Ack. Yet another Austin institution. Pffft. The burger and fries were pretty average, and I didn't try any of the malts or the "real" Dr. Pepper.
The decor is kind of interesting, but that's about the only positive thing I can say. Either this is a 78704 thing that I don't understand, or Texicalli Grill has something other than food going on behind the scenes. Given that the restaurant was almost deserted (except for our party) on a Saturday night, I'm going with the second option.
One reason we had never tried Texicalli Grill before was because they were located right next to Curra's Grill, which early on was good enough to make us overlook other dining choices in the same neighborhood, especially one whose name lead us to believe was another TexMex place.
Despite the name, Texicalli serves up primarily sandwiches and hamburgers. They also display a number of virtues right off the bat. They offer "real" (i.e., sugar rather than corn syrup-based) Dr Pepper, as well as home-brewed root beer (both of which live up to the hype). The queso waffles fries are pretty good, though not nearly the deal the cheese fries at the Outback are. (Digression: Almost all waffle fries, thin fries, and curly cut fries seem to be pretty good to great; "steak" wedge fries range from good to sub-mediocre, while "crinkle-cut" fries range from mediocre to really bad; can anyone explain to me why this should be? I suspect it has something to do with the total area subjected to oil and/or which come out of frozen bags, but I am interested in hearing why...) The malt I had was excellent, and made from real ice cream. The texicalli sandwich, however, was fairly mediocre, and seemed too small for the price (though after the malt I was pretty full). Delaware offers a lot better bang for the buck in the sandwich department.
Service was pretty good considering one guy seemed to be taking orders, providing refills, and doing some of the cooking. As for atmosphere, the walls and ceiling are covered with "Austin as 1970s music theme park" memorabilia. Lots of Kerry Awn posters on the wall, as well as signs flacking for certain local tax fattened political weasels. If the latter doesn't bother you, Texicalli Grill offers up pretty good grub for South Austin.
Austin Pizza is a decent enough pizza place, but it just about drove me crazy. To start with, they only have one size and one style (thin crust) of pizza. Their pizza will probably serve two people: at about $10, that's not too bad.
Unfortunately, while they have sit-down seating, it really is more of a pick-up and go joint: the tables they have aren't very comfortable. If you order iced tea, you'll find that they have no artifical sweetner (at least, they didn't when I was there, and they reacted like it wasn't something they kept around at all). At least soda refills are free. And, while it may not be fair to hold what's on TV against a restaurant, I really could have done without the self-righteous sanctimony of Rob Reiner's sloppy wet kiss to Bill Clinton, The American President, which was playing while we ate.
Austin Pizza isn't awful, but there are better places in town. Frankly, I think I'd be just as happy (if not more so) ordering from Pizza Hut.
Austin Pizza is a case where you get what you pay for. They only offer one size of thin crust pizza (what they call a large and what I call a medium) at $9.99 for four ingredients. It's pretty decent pizza, definitely superior to that served at CiCi's or Gatti's, but not in the same league as Mangia's or Reale's. Worth trying if you're in South Austin, but I wouldn't go out of your way for it.
Good enough barbecue. I thought the pork loin was kind of dry. The ribs and brisket were okay, though.
The BBQ this time around was still Pretty Darn Good, but perhaps not as good as our last visit. In particular, the pork loin seemed rather dry (a common problem with BBQ places as of late).
I still think Kreuz Market is the winner for best Lockhart BBQ.
I have nothing new to say about Red Lobster. I will observe, though, that crab legs seem to me to be a negative energy food: you expend more energy preparing them for eating than you get out of consuming them. This leads me to believe that they're a perfect food for Atkins types: if you could find a 24-hour all-you-can-eat crab legs place, you could (in theory) just sit at the table, eat nothing but crab legs (and butter) and watch those pounds melt off your body. Let me know if you try this.
The Saturday Dining Conspiracy proudly announces the arrival of a new un-indicted co-conspirator: Samuel Thomas Landwermeyer, born (appropriately) on July 27th, weighing 7.5 pounds. Samuel joins his fellow unindicted co-conspirators, Andrew and James Landwermeyer, and his (also unindicted) parents, Margaret and Bryan Landwermeyer.
Not a lot to say that wasn't covered in our review of the other location. We dropped in on this one so we could have the all-you-can-eat crab legs, which were pretty darn good (though it was disconcerting to realize that we had been there 3 1/2 hoursprying the suckers open).
See the logs for August of 2002.