Big D, part 2

Big D, part 2

After keeping you in suspense for several months, I decided to finish telling you all about my trip to Texas. Actually this post is mostly about the food I ate since I figured that you probably wouldn’t be too interested in the database conference I attended. So if you haven’t eaten lunch yet, this post may be a little dangerous. You’ve been warned.

So when you go to Texas I guess what you’re expected to do is eat meat. Lots and lots of meat. Not just any meat. You’re supposed to eat Texas BBQ. Last year when I went to the same conference we ate at a BBQ place called Dickey’s BBQ Pit. It was some pretty good stuff. This year we tried Sonny Bryan’s Smokehouse. Like Dickey’s this place is a chain, but don’t let that discourage you. It was lots of smoked meat and deep-fried goodness.

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Outside the Smokehouse on a rainy evening

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I had the BBQ ribs, brisket and chicken with a side of fried okra and green bean casserole

Continuing on our meaty-goodness theme, we asked a barista at one of the coffee shops where we could get some steak. We didn’t need a fancy, gourmet steak. We just wanted a place to eat a big hunk of meat. His answer? Texas Land & Cattle. Let me tell you, it didn’t disappoint. Ruth’s Chris it’s not, but it was a good piece of meat. I had the ribeye with a baked sweet potato and it was under $20 ($17.95 if I remember correctly)! I probably wouldn’t eat there every week, but for a nice dinner it was quite reasonable.

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I didn’t quite get the meat sweats, but I got close

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Our cheesy queso appetizer

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The main dish!

On our last day, we had a few hours between the end of the conference and our flight so we ventured down to Fort Worth. As luck would have it, we got there at the tail end of Western week so the town was abuzz with people dressed in Western regalia and doing some educational demonstrations for the kids.

It was like we ventured back into the Old West complete with people on horseback and cowboys.

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This is what the Old West would have looked like with paved roads, cars and stoplights

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Deb and some settlers

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I’m also sure the Old West had tons of mice riding on cats riding on dogs

One thing I did want to try were calf fries. I had never tried one before and I didn’t know when I would be able to try them again, so I figured I’d take my chances and go for broke. I also had a normal lunch of a chicken-fried steak sandwich too just to make sure I could wash the calf fries taste out of my mouth.

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The infamous calf fries

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What the inside of a deep-fried calf testicle looks like

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Mmm, so ono

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My rather mundane chicken-fried steak sandwich (which was huge by the way)

Of course we did try to eat healthy when we weren’t eating meat, but I figured you can eat healthy anywhere. As the old saying goes, “when in Rome, do as the Romans do”. So meat it was.

One thing we really didn’t try was Tex-Mex. Maybe if I go back again next year, I’ll make sure that it’s on the menu.

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