeching halt in 1989 when the federal government made it illegal to refuse children from rental housing. Overnight, The Village became nothing more than another bunch of crappy apartments. I miss it.
So I saw on this interweb thing that there were going to be some food trucks down in the Village Country Club parking lot after work. I decided to run down there and grab a bite. I went more out of nostalgia than hunger.
It hadn’t changed much – the trees were much larger, the atmosphere more laid back and family friendly, but there were memories stirred up… all of them good.
The trucks down there were the usual suspects – but there was a pizza truck I had never been to before, The Gepetto Pizza Truck – so I bought an eight inch pie. It was pretty good – pizza is pizza and always good eats.
One of the lines of food trucks at the Village Country Club.
When you visit a place you haven’t seen in years – it’s always surprising how much the trees have grown.
The Gepetto Pizza Truck
Making Pizzas.
I don’t know if I’ve ever had a pizza I didn’t like.
After I ate, I called Candy to see if she wanted me to bring something back for her and she asked about desserts. Rockstar Bakeshop was down there with their truck, “Layla”, so I bought her a homemade whoopie pie… and didn’t eat any of it. She said it was good… rich, but good.
Rockstar Bakeshop always gives its fare fantastic names.
Rockstar Bakeshop’s truck, “Layla”
Arroz con Pollo!
One of the best things about a big food truck fair is that the huge crowds will attract food trucks from other cities. Not surprisingly, some of the best ones drive up from Austin.
At the last big fair I went to I was walking around looking for trucks I hadn’t tried before, with a special eye out for trucks from other towns, I spotted a food truck that offered Colombian food. It was called Sabor Colombiano on Wheels and is based in San Antonio. It looked different from the other trucks which are mostly based on large, boxy, UPS-style bodies. This one was a converted RV.
There wasn’t much of a line waiting to order, but more like a large clot standing off to the side. Their menu was simple: Chicken and Rice, Fried Plantains, and Beef Empanadas. I ordered the arroz con pollo with the platanos fritos on the side. They explained that the food came out in big batches and that was why everybody was standing in a group.
So I pushed into the crowd and waited. After a while, the orders started coming out. There was a little table with some sort of relish and a pinkish sauce. I have no idea what these were, but I knew I wanted some. When my order came up I pushed the crowd back so I could get to the little table and ladle on plenty of the two mystery sauces.
The food was really good. It wasn’t too pimped up or fancy… simply good hearty Colombian peasant fare. I really like the arroz con pollo – it was just right. I’ve eaten a lot of platanos fritos in my day, and everybody makes them differently. These were slices of plantain smashed flat and fried crisp, which was very good.
So, if you are in San Antonio and looking for a bite, look up Sabor Colombiano on Wheels on facebook and see where they are at.
Oh, and the sauces… I still have no idea.
The Colombian Food truck was a converted recreational vehicle.
A simple menu.
Arroz con pollo, platanos fritos, and some mystery sauces
Bill Chance 