When I moved to Houston I found a world of cuisine that I could have never dreamed of before—growing up in rural Louisiana we thought that Mexican food at Casa Manana in Lake Charles was the bomb. And I had no idea that there was such a thing as Vietnamese cuisine—but I fell in love with it as soon as I tried it. Of course back at that time Kim Son was all the rage and seemed to be the pinnacle of Vietnamese cuisine in Houston. But lately I have a new restaurant obsession. My friends and I have rediscovered …continue reading

Growing up in Cajun country where fish is battered and deep fried, the idea of sushi was completely foreign to me. I first ate at a Japanese restaurant in 1986 when I visited a friend in Houston. It was something I had only heard of on TV.  I recall that excursion to Miyako—the original out Westheimer—I marveled at the novelty of dining on raw fish and balled up rice wrapped in seaweed. Over the years since then I have been lucky to experience a wide variety of Japanese restaurants all over the world and have come to learn that the cuisine isn’t just a …continue reading

The Next Door Bar is a Montrose drinkery on the same block as Rudyard’s at 2020 Waugh in Houston—seems like it has been there forever. The bar serves up strong cheap drinks, Lone Star in a bottle, a rockin’ juke box, old fashioned video games, and plenty of people watching. I stopped in last week for a nightcap and to see the Halloween decorations—this is a neighborhood watering hole that tends to go all out at Halloween. I’ve been a patron for at least a decade. But Next Door isn’t only a hard core drinking bar; it is also, as …continue reading