What's Eric Eating Episode 200

Houston's Top Chef star teases hot new restaurant, plus smokin' Spring Branch BBQ

Chef Dawn Burrell is this week's guest.

Photo by Jenn Duncan

On this week's episode of "What's Eric Eating," chef Dawn Burrell joins CultureMap food editor Eric Sandler to discuss both her appearance on Top Chef and her upcoming restaurant Late August. Burrell, who earned a James Beard Award semifinalist nomination for her work at Kulture, made it to the finals of Top Chef season 18.

The conversation touches on many aspects of Burrell's time on the show, including her motivation for joining the cast, her favorite challenges, and how her life has changed with her expanded celebrity. She also responds to those who have said she should be named Top Chef after sexual harassment allegations emerged about winner Gabe Erales.

After breaking down the show, Burrell and Sandler move on to Late August, the restaurant she'll open in partnership with Lucille's chef Chris Williams later this year. Sandler asks the chef to elaborate on the "Afro-Asian" cuisine she plans to serve there.

"What I like to say is that this is going to be food from the African diaspora with Asian techniques or flavor profiles, but we will also discover those cross sections where cuisines are similar like the useage of rice, the useage of specific vegetables, and the uses of very similar sauces and fermentation processes," Burrell says. "We're going to develop a new style, which is Afro-Asian cuisine. A lot of cultures like Guyana, they have all those flavor profiles because of migration."

Prior to the interview, Sandler and co-host Michael Fulmer discuss the news of the week. Their topics include: the upcoming closures of Spanish Village and Tony Mandola's; the deal that will keep over 30 locations of Luby's open statewide; and chefs Angelo and Lucianna Emiliani's plans to open Cafe Louie in the East End.

In the restaurant of the week segment, the two hosts discuss the new, Spring Branch location of Feges BBQ. They discuss when a restaurant crosses from being a barbecue joint to being a restaurant that serves barbecue.

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And the winners are...

Houston restaurants have a historic night with 2 James Beard Award wins

Courtesy of HoustonFirst Corporation

Houston was well-represented at the 2026 James Beard Awards

Houston had a historic night at the James Beard Awards. Held on Monday, June 15, at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Two of Houston’s six finalists took home prizes for both national awards and Best Chef: Texas.

They are:

Emerging Chef: Adrian Torres, Maximo
Best Chef Texas: Evelyn Garcia and Henry Lu, Jūn

Houston’s other finalists were: June Rodil (March) for Outstanding Professional in Beverage Service; Ope Amosu (ChòpnBlọk) for Best Chef: Texas; Agnes and Sherman for Best New Restaurant, and Hugo Ortega and Tracy Vaught (H-Town Restaurant Group) for Outstanding Restaurateur.

Other Texas nominees included: Tavel Bristol-Joseph (Nicosi, San Antonio) and Maggie Huff (Lucia, Dallas) for Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker and Mixtli in San Antonio for Outstanding Restaurant.

The other nominees for Best Chef: Texas were: Scott Girling (Osteria il Muro in Denton), Gabe Padilla and Melissa Padilla, (Cafe Piro in Socorro), and Finn Walter (The Nicolett in Lubbock).

James Beard Awards Lindsey Brown Chris Shepherd Southern Smoke Foundation Lindsey Brown, center, and Chris Shepherd, right, at the Impact Awards. Photo by Max Flatow

In addition, the Houston-based Southern Smoke Foundation, a nonprofit that provides emergency assistance and mental health services to hospitality workers, received an Impact Award at a separate ceremony on Sunday, June 14.

Tonight’s two wins firmly establish Houston as Texas’ premier culinary destination. They follow Thomas Bille of Belly of the Beast in Spring winning Best Chef: Texas in 2025 and Benchawan Jabthong Painter (Street to Kitchen) winning the same category in 2023, meaning the city’s chefs have now won three of the last four awards in that category. Torres is only the second Houstonian to win a national award, following Southern-inspired cocktail bar Julep’s win for Outstanding Bar Program in 2022.

Although he’s only 27 years old, Torres has frequently found himself in the national spotlight since took over as Maximo’s executive chef in 2025. Since then, he’s been named a Rising Star by StarChefs magazine, earned a Bib Gourmand designation for Maximo from the Michelin Guide, and won the 2026 CultureMap Tastemaker Award for Rising Star Chef of the Year.

“I am proud to be the son of immigrants. I am proud to be an immigrant. And I am proud to be a DACA recipient,” Torres said to applause from the crowd of culinary professionals.

“Tonight, the headline is that a brown kid from the Northside, raised by parents who sacrificed everything for the chance at a better life, is standing on this stage accepting one of the highest honors in this industry,” he added.

James Beard Awards Evelyn Garcia Henry Lu Jun Evelyn Garcia and Henry Lu won Best Chef: Texas.Photo by Casey Giltner

After establishing themselves by serving casual fare at pop-ups and farmers markets, Garcia and Lu opened Jūn in 2023. Billed as a New Asian American restaurant, it features a wide-ranging menu that includes charred cabbage with tofu Caesar dressing, carrots with everything salsa matcha, and the signature fried chicken that’s seasoned with shrimp paste, ginger, and Thai chili. In 2025, they opened Third Place, a daytime concept in the Jūn space that showcases pop-ups from both established and up-and-coming chefs.

Like Torres, Lu also celebrated his immigrant parents. “I want to thank our immigrant parents who lived the American dream and put us where we are today. They invested so much in us. Everything we are today is because of them,” he said.

“Houston, I love you so so much,” Garcia said as she and Lu accepted their award. “Our amazing city is made from creatives from first generations like we are. It is a city of dreams and hopes. What has taught me anything with Jun is there’s room for everyone, there’s a space to tell our story, that it’s meant to be heard, and that there’s a reason why we’re here.”

Considered the Oscars of the food world, the awards recognize excellence by chefs and other culinary professionals in a wide range of categories from Outstanding Chef to Best New Restaurant. In 2025, the James Beard Foundation added three new categories to recognize the beverage side of hospitality: Best New Bar, Outstanding Professional in Beverage Service, and Outstanding Professional in Cocktail Service.

Winners must also have “demonstrated commitment to racial and gender equity, community, sustainability, and a culture where all can thrive,” according to the organization’s website.

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