Curras Grill

http://www.currasgrill.com                                                          Austin, TX
https://www.facebook.com/CurrasGrill

The plan:
Find the best barbecue on our way to the airport so we could fly home bathed in smoke and sauce to savor the whole flight home.

Reality:
A local told us... 
    "Oooo.  You'll never get in there.  They usually sell out by now.  They might even be closed."
    "So where do we go?"

We passed Curras many times during the week going to and from the Onion Creek Field for the Aussie Rule Football finals in Austin, TX.  The place falls in the "hole in the wall" category, based on it's location and exterior: unassuming.  Our Local told us she took ALL her out of town friends to Curras.  Now we know why.

Steve ordered Carnitas Tacos.  I had Chicken Mole.  Our young waiter was happy to give us his opinion.  He has Mexican heritage and had worked in several Mexican restaurants.  He emphatically insisted that we would enjoy our food.  He explained the complex preparations of both dishes.  The mole had over 27 ingredients!  He promised us we would enjoy our meal.

Highlights:
- Chips and Salsa: crunchy, thick chips, lightly salted.  Complex and gentle heat in the dip.  Fresh.  No disappointment, but this traditional appetizer did not stand out from other great places we have enjoyed, HOWEVER...

- The mole tasted like eating perfume.  Seriously.  The flavors were subtle and complex.  Light and satisfying.  The chicken was TENDER.  Whoa!  Whew! Yum!  Woo!  Wow....

- The Carnitas did not disappoint. 

Now, if you read my review of Hopdoddy this will sound familiar...  Is it Austin?  Will we find this at more restaurants here?  WHAT is with these people?!  They do not take any part of their menu for granted.  For 99.99% restaurants a shell is a shell.  Get it out of the bag, serve your amazing food on the shell and out ya go!  Right?  Not here.  Just as Hopdoddy serves their amazing food on an amazing bun, Curras serves their amazing food on an AMAZING corn tortilla.

- Soft Taco Shells:  Scratch-made at the restaurant, these corn tortillas were soft, tender, flexible, silky.  Da BOMB!  Steve could not decide whether the shells were flour or corn.  He ordered corn.  They smelled like corn.  They felt like flour?!  The texture (both to the hand, eye and the mouth) was CRAZY good!  We were eating at a table by a window in the afternoon with lots of natural light!  These shells completely elevated this dish.

If I sound effusive, I am.  Plain and simple, our meal was simply amazing.

So our flight home was not wrapped in glorious clouds of smoke and BBQ sauce.  Instead we were laughing about judging a "book" by it's cover.  An unassuming restaurant can hold a pearl of delicious dishes, prepared with love.

Cinco NOMS out of cinco!
I can not wait to get back to Austin to try other dishes from Curras.

P. Terry's Burger Stand

http://www.pterrys.com                                                    Austin, TX
https://www.facebook.com/pages/P-Terrys/49039729644

Without going into detail, we nearly doubled the cost of our trip to Austin trying to get off the plane in Dallas to go to In-N-Out, and then driving on to Austin!  DARN that airline!

THEN we found out that In-N-Out had THREE locations in Austin!!!
THEN we discovered that NONE of them were open, yet!!!
The heartache!  The sadness!  The disappointment!!

With our heads hung low, we heard that P. Terry's is a pretty good burger chain  in Texas.  We expected very little from it (lets face it... It is not In-N-Out), but thought we would give it a shot.  We set aside time in our eating schedule.  While on my far flung Goodwill adventures I found a P. Terry's on a ridge overlooking Austin in the Hill Country, and figured the view would be nice in the evening.
Steve was super tired, but he was game for an adventure.  This location had a fun and fabulous over-the-top mid-century modern (almost Jetson's) design.  The city lights were just coming up and the view is SPEC-tacular.
So much of what they do is replicated from In-N-Out.  Even the way the cooks dress!  Some menu variations, but we were just looking for burgers and fries.  P. Terry's far exceeded our expectations.  If we closed our eyes, we imagined that we could have been eating at In-N-Out.  We sat on the patio, and even though it was chilly, we totally enjoyed the lights of Austin below.
 
I have to say, we love Raleigh, but we sure miss the long-distance views, let alone city views.  

We were so happy to quietly eat our burgers and fries while enjoying the playfulness of the architecture, and the twinkle of the lights below us.
Happy and sated we headed to the car.  We sat as the car warmed up and looked directly out the front window.
  "What is THAT?"
  "I have NO idea."
  "What the...?"
After a few minutes, we realized we were watching a HUGE Texas moon rise. HUGE!  (We were in Texas, after all...).  Within about ten minutes, the moon was up and we continued to sit and watch in disbelief.  If Steve hadn't been so cold and tired we would have stayed longer ... Lingering in the post-burger and city lights beauty of the evening.

Five noms out of five, even though it is not In-N-Out.

We will go back to P. Terry's next time, but only to this location with the AMAZING view!
(We'll save In-N-Out for California trips!)

Hopdoddy Burger Bar

http://www.facebook.com/hopdoddy         Austin, TX
http://www.hopdoddy.com

We thought we would hit a steakhouse for dinner in Austin two years ago.  When we realized the prices for said "steak and taters", I suggested we find a good burger joint, instead.  I don't remember what led us to Hopdoddy, but what a find!!!

We did not understand why they would not let us in.  Bouncers for a restaurant?  Nope.  The line to place orders ended just inside the door.  We learned that we were lucky!  Other times the line wraps around the outside of the building! The order counter is in the back of the restaurant.  The WAY back!  We waited in line along the busy and friendly bar counter, only to be zig-zagged to yet another line that continued to the rear of the restaurant!  Clearly Hopdoddy is something special.

Remember, too: this is Austin.  This is a foodie town.  These people have many options for amazing food.  For Austin to wait in line for delicious food is saying something!

Now I will go weird.  Austin? Texas?  BEEF, right?!  The beef of their burgers is fantastic, but in the 24 months between my first and second visit, do you know what I remember?  The big jelly-roll pans they serve their food on?  The great fries?  The kooky topping combinations?  The great service? Yes, there are those to remember... But what stands out are the amazing hamburger BUNS!  Made on-site, they are at once soft and toothy.  The yeasty perfume still fragrances my memories!  Never have I had such a delicious bun.

Now, a comedic moment.  We didn't speak for probably the first 15 minutes of our dinner once the food arrived at our table!  We were entranced.  Transported.  Don't get me wrong.... We like our food.  We consider ourselves Foodies.  More gourmand than gourmet, but we appreciate food.  We were so taken by the food we forgot to speak!  That has never happened before or since!

What we ate for both our first and second visits?  I don't remember.  Seriously.  Bad form, I know!  I take that back.  I had a goat cheese salad to start this past visit, and it was beautiful! Oh my.  Nuf said. (Sorry, Roy.  This was a good goat!)

Hopdoddy is a permanent fixture on the SpatulaCity.net Austin Restaurant List (yes, we do have a list) for all future visits.  We heard they have other locations: Dallas and Scottsdale, too!  Lucky spuds. Sigh.

Nom-nom-nom-nom-nom!
(Five enthusiastic Noms out of five!!!)

Verts

http://www.facebook.com/vertskebap             Austin, TX
http://www.vertskebap.com

Steve likes a good gyro.  Austin would know a good gyro.  I sought out a good gyro place to surprise him.  But as you read, I was looking in Austin, so the place I found was fun, tasty, and  fresh.

I started with Yelp, and soon found Verts.  Bee Cave, TX wasn't too far away since I was near the Hill Country - scouring Goodwill stores in Austin (but that is for another post) so...

A very friendly (we're in the south, y'all) patron in front of me could see me craning my neck to figure out how to order.  He quickly explained the process, and told me that he ate there at least three to five times a week!  I liken Verts to the gyro version of Chipotle.  Clean, fun, fresh gyros, with a vegan version to boot.

The guys that started Verts are Germans who went through the MBA program in Austin.  With all the great food and the quantity of Food Trucks around town, they thought they would serve up food they loved and missed: Berlin-style gyros that are super popular as street food.  They started serving out of a Smartcar, and have quickly expanded.  There are several brick and mortar locations, and more to come.

Although I am super sensitive to salt, and Verts can be salty, this is also on my permanent Austin Food List.  We are going to have to make our vacations longer to get in our favorites AND make new finds.  What a delightful First World problem.

Four Noms out of five.
    (Sorry... Took off one for the quantity of salt.)

Patrick Jane's Gourmet Pizza Bar

http://www.patrick-janes.com                                         Cary, NC
https://www.facebook.com/PatrickJanesPizzaBar

Attended their Australia Day celebration (Australia Day marks the anniversary of the 1788 arrival of the First Fleet of British Ships at Sydney Cove, New South Wales).  Also in attendance were the NC Tigers - your local Australian Rules Football team:

To celebrate, they had a special menu with some traditional Aussie favorites.  We ordered a meat pie, but they ran through their first batch so quickly, there were not any ready.  We got a sausage roll instead.  Here's a picture of our sausage roll:

or, what's left of it...  we were told that it wasn't a traditional preparation, but what to we know, it was noms!

Anita got the Goat & Pecan salad:

 For the main course, we got a Shakin Bacon pizza:

We finished our meal off with a lamington (a dessert of Australian origin. It consists of squares of sponge cake coated first in a layer of traditionally chocolate sauce, then in coconut) -- no picture -- newbie mistake.

If you are a traditional pizza lover, this may not be your place, but it's fresh, clean, and a different take on pizza.

Landmark Restaurant Diner

Featured on "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives"                      Charlotte, NC

The place was busy, we thought that was a good indication...

The service was slow, our server was not that familiar with the menu, and she did not know what Guy ordered on Triple D.

From what we had heard, the restaurant is operated by Greeks, so I thought the Greek platter would be a safe bet.  It was rather mediocre and the gyro was not fresh -- it was pre-packaged, heated, and put on the plate.  The portion size was rather generous, but again, the food was not great.  The tzatziki saved the day, it was was quite nom!

The place was busy and featured on Triple D, so they must be doing something right, we did not see it.  Overall, I'll have to give Landmark a Goat.

Penguin Drive-In

Alex and Penguin's Pimento Cheese Burger

                  Charlotte, NC


Featured on both "Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives" and "Man v. Food"

http://www.penguindrive-in.com
http://www.penguinrestaurant.com

The Penguin never disappoints!

Update: Google has the Penguin Drive-In as "Permanently Closed" --
sad face :(