Flavors of the Month: July 2019

Austin restaurants and dishes are featured in my monthly Flavors of the Month posts. Check out this post for recommendations!

Pastrami Sandwich at Mum Foods
We ate at Mum Foods on the fourth of July and I’m still dreaming about the Rachel sandwich. If Mum Foods sounds familiar, we usually get their brisket and pastrami at the farmers market. This pastrami sandwich is next level. It’s pastrami, Emmental cheese, slaw, and special sauce on sourdough, and I’m over here counting the days until I get more of it. We also tried the chocolate chip cookie and buttermilk cookie. They were very sugary but I’d order the cookie again. It has chocolate from local company SRSLY.

Lobster Noodles at First Chinese BBQ
We don’t eat Chinese food very often, so when we do, everything tastes amazing. This is one of my favorite dishes – steamed, then stir-fried lobster in garlic sauce poured over egg noodles. The noodles end up juicy and bouncy, and of course, the lobster is delicious.

Dessert at Snowy Village Café (Complimentary)
I went to a tasting at Snowy Village Café and am a big fan of their bingsu and taiyaki! Bingsu is milky shaved ice with toppings and taiyaki is fresh made fish-shaped croissant with filling and toppings. I got the assorted fruit bingsu and red bean taiyaki with whipped cream, bananas, and strawberries. They’ve got a pretty big menu with variety. You could also get your bingsu in a pineapple or watermelon!

Korean Fried Chicken at HiWings
This is currently my favorite place for Korean fried chicken in Austin. The breading and sauces are excellent! I love the mango habanero (hot I can handle) and the lemon pepper (sauce-less, very crispy). We’ve been getting the whole chicken with two sauces.

Lunch at Sugar Pine
New casual Japanese restaurant Sugar Pine been opened about a month or so and I loved it! On the savory side, we got katsu chicken curry (like a bento-box), chicken karaage, soba noodles, and onigiri. When I come back, I must have more onigiri and the chicken karaage set dish! I also liked their ice cream (tried taro and matcha) and fresh waffle cones. I want to come back for their Thai tea and black sesame flavors!

Burger and Lunch at Carpenters Hall
This new-ish restaurant is at Carpenters Hotel in South Austin are warm and cozy all over. Lunch was excellent, from the bean dip and ceviche to this juicy burger and fries. I like that the burger had big pickle slices and the toasted buns were crispy. I would order it all again, but I would want to come back to try their desserts and cocktails. The hotel also has a small coffee shop with pastries.

Dinner at Vasquez Restaurant
I don’t typically crave Mexican food but I will happily eat this plate of tacos at Vasquez Restaurant. Simply dressed with onion and cilantro, this plate has two each of barbacoa, al pastor, and beef fajita.

Dinner at Intero
I’ve been thinking about returning to Intero for almost a year! The Italian restaurant strives to use all parts of the animal and produce. My friend Janna and I dined during restaurant week last year and loved it. Will and I visited for dinner recently. Here are the dishes we had:

bruschetta, eggplant caponata, feta, smoked garlic, basil
charred okra, sweet peppers, nduja, potato butter, cured egg
coal-roasted butternut squash, mushroom, guajillo, beef fat hollandaise
gnocchi, roasted chicken, yellow squash, brown butter, pecan
ravioli, smoked snapper, charred tomato, pickled chiles, dill

If you visit, I recommend the bruschetta and the spaghettini, which I loved on my first visit.

Thanksgiving Dinner
I had a turkey from last Thanksgiving sitting in my freezer and my friend Dan graciously offered to cook it along with mashed potatoes and stuffing. I believe he did a dry brine and then cooked it in an infrared cooker. The dinner was delicious!

Dinner at Suerte
Did you see my post about Suerte? If you like upscale Mexican food, it’s definitely a restaurant you should check out. See all the details in this post.