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Michael Barnes is the Austin American-Statesman's social columnist. He lives in South Austin with his partner, Kip, two dogs and two cats. More on Out & About.

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All the entries posted on January 14, 2009.

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Austin360 blogs > Out & About > Archives > 2009 > January > 14

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

AU40 & Tribeza Party at Paggi House

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 09:54 PM

A lively confluence: Austin Under 40 and Tribeza. They occupied every single open spot of Paggi House’s copious patios. Will let the images tell the story.

Lara Mandy, Crystal Harris

Toohey Tephsoumane, Ami Desai

Alisa DeLuna, Jason Stoneberg

Matt McCoy, Jessica Cathey

Monique Hayes, Rebecca Horwitz, Liat Groszc

Amanda Vasquez, Stuart Featherston

Yank Curtis, Eric Lewisong>

Teresa Clark, Jennifer McNevin

Erick Smart, Minda Dunham

Amanda Chiampi, Jenny Murphy>

Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Out

Your A-List, Best Low-Fat/Health-Conscious Options

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 07:30 PM

It’s been a heck of a ride for Austin-based Whole Foods. The brand started not that long ago in someone’s Central Austin living room. When I arrived, it was still a single, overstocked, flood-prone store on North Lamar Boulevard where Cheapo now slumbers. In less than 20 years, it had become an international operation with hundreds of stores, a high-end reputation to go with its high-quality products, and a simmering feud with the Federal Trade Commission over its acquisition of former rival Wild Oats. Stock prices went up. Stock prices went down. I’m dizzy just remembering.

Nowadays, everyone and their mother offers natural, low-fat or health-conscious foods. Still, Whole Foods won the A-List vote for this function with 23 percent of the vote. Zen, the Japanese fast-food joint, came in second with 20 percent. Central Market, which, for a while, operated the finest grocery stores in Texas earned 13 percent. (CM is still great, but Whole Foods and others learned from these gourmet masters.)

Eastside Cafe, which grows much of its food right next to its restaurant on Manor Road, served up 7 percent, while Mr. Natural — naturally — too just under that. Casa de Luz, Baby Greens, Mother’s and Wheatsville virtually tied in the next spot, while Leaf and Sun Harvest brought up the rear.

Permalink | Comments (1) | Post your comment Categories: Food, Your A-List

Your A-List, Best Sportscaster

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 05:14 PM

Austin’s best sportscaster with 44 percent of the A-List vote is a — country music artist? No, silly. Roger Wallace the country musician is not Roger Wallace the KXAN sportscaster. (Just as I am not Mike Barnes from KVUE, who came in second in the A-List poll with 34 percent of the tally.)

Veteran Dave Cody of KTBC tripped into third place with 23 percent, while Bob Ballou (KEYE) edged Jeff Power (News 8 Austin), both straddling 5 percent of the count.

Hey, stray thought: Where are the women?

Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Media & Books, Sports, Your A-List

Closing, opening, altering downtown

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 03:55 PM

You find out so much on foot. Walking to an appointment downtown, I discovered…

The short-lived Bellissimo at 107 W. Fifth St. will become a Chinatown, giving a nearby pan-Asian Imperia a run for its money. I saw the architectural elevations.

The Whiskey Bar at 303 W. Fifth St. is most definitely closed, a tattered sign on the front door announces, but will open under new ownership.

The Seattle’s Best at North Lamar Boulevard at West Fifth Street is gone, gone, gone. An women’s apparel shop is destined for the spot, I learned from a Jackson Ruiz employee.

Construction has started on a retail outlet in the Monarch’s parking garage. No particulars yet. Will it be Zin?

Pangaea, 409 Colorado St., is opening midweeks to showcase live music. Owners Michael Ault and Steven Seymour, had always said they wanted to book musical acts there. Looks like the time has arrived. (Well, this I found out from an industry insider. No sign outside the ultra-lounge.)

Permalink | Comments (4) | Post your comment Categories: Out

Satire: Malcom Gladwell follows the Longhorns?

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 01:48 PM

The New Yorker writer and trend-spotter Malcom Gladwell is among the last people I’d expect to be covering the Longhorn football team. Yet he appears to do so in “Context.” He even examines the odds of a leader like Colt McCoy coming out of a small town.

In fact, it’s a spoof. Sounded too fun to be true. Entertainment is entertainment.

Permalink | Comments (1) | Post your comment Categories: Sports

Spice Boys go Middle Eastern

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 10:51 AM

Claudia Roden taught me to cook Italian. More than anything else, her “The Good Food of Italy — Region by Region” inculcated the crucial locality of Italian cuisine, something I’d observed on multiple trips, but had not absorbed in the kitchen. While cookbook writer Marcella Hazan properly remains the basis for Americans building their Italian repertoires, Roden lent each new recipe a ripe sense of individuality.

Almost 20 years later, I’ve opened her classic — edited, expanded and updated — “The New Book of Middle Eastern Food.” This is the 1968 cookbook, recently revised, that introduced to the English-speaking world incredibly varied cuisines from Iran to Morocco, which she learned initially growing up in Cairo and Alexandria, Egypt. The fact that her family is Jewish from Ottoman Albanian extraction only opened her senses wider to borrowings from Armenian, Turkish, Greek, Coptic, Persian and other cooking traditions.

Saturday, the Spice Boys, our decade-old gourmet dinner club, will be reunited through Roden’s Middle Eastern recipes. The six courses: Ta’amia (Nick); Trid (Dale); Melokheya (Antonio); Tagine Kefta Mkawra (Michael); Havij Polow (Robert); Omi Ali (Kip).

The Spice Boys is as much a social phenomenon as a gustatory one. Two special guests will join us on Saturday. Even if our Middle Eastern efforts fail, the social urge will be satisfied.

Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Food, Media & Books

Last chance inaugural parties

By Michael Barnes | Wednesday, January 14, 2009, 08:55 AM

This dyed-in-blue town will go nuts on Tuesday. We’ve assembled a list of a dozen or so promising inaugural parties to cover on Jan. 20. They span a range from private brunches to big evening blow-outs. Our plan is to hit 10 or so and report them live. (Before then, the Travis County Democratic Party has scheduled a gala at the Driskill Hotel on Saturday.) If you are planning a social event around the inauguration, or if you are attending any of the parties in DC and don’t mind a little notice in the newspaper, then e-mail me at mbarnes@statesman.com.

Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Out, Politics & Law

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