Hungry?

A word about the local cuisine. It's delicious. The one good thing I'd heard about Houston before making the trip (which is a shame, really - the more I'm down here, the more I see that there are lots of good things) is that the restaurant scene is a superb one. So far, that's definitely been an accurate assessment. There are just a ton of places to find good food around here.

Obviously, the two that stand out most are Tex/Mex and barbeque. I'm a huge fan of the former, and ambivalent towards the latter. That's been reflected in my choice of restaurants thus far. I've eaten Tex/Mex thrice and had ZERO barbeque. Brian insists that I try it, however, and is certain that my ambivalence is resulting from the fact that I haven't had good barbeque before, so we have plans to grab some before I leave. As for the Tex/Mex, the two standouts have been a restaurant called Tony's which served a phenomenal Chile Relleno, and El Paraiso where I had some very good Enchiladas Verdes.

When the food you're eating is in part named after the state you're currently eating it in, you tend to get the real deal. Tony's and El Paraiso have provided that so far, but as many of you have seen from the comments, it has been impressed upon me that I go visit Taco Cabana, a local fast food taco joint which, down here at least, rivals Taco Bell. Rest assured, I'll hit there in a couple of days too, much to my cousin's disgust (among other things, he's somewhat of a gourmet cook and has provided some fantastic meals when we haven't eaten out - steak salad with fresh clementines, raspberries, and goat cheese anyone?) I don't care. I'm here to experience the local flavor. Taco Cabana is somehow a part of that. I'm stopping in, but don't worry - I'll make sure to get the preventative angioplasty beforehand.

On that note, I'll also mention that much of the local food is ridiculously fattening. Actually, in recent years, Houston has squared off with Detroit in a bitter battle over the highest percentage of obese residents, and it's easy to see why. Like Los Angeles, nobody walks here. There's enough sprawl and things are spaced far enough apart where driving five blocks doesn't seem like a big deal. Also, some of the favorite local foods are just mind-boggling. Take, for example, the Frito Pie, which is a plate full of frito's and topped with chili and cheese. I was very close to ordering one of these at the rodeo, but couldn't bring myself to. The gag reflex was just too much. Instead, I settled on a funnel cake, which is much like fried dough except prepared a little differently. Flour is squeezed from a tube into a vat of boiling lard (or other fattening oil) and the resulting "cake" looks like, well I'm not sure... click the link to see. I really shouldn't be eating all this crap, I know, but whatever - it's a vacation. Besides, this is what gym's are for. One of these days, I'll start going to mine.

Alright, enough about food. I'm off to go explore the city some more. If I can get the damn camera to work, I'll post some more pictures later. Have fun, folks.