MEXICAN STANDOFF GEORGE TOOMER VS. W.L. TAITTE

A note from the referee:

Wait. Wait. Tell me it’s the death of high tech. Even the death of sex. But Tex-Mex? Say it ain’t so, José. I came to Texas because of Mexican food, can eat it three times a day-I even dream about it at night. And I’m not picky. If about half the plate looks brown and the other half looks yellow and somewhere there’s a patch of green, it’s　Mex-ican to me and I’m likely to like it. So how can something that tastes so fine be in decline? What are they arguing about? The correct color of guacamole? The virtue/vice of cilantro? The proper consistency of frijoles? It’s beans to me.

Still, some people can’t leave well enough alone. So I got stuck holding a tape recorder while two bona fide foodies with quite different dispositions and conflicting tastes tried to hash out this Mexican food mess. What is Tex-Mex? Does Dallas have the real thing? Why is it so popular? Do fajitas count? And who’s got the best, dammit?

Our idiosyncratic dialogue opens in La Trendosa, an imaginary Mexican restaurant. In the far corner, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and a look of doubt, is George Toomer, restaurant consultant, local bard and self-proclaimed “cultural slut.” George’s status as a junk food expert and champion of the people’s taste got him featured in People magazine along with James Beard and Julia Child. “And I’ve been on the ’Today’ show five [times,” he brags. “And who cares? But gosh, Jane Pauley’s pretty. I looked down her blouse.”

And in this corner, wearing a suit (“Give me a break, I had to go to a funeral”), W.L. (Lawson) Taitte, D restaurant critic, opera aficionado and otherwise down-to-earth guy. “What kind of car is that?” he asks of George’s Bentley, one of the five cars George drives. Lawson is a serious eater and a tough critic. If the meat’s too tough, he’ll cut it with his pen. When it comes to food, he’s no Mr. Nice Guy.

George is a celebrity, although few people know why, including George. But the face is familiar. Lawson is well known too, but by name only, with bylines in this publication as well as in Texas Monthly and The New York Times. His face remains a secret lest an overzealous restaurateur try to feed him something better-or deadlier-than what you or would get.

They aren’t alike, these men. They don’t go to the same parties or answer the same personals. Not that they’re a perfect study in contrast. The truth of the matter is that George, the People’s Palate, worries that fast food will be the death of good eating. Lawson, schooled in the intricacies of classic cuisine, has been spotted at the grocery store digging through frozen food. George claims he knows what the People like, but he isn’t always eager to eat it. When George says “sump’n’s missing” in a salsa, Lawson can tell you what. But they’ll both assure you it’s not great salsa.

As different as they are, George and Lawson have some mutual raves. Both fondly recall the Mexican combination plate of their childhoods, variously known as the Number Three, the Number Seven, the Rosita, etc. If our encounter confirmed anything, it’s that it’s harder to find simple Tex-Mex than it used to be, and unfortunately, simple tends to be better. Or is that just the way we remember it?



George: So you’re a trained palate.

Lawson: I don’t know that I’m any more trained than you are. George: You’re probably not. I have a 280-pound resume and you obviously don’t.

Lawson: Wait a minute, now, I’m 50 pounds overweight. That counts. What kind of restaurant is this, anyway?

George: It’s new. Tex-Mex, I think.

Lawson: Awfully crowded. Big menu. too. Points off for that, because that means they’re trying to do too much.

George: I think Mexican food is always fun. The thing that bothers me is the new slicking of it, particularly the fajita deal. I mean, we’ll probably see armadillo fajitas, swordfish fajitas… something in taupe.

Lawson: Hold it. Fajitas aren’t new. They’re just new to Dallas. And as for slick, didn’t you have a lot to do with Genaro’s, which is quasi-Mexican, heavy on the fish and pretty as a postcard?

George: A postcard of Miami. It’s Genaro’s Tropical-it’s meant to be neither authentic Mexican, or Tex-Mex.

Lawson: Nor Tex-Mex. George: Huh?

Lawson: Nor, not or. I’m cor-recting your grammar.

George: Oh no. not one of those.Lawson: Well, D is worried that Tex-Mex might be dying.

George: D worries too much. Tex-Mex is a myth created by people who write menus.

Lawson: Not exactly. “Tex-Mex”-specifically as a restaurant food-was an invention to offer a bit of flavor-cumin, oregano, peppers, onions, garlic, etc.-to the deprived Anglo-Teutonic palates of our forebears. It does not quite admit of culinary distinction-it’s usually too routinized, and it’s often made with prefab chili powder, and so on-but it can be very good. And by the way, don’t you write menus?

George: Look, the more expensive the ingredients, the crummier the food. And all good Mexican food-the real stuff-is produced by people under the poverty line.

Lawson: George, that’s arrogant racism. Mexico has one of the world’s great indigenous cuisines-a kaleidoscopic blend of Spanish, French and Indian influences. Sadly and ironically, restaurants even in Mexico don’t do a very good job of showing off the variety of the native cuisines. There are some local holes-in-the-wall in the various Mexican cities that do good jobs with various regional specialties. In Mexico City there is one fair place that tries to give an overview of the gastronomic territory, and there used to be at least one good Yucatecan restaurant. But Mexico City, like so many other big cities, prefers international-especially French-cooking in its fancier restaurants over the local stuff. So does New York. So does Dallas. Where in either city can you send a person who wants to learn about the great traditions in American cooking?

George: There’s a place in New York called America that’s supposed to be grass-roots “momma” food, but they put caviar on their nachos.

Lawson: It’s sad that only the French, the Chinese and, to some extent, the Italians have established a specifically restaurant-oriented tradition of fine cooking, but it’s a fact.

[Chips arrive.]

George: [biting into one] You can always tell whether a restaurant is Middle America by the consistency of the chip. The chips at El Fenix are for people with no teeth. The more expensive the restaurant, the harder the chips are to eat.

Lawson: Well, these chips are pretty good and fresh and the hot sauce is pretty fresh too. But there’s no cilantro in it.

George: Cilantro? Cilantro is wimpy, like fern bars or wheat bread. I don’t know all that you know, but I get paid to taste food in restaurants, as a consultant. I know what the public likes. And I’m right on that. Something may be culinary perfection, but the public ain’t going to like it. Cilantro’s trendy, but it doesn’t have staying power.

Lawson: That’s one thing we keep around the house. When I’m trying to lose weight, I put cilantro in everything.

George: Oh, yeah. Go to Mexico and see if they have cilantro around the house.

Lawson: Well, sure they do. You know the first place I ever had cilantro? At El Pastor on the square in Reynosa. They had the cabrito up on the wall and beans with so much cilantro that even I thought it was too much.

George: You didn’t even hear about cilantro in Dallas until about four years ago.

Lawson: I know, but better late than never.

George: I think cilantro is cute. Girl food!

Lawson: But it still tastes good. And I have a close friend who’s married to a Mexican girl. Her family cooks with cilantro all the time.

George: [perusing the menu] You can tell if a Mexican restaurant is for Middle America because you can pronounce everything on the menu. Some places even spell it out so you don’t embarrass yourself. You know, TAH-CO. CHA-LOO-PA.

Lawson: [closing his menu, gesturing for the waiter] If you order the El Gigantes dinner, you’re probably going to get everything the place has except for fajitas.

George: Most of these dinners are reasonable. It’s the antidote that’s expensive. [to the waiter] I think I’ll just have the Gringo Deluxe and a small stretcher.

Lawson: I’ll have the Number Two Trendosa.

George: One of the big trends over the years in Mexican restaurants is the puff taco. I think that was an accountant’s decision.

Lawson: No, that was Ojeda’s decision, About 17 years ago. Then they spread like cancer.

George: I gotta say I hate these little plastic butter tubs. Butter shot from a gun.

Lawson: Yes. And what about those frozen, rock-hard mini-tubs of butter at Genaro’s? You have to shave it off.

George: [glares, changes subject] The trouble with a Mexican lunch like this is that you have to forewarn everybody you’re going to see that afternoon. You get breath that’ll coat their teeth.

[The food arrives.]

George: You’ve got to admit this was quick stuff. Probably ready since Wednesday.

Lawson: We should’ve timed it. Always makes you wonder [takes a bite]. Well, the beans aren’t very good.

George: You know, a lot of times they extend this stuff with oatmeal.

Lawson: That’s one ingredient I can’t detect.

George: Mexican food sure used to be a big deal. You know, it was an occasion to go eat Mexican.

Lawson: Because there was nothing you could eat in Texas that had any taste to it. I remember eating my first pizza when 1 was 10 years old, in Harlingen, at II Sorrento restaurant. It was an exotic delicacy. Tomato sauce, oregano-I mean, you just didn’t eat that stuff. Chinese food was limited to chop suey and sweet-and-sour pork gristle. And there was barbecue. Mexican food was one of the few foods that didn’t taste like something from provincial Germany. Compared to what was around then, this stuff tasted pretty good.

George: I remember those days. Boiling was the main mode of cooking. Put everything in the pot until it got soft, or make salad. My mother bought one of those salad master sets when I was a child. She turned everything that moved into salad. But we used to go out for Mexican food. It was always great fun. It was so much better than mother’s Mexican food. Of course, anything was better than mother’s Mexican food.



Lawson: There was a time when I tried to go out for Mexican food at least three times a week.



George: I remember a place here called the Acapulco Cafe. I think it was in a converted garage, or service station. It was right where the parking lot is at El Fenix downtown. I’ve never tasted a chili con queso as good as that used to be. Good chili con queso has a chicken broth base. I’ve tasted it made just right in Genaro’s on occasion. Can’t nail it down. Peppers or something.



Lawson: A lot of the old stuff was made out of Velveeta and Rotel tomatoes out of a can. They’d just melt down the Velveeta and stir in the Rotel tomatoes. The best Mexican chain in the Valley did it that way. [frowns] This guacamole is no good. It looks like it’s got tomato in there, but it doesn’t taste like it has tomato, or garlic or anything. It’s extremely bland.

George: And what are the rules for making guacamole, O Elitist Palate of the Four Stars?

Lawson: Not much to it. You mash avocados, not too fine. You find some way to smash up tomatoes and onions, fresh peppers if you like ’em, cilantro, if you like that, and otherwise nothing but salt, pepper and lime juice. That’s the right way to make guacamole.

George: Yeah, you’re right. Except the part about the cilantro.

Lawson: This guacamole doesn’t have enough acid in it. The pH is off by at least two points.

George: And look at this. You can’t even see the enchilada. It’s a puddle. The cheese is the same height, and the cheese is higher than the beans.

Lawson: Aside from the topography of the plate, real refried beans ought to be thick with lard.



George: Have you noticed that some places have beans with a plastic-looking glaze?



Lawson: Yes, I have. And I’ve spotted another depressing trend: Sometimes at the last minute they put this stuff in the broiler, so you get broiled Mexican food. Points off.



George: The microwave was the death of Mexican food.



Lawson: So Mexican food is dead?

George: Nah, that’s just an expression. But it’s suffering.

Lawson: Hmmm. These tamales are better than 1 expected. It’s hard to find a good tamale, even in Mexico. The texture of the masa is more important than the filling. The filling can be cat meat, but the masa should be good.

George: My family used to own a tamale factory. We’d go over ’ and eat them right when the machine popped ’em out. It was over on Second Avenue. Come to think of it, 1 don’t know if we owned the building or the factory. I was very young. Anyway, I’ve always eaten out.

Lawson: My aunts made la-males.

George: Ugh, homemade ta-males. Get a free one if you can guess the meat.

Lawson: No, they can be good. But they seldom are.

George: People try too hard. Why would you want to make this in your home when someone else can do it so much better? Nothing’s wasted in real Mexican food. That’s the key to good Mexican food. Roof of cow mouth, ears, lips, anything that can be cut from a goat. The glories of leftovers.

Lawson: The fact that you say cow shows that you’re from North Texas. If you were talking about Mexico Mexican food, you wouldn’t get near a cow. Real Mexican food is based on pork. But even more important than that, it’s based on corn. And the corn products are what have suffered. This yucky taco shell, the yucky tortillas. Tortillas are what makes the difference between a place like this and a place like Joe T.’s, which is sometimes pretty good. The taco shell at Joe’s is made out of a tortilla, fried with the meat in it, not preformed and assembly-lined.

George: La Fogata on Fitzhugh fries their own tacos. Unfortunately, they also record their own music.

Lawson: But your point, that it’s made with otherwise inedible products, is indisputable.

George: I think the Mexican food restaurant you like best as an adult depends a lot on what you grew up on. People in San Antonio will always say San Antonio is the home of Tex-Mex and that it’s the best. I’m not from there; it didn’t knock my lights out, you know. But California has the worst Mexican food. To me. El Chico was never great. They aspire to recreate their TV dinners. El Fenix is really not bad when it comes to combo plate stuff, They’re consistent. The majority of the people in Dallas grew up on El Fenix, and they don’t even understand the new stuff like red snapper. It’s hard to believe, but for some people, going to El Fenix is an elaborate dining extravaganza.

lawson: There was a place in New Jersey, five miles up the pike from where I once lived, called El Burrito, back in the mid-Sixties, that actually used curry powder in their enchiladas. George: That’ll teach you to look for Mexican food in New Jersey. The problem is the chains. The single worst destroyer of good Mexican food is the franchise.

Lawson: Yeah, that’s probably true. But wait a minute, I thought fast food was your living.

George: Well, only sometimes. Besides, I don’t have to eat the stuff. When you start a commissary and open a warehouse somewhere and all the stuff is delivered to the franchises, then you have to figure out a way to save steps, and when you save steps you destroy quality, Made-from-scratch is always the best.

Lawson: And by hand, and individually. Nothing can really claim to be good Mexican food unless the tortillas are made by hand, patted out by hand by little old ladies. And they need to be made from corn. Flour tortillas are another cause of this death of Mexican food. After all, flour is just barely a Mexican thing. But flour tortillas are about the only kind you can find homemade in Dallas, as far as I know. Her-rera’s makes flour tortillas. Fonda San Miguel in Austin makes corn tortillas.

George: Most com tortillas are cut from big sheets of flat masa. All done by machine.

Lawson: Do you think there is one Mexican restaurant that is The Best?

George: No. When people ask me where to eat Mexican food, I say if you want tacos al carbon go to Chiquita’s and if you want steak go to Javier’s and if you want good rice, try Mocte-zuma’s. No one does everything best. Of course, there are so many places spawned by the same people that often you’re eating the same thing in a different location.

Lawson: To someone who wasn’t specific about what they wanted. I’d say go to Chiquita’s and order the beef d ishes. I might advise them to go to Genaro’s and order the swordfish. But that’s an original recipe. That’s also a restaurant you helped design, so points off.

Maybe it does depend on what you grew up with. For example. I like the enchilada sauce at Joe T.’s, which is heavy on the cumin, because that’s the way my favorite restaurant when I was growing up did it.

George: What? Favorite restaurant? I thought you were of the I-hate-everything school. Do you ever come out and say “This is the best I’ve ever had”?

Lawson: Yes, I do. George: That’s a new twist.

Lawson: But seldom at Mexican restaurants in Dallas.

George: But this is where you live. You’re supposed to know Dallas restaurants. One of them has to be the best.



Lawson: I think we should be cautious in handing out superlatives. Chinese food in Dallas is a lot better than it was a few years ago, and 1 think that might be partly because some of us played Jeremiah for a while and said, “Oh, this Chinese food is rotten,” until it got a little better.



George: Of course, if this were all home kitchen-done they’d lose money. I’d really like to know which items here are brought in-are pre-prepared. That’s real common in the big franchises.



Lawson: Well, quality costs with some dishes. Some things are really just hard to prepare. Not long ago I made chiles rellenos for a friend, and it’s an all-day proposition to do it right.



George: I think you can tell a Mexican restaurant’s authenticity by the fixtures. The more authentic the decor, the less authentic the food’s going to be. I watch for designer adobe. It’s scary, what’s happening at some of the fancy places. Plates going up to $14, $15. You’re not paying for the food, you’re paying for the lights, the real glass-the dining “experience.”

Lawson: I had a “dining experience” the other day. On The Border at two in the afternoon. Nightmare. The place was nearly packed. At two.

George: ’Cause it’s Highland Park. That’s what the name means. On The Border of Highland Park. It’s the number one stop on the gerbil trail.

Lawson: The what?

George: The gerbil trail, the Highland Park gerbil trail. Have you ever seen those houses that gerbils live in, with the tunnels? Well, Highland Park is like that. It’s the cultural ghetto; they don’t even know the names of streets in Dallas. But anything that’s near Turtle Creek, they can figure that out. So the tunnels go from Highland Park to Routh Street Cafe, so they can make it there without having to rub shoulders with the riffraff. Now they’ll add another few feet to the trail and go to The Crescent. That’s why Pepe Gonzalez is making it. It’s in The Quadrangle, on the trail.

Lawson: [sarcastically] It’s always full.

George: It’s always full but it’s real safe, and it’s totally Highland Park. Of course, to them it’s walking on the wild side. Two blocks off Cedar Springs. They’re slumming. As for On The Border, it’s non-Mexican food. White boy food. Capital Tex, lower case mex. By the way, are you from Dallas?

Lawson: No.

George: [smugly] Huh.

Lawson: I am from Texas, though. I grew up in the Valley, where they invented fajitas. My father was eating fajitas 25 years ago.

George: [lost in thought] These people who love On The Border are all health freaks, you know. ..

Lawson: God, you are down on that place, aren’t you?

George: Look, carcinogens come from burning anything, and here are these people, they’ve jogged in to eat burned things. Mesquite. Designer firewood.

Lawson: Mesquite is what grows in Northern Mexico. It wasn’t the designer thing. When we went to the beach in the Valley, that’s what we used to grill our hot dogs. It’s what grew by the roadside. It’s all there was. That or cow patties.

George: I like Dutch Elm fajitas.

Lawson: A woman from The New York Times was shocked to find that fajita meat is sometimes soaked in soy sauce or Worcestershire sauce, which in fact they do in South Texas. She didn’t seem to realize that fajitas are not a Mexican dish, they’re a Valley dish. It was an upscale dish to people in the Valley because it was made with beef. I think it’s kind of like chili. It was really invented here more than there.



George: Genuine chili is a soup. A real hot. thin soup, not crammed with chunks of possum and six kinds of beans and mushrooms and tangerines and God knows what else.



[Sizzling platters of beef, pork, chicken and shrimp arrive. ]

Lawson: Did we order fajitas?

George: I guess they figure everyone eventually orders fajitas.

Lawson: Bark fajitas are slumming. Pork’s a poor cousin to beef.

George: Mmm. These shrimp are good. Need a little sugar. Little salt.



Lawson: [probing with a fork] The meat is burned. This is what happens with these sizzling platters. It’s not the way it’s supposed to be done. The meat just sits on these hot platters, and the longer it sits the more burned it gets.



George: Aren’t fajitas basically make-it-yourself tacos al carbon?



Lawson: Well, tacos al carbon only became a word in the American restaurant industry in 1973 when Ninfa’s opened. Carbon means charcoal. It’s charcoal-broiled taco. In Mexico the meat is cabrito, baby goat. It’s put on a big metal stake and turned in front of the fire until it’s cooked. Then it’s cut up and served with the flour tortillas and the beans with a lot of cilantro and cumin in them. Those are tacos al pastor, pastor meaning shepherd. So it’s a goat shepherd’s dish, cooked the way the shepherds would cook the goat. George: Fajitas are Mexican souvlaki.

Lawson: Not exactly, George. They’re. ..

George: Fajitas are very macho. It’s a very masculine dish, not a female dish. And there’s a lot of it. Bigger is better. Would you agree with that?

Lawson: [reluctantly] Yes.

George: Damn right. It’s a men thing. The noise is the big deal. 1 promise you that’s the reason they’re popular. If they didn’t make noise, they wouldn’t be selling. They make noise and draw attention to people. That’s one of the secrets of the restaurant business. You do a flaming thing, you do a sizzling thing- anything that draws attention to somebody. You can always tell who’s doing it for the sizzle because they won’t look around. They know you’re looking, And they never acknowledge the sizzle.

All is vanity. You notice how the windows at On The Border reflect, so you can watch yourself? You wanna bring On The Border to its knees, you put a restaurant across the street and call it Mexican Mirror Miracle. Have fashion catalogues as your menu. That’s the new pornography. Nobody in this town wants to see a naked body, they want to see $600 worth of suit. Turns ’em on. Weird stuff.

Lawson: Can one have sex after a big Mexican meal?

George: Well, I don’t know about one, but that’s a damn good question. Only if your partner’s eaten the same thing. Of course eating is substitute love-making. Like fashion. Fajitas are good because flour tortillas are a neutral color and go well with just about any fashion if you drop one on yourself. So Lawson, tell it to me straight. Are you saying fajilas are Tex-Mex?

Lawson: Now they are. But. basically they’re steak with a little more flavor.

George: Makes sense. Tex-Mex is ersatz Mexican food. On the border of being real.

Lawson: Almost all of the Mexican food in this city is on the border to one degree or another. Nothing’s purely Mexican, and Tex-Mex, by definition, isn’t pure. But you can make lots of categories. There are the ambitious restaurants, which attempt authenticity-from Mexico or somewhere else. Chiquita’s and its clones. Via Real, Garza Blan-ca, Genaro’s. Javier’s.

George: I think Javier’s is one of the best Mexican food restaurants in the city. Lawson: I thought you represented the culinary commandos. Javier’s is the most expensive Mexican restaurant in the city. And it’s not really Mexican.

George: It’s colonial Mexican, dad gummit! It’s what the wealthy people ate. Or something like it.

Lawson: Then there are what I call the “white tablecloth” restaurants, the ones that are simple but serious, that remind me of Mexico City. For example, Cafe” Rincon and Calle Doce in Oak Cliff. Then there’s preppy, which could include everything from On The Border to Mia’s, a tiny, unpretentious place on Lemmon run by a Mexican family. It’s really popular.

George: Again, those places give the illusion of walking on the wild side. Like Herrera’s and Guadalajara used to.

Lawson: I think Guadalajara is abusive.

George: Maybe, but people love dives. If you want to guarantee restaurant success, put a rusted refrigerator in the middle of the dining room or make partitions out of beer cases. The new Guadalajara will lose business if it’s too upscale.

Lawson: Then there are the places patronized almost exclusively by Mexicans, and those aren’t usually any better than anything else. I like Chiquita’s as well as any place in town.

George: Well, they really are pretty good. I have to admit. I just don’t like the people who go there. I feel like I’m at a deb ball on a Mexican patio.

Lawson: People are a problem for you, aren’t they, George?

George: Back off. Lawson! I want to say right now that I think it’s real crappy that there’s never a four-star Mexican restaurant in D or in the papers. Only nouvelle doo-da gets the four stars or the D award or whatever.

Lawson: Well, I just don’t find that there is that qualify of Mexican food in this town. I have eaten some meals in San Antonio restaurants and some meals at Fonda San Miguel in Austin that beat to pieces any Mexican meal I have yet eaten here.

George: Something in a slain, like that nouvelle crud. That’ll be the next trend you guys will endorse. They’ll give you a $20 plate with stains-veal stain, minced kumquat stain. Stain of that damned cilantro. Wait and see. I think gourmet means getting ripped off. Four stars and abuse. Maybe we could pay money and not even get food. Five stars!

Lawson: Check, please.

DAN JENKINS COMES HOME FOR TEX-MEX

“GOOD TEX-MEX isn’t too hot and doesn’t get too fancy.” says Mr. Semi-Tough himself, Dan Jenkins, who has peppered his best-sellers with references to his favorite cuisine. “When you start doing too much sour cream and shit, it ain’t Mexican.”

The celebrated author and sportswriter recently as caught sampling the basics at Juanita’s, the downtown Fort Worth Tex-Mexery started by his wife. June. This is the second Juanita’s; the first is on the Upper East Side in New York, where the lenkinses live. It’s ironic that Fort Worth is the site of a sequel to a New fork Mexican restaurant, but Juanita’s mew recalls the kind of Tex-Mex that Dan and June grew up eating in Fort Worth, not Manhattan’s torn idea of the stuff. In fact, lune opened the first Juanita’s because she and her husband couldn’t get good Tex-Mex in New York.

“June thought there was a market for it and we like to eat it.” says Dan. “There must be a hundred Mexican restaurants in New York. Hell, there could be a thousand, for all I know. But we’ve lived there about 20 years and we’ve never found a good one. We’ve been to all of them. Their idea of an enchilada is cottage cheese wrapped up in bread with ketchup poured over it.”

Juanita’s in Manhattan is a success and the new Juanita’s seems headed in the same direction. June has included some fancier, new-style dishes to give people a choice, but the heart of the menu is enchiladas and tarns. Just what Dan likes, and just what he’s had a hard time finding-even in North Tens. “In Dallas, year in and year out, Raphael’s has been the place I’ve liked best. That and Casa Dominguez, the old Casa Dominguez. Because they were more like what I grew up with. People say, ’Aw, no, I’ve got a better place than that; and invariably it’s a place that puts on a bunch of sour cream and duck sauce.”

The Jenkinses now keep an apartment in Fort Worth above the restaurant so that June can exert quality control. While she’s downstairs tending shop, he’ll be above doing the same. “I’m starting a new book, and I’ll probably be writing it right up there, sniffing enchiladas as I go.” -T.A.