As local foodies, sometimes it feels like all our cheerleading for the awesome Houston culinary scene is just shouting into a vacuum when it comes to national recognition. So forgive us a little jump for joy when we saw that Travel + Leisure’s list of the 50 Best New Restaurants in the country is solidly 10% Texan, with 4 entries from Houston.
The deserving quartet? Richard Knight and James and Megan Silk’s adventurous Old World gastropub, Feast (fresh off a glowing review in the New York Times); Bryan Caswell’s Reef, also no stranger to national praise; Scott Tycer’s ethereal and avant garde Textile; and Hotel Icon’s Voice, site of possibly the most beautiful dining room in town.
The remaining Texas entry is Dallas’s excellent Asian emporium Tei-An. Only New York, San Francisco and Seattle rated more entries on T+L’s list (Chicago also had 4), so is our city actually being recognized as a foodie destination? We can dare to dream.