Tex-Czech picnic stew
Czech Texans often serve this hearty beef and potato stew known a picnic stew at community gatherings.
Soup recipes
Red lentils with jalapeños and lime
One of my dearest friends recently gave up eating meat. As we were talking about her new lifestyle, I asked if she was enjoying lots of beans. She replied that…
Chili Queens chili
The first time I heard about the San Antonio Chili Queens, I was on a plane. A friend wanted to make a documentary about Tex-Mex, and she showed me her…
Green chile pork posole
Last week, I lost my sense of smell. Thankfully, my sense of taste was still functioning, so eating wasn’t completely strange. But everything had only the basic essence of salt,…
Black-eyed peas for New Year’s Day
My first New Year’s Day in New York City, I was panic struck: where was I going to find my annual dose of black-eyed peas? Not having any of the…
Butter beans
One day my grandma mentioned my uncle was preparing a big pot of butter beans for dinner. She then asked how I liked to cook them, but I confessed they…
Chicken tortilla soup
In the 1930s, a Dallas cooking school advertised its course offerings, stating that it would be teaching how to make tortilla soup. This was the first mention in the Texas…
Fideo loco
A few years ago, I was enjoying breakfast tacos at Pete’s in San Antonio and I spotted a sign advertising fideo loco. In Tex-Mex, when an item is qualified with…
Black-eyed pea gumbo
Black-eyed peas have long been the dish of choice for Texans on New Year’s Day. While this humble field pea was once considered poor-people food and not eaten by polite…
West Texas black beans with green chiles
When I first moved to Austin in my early 20s, one thing that struck me about the Tex-Mex on offer there was the prevalence of black beans. While the standard…