What: Houston Restaurant Weeks launch party.
Where: Local Pour.
The 411: Chefs, foodies and party boys and girls revved their engines for the month-long dine-out marathon at a kickoff party featuring a lip-synching battle won by Willie Mike, a contestant on the current season of MasterChef, who dazzled judges with a cover of Van Halen's "Dancing in the Street."
Pablo Gomez, culinary operations manager for Local Pour's parent company HUSA, impressed the food-loving crowd with an array of light bites, including shrimp shooters, salmon ceviche, crab-stuffed mushrooms and caprese skewers. Not to be outdone, Nash D’Amico and his daughter Brina D’Amico of D’Amico’s Italian Market Cafe offered up their famous meatballs and Caesar salad. And those who had room for dessert feasted on cupcakes from Drew’s Pastry Place.
And, of all things, complementary massages were available, too, courtesy of Massage Heights.
Who: Houston Restaurant Weeks founder and chair Cleverley Stone and an array of media personalities, includingFOX 26's Ruben Dominguez, Channel 8's Ernie Manouse, Channel 11's Ron Trevino, KPRC 950's Michael Garfield (aka the High-Tech Texan), Sports Radio 610’s Patrick Creighton and Nate Griffin and MIX 96-5’s Chad Pitt and Lauren Finkelstein.
Also seen in the crowd: Amy Ragan, Carolyn Sampley, Brandice Bailey, Neal Hamil, Hilary Rosenstein, Becky David, Carrie Grzelak, Brittany Hammond, Heather Icenogle, Jessica Layfield, Liju Mathew, Kimberly Satchebell and Tori Satchebell.
CultureMap editor-in-chief Clifford Pugh contributed to this report.
Cleverly Stone and Steve Riley.
