Well, what a bimester it’s been since we last broke bread! We had the Snowpocalypse of 2021 followed by the governor’s cancellation of state-mandated masks and business occupancy. I hope you faired well during that unfair weather event and the subsequent ERCOTastropy. A number of neighborhood restaurants, funded by donors, stepped up to help residents. Pinthouse Pizza offered to fill drinkable water for folks. Cotton Global Disaster Solutions paid for 400 bowls from Chi’lantro and ~100 meals from Old Thousand. Ranch Water/Players Reach/Yah Agency splurged for ~225 flat-top burgers and chicken sliders from Cover 3. Austin Winter Storm Relief sponsored Koko, the second-best food blogger in Austin, to provide ~200 bowls of chicken or beef pho. Austin Winter Storm Relief also provided 300 small sandwiches from our Schlotzsky’s. Nutrabolt and C4 sponsored ~500 tacos from our Tacodeli. This was a neat way for sponsors to support not only residents in the area but also our restaurants. Kudos all around!
The governor rolled back the mask mandates and opened businesses, including restaurants, to 100 percent capacity, but Austin has seen things differently, still requiring mask use by citizens and restaurants (at least as of March 27th). The governor’s order made it clear that individual businesses, among others, can set their own mask and occupancy requirements, ask people that don’t comply to leave, and have those people arrested for trespassing when they don’t. In short, respect the wishes of our restaurants or, if you don’t agree, go quietly somewhere else.
With possibly the best name in the business (both rep-wise as well as name-wise), Mo Pittle, who owned and operated the JewBoy Burgers trailer at 5000 Burnet before it bricked-n-mortared at 5111 Airport, has returned to the ‘hood with JewBoy Sub Shop at 6701 Burnet, the former location of Pour House Pub. We stopped in, and… Oh. Yeah. Expect a review soon. The JewBoy Sub Shop opening was also, essentially, the announcement that Pour House Pub had closed permanently, presumably due to covid. Pour House had been temporarily closed since June of last year.
If you are a fan of Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives like we are, you’ll be excited to hear that Allandale is in the delivery radius of Guy Fieri’s Flavortown (ghost) Kitchen. As you might imagine, with a burger topped with bacon and mac-n-cheese, it’s comfort food to get uncomfortable in your jeans. In other news, Humpty’s Wall of Breakfast opened up the road at 8820 Burnet. Kitchen United has added Austin Daily Press (tortas and tacos), Grimaldi’s (pizza!), Lo Pan’s Kitchen (Chinese), and Proteinhouse (protein!) to the mix.And keep an eye out for Roya ghost-kitchening out of our District Kitchen. Chef Amir Hajimaleki has been conjuring impossibly gorgeous Iranian dishes in preparation for, hopefully, an eventual permanent location.
In terribly sad news, just after his food co-writing debut last issue, doctors diagnosed Geoff the Ditch Cat with large-cell lymphoma, essentially a death sentence. He didn’t respond well to chemo and passed away mid-March, leaving us hopelessly heartbroken. That cat loved pizza but would go BONKERS for East Side Pies’ pepperoni and roasted green chile. Leave a smidge out for him the next time you partake.
I wrote this article for the Allandale Neighbor.
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