"Like the man said, we are what we eat. And, fortunately, what we eat is delicious. The cuisines of our state—Mexican food, barbecue, and comfort food by way of chicken-fried steak—have been the stuff of great meals for as long as there has been a Texas, and also of great magazine stories for as long as there has been a Texas Monthly.... Food has a constituency larger and more passionate than that of any other subject we cover.... And food is fun to write about, though not always to report on: Ask our longtime restaurant critic and resident gourmand Patricia Sharpe to regale you with tales of eighty tacos in four days and you'll see why unlimited eating on someone else's dime may not be as enviable as it appears."

—Evan Smith, from the introduction

From reviews of the newest, hippest restaurants in cities across Texas to stories about the comfort foods we all love, Texans have long relied on Texas Monthly to dish up some of the best writing about food in the Lone Star state. This anthology brings together twenty-eight classic articles about food in Texas and the culture that surrounds it—markets that purvey exotic and traditional foods, well-known chefs, tributes to the cooks and cookbooks of days gone by, and even a feature on how to open a restaurant. Many of the articles are by Patricia Sharpe, Texas Monthly's longtime restaurant critic and winner of the James Beard Journalism Award for Magazine Feature Writing without Recipes. Joining her are Texas Monthly editor Evan Smith and contributors Gary Cartwright, Jordan MacKay, Skip Hollandsworth, Pamela Colloff, Anne Dingus, Suzy Banks, Joe Nick Patoski, and Prudence Mackintosh.