the mighty cone, solar pumps, and a shiny knife in austin
Sunny days helped visitors recharge their devices at solar pump stations (from local Beth Ferguson and the Sol Design Lab),
almost as delightful to find as the vintage on South Congress (my friend Laura in a bold jacket at Flashback Vintage).
We discovered all kinds of food vendors in a lot where there was once only an Airstream with a rotating cupcake, including the new Cutie Pies Wagon, where the window was wreathed in maribou, and we celebrated Pi Day on Sunday with a buttermilk pie.
Local favorite Hudson’s on the Bend has a spot nearby to sell their “mighty cones,”
and their avocado cone was just as good as the ones they sell at the Austin City Limits festival in the fall (and the chile dusting the fries and spiking the ketchup were further reminders why the restaurant is beloved here).
Sunday night, I happened into the underground dinner theater of serious Brooklyn food maestro Michael Cirino of A Razor, A Shiny Knife (you’ll see Brooklyn author (The Art of Eating In) and blogger Cathy Erway cooking in the kitchen too).
It’s all in the details—the ash Michael created for the goat cheese in the salad,
the orange juice that cooked the carrots,
the wit of Jay Parkinson (at left, he wrote a wonderful blog post about the night) and the thoughtfulness of Robert Fabricant (at right) and a whole group of strangers meeting for the first time to eat and cook together,
the splendid shavings of truffle over silky puree that you had to close your eyes to taste (there was a beautiful course with brussel sprouts and grapes before this),
and if you ask for extra fat you shall receive it from Michael,
before he presents a peppered granita,
kitchen torches appear,
and mignardises dazzle: sparkly bourbon spheres and strips like fruit leather,
bourbon gelée.
I snuck another bourbon ball from the kitchen that had produced so much molecular gastronomy that night (truly, the power of underground dinners is that the magic is mobile, powered by the creative force of the cooks, and for all its whim, the experience is a circular and shaped one),
and, meeting up with Christina downtown, and with new friends that produce local Hill Country wine and have a pet rooster, off we went into the starry Austin night…
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Posted by Kristen Taylor on Tuesday, March 16th, 2010, 9:30 am * Filed in Entertaining, Food, Travel. * Tags: austin, dinner, kristen, kthread, taylor, underground. Follow responses through the RSS 2.0 feed. Leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
March 16th, 2010 at 9:39 am
Awww man! I didn’t know this was happening! Wish I could have hung out with you all :) Sorry I missed you Kristen
March 16th, 2010 at 10:49 am
Looks delightful! I can’t wait to hear more about your sojourn through SXSW =)
March 16th, 2010 at 12:11 pm
Andre, sorry to miss you too, but I’m sure our conference travel will put us in the same city again at some point this spring. I’ve been watching all your great tweets from SxSW–
John, I have been meaning to e-mail. It truly was a sunny weekend. And your Ink and Vellum has returned, which makes me happy too, congrats—