Sitting Down With

The chef who revitalized Lubbock while building on his family's legacy

Chef Cameron West knows a thing or two about legacy. The busy chef and restauranteur is the grandson of the city's former mayor, Dirk West, who is also famous for drawing the cartoon mascots for Texas Tech, Nebraska, and Kansas City.

Cameron, himself a Texas Tech grad, furthered his training at the Culinary Institute of America, in Napa Valley, at The Ritz-Carlton Orlando, with Jon Bonnell in Fort Worth, and under chef Dean Fearing in Dallas. But he always felt a pull toward his hometown of Lubbock, and had a hunch that the West Texas city was just waiting for a restaurant renaissance.

Today, Cameron and his wife Rachel head up four critically acclaimed eateries in Lubbock, and are largely credited with rejuvenating the city's culinary scene.

CultureMap caught up with Cameron to talk fried chicken, national awards, and how neighbors take care of each other.

CultureMap: First off, can you give us the vibe of each of your restaurants and what dishes each is known for?

Cameron West: Sure, we have:

The West Table: Our first restaurant in Lubbock, opened nine years ago. It serves upscale American that's seasonal and local whenever possible, and was downtown's first "destination" restaurant. We're known for the bone marrow, oysters, and fried chicken during brunch, and foods that were less common in Lubbock when we opened.
Dirk's Chicken: Our motto is "Birds. Beers. Bubbles." and that pretty much covers it. Dirk's is named for my grandfather, and you'll see a lot of his original artwork displayed around the restaurant. The vibe is more Southern, with (obviously) fried chicken, chicken-fried steak, and we have oysters here too.
The Brewery LBK: This is an eclectic-casual brewpub across the hallway from The West Table. We have 12 rotating beers on tap, and three years ago USA Today crowned it the best brewpub in the country.
Neighborhood F+B: The newest of our restaurants, this is a neighborhood bar and grill with casual, comforting food and a wonderful bar program to boot.

Photo courtesy of Visit Lubbock

Cameron West has brought a lot of flavor to Lubbock.

CM: You traveled all over the country and worked with some very famous chefs. Why did you want to return to Lubbock?

CW: I had seen other chefs come home and sort of "renovate" their downtown, and Lubbock's downtown was a little behind in the culinary scene a decade ago. The West Table was successful from the start and really jumpstarted a lot of the downtown revitalization. It showed that the people of Lubbock were really ready for this kind of love to be poured back into their community.

CM: Speaking of community, you're known for being very involved in yours.

CW: Definitely! My mother and father have lived here their whole lives, and now we're raising our family here too. So it's very important to me to constantly be doing charity events like Home for Heroes and March of Dimes. Everyone here takes turns taking care of each other.

CM: In addition to being local favorites, your restaurants are drawing a lot of out-of-towners too.

CW: Lubbock is a great stop for people who are driving to New Mexico to go skiing, and it's a destination in its own right for Texas Tech football games.

CM: In a way, you're carrying on your grandfather's Lubbock legacy.

CW: Indeed. I had all his artwork just sitting around, and I opened Dirk's partly to have a place to display it. It's been a pleasure to reintroduce him to the next generation, and it's really fun to see people realize he's the talent behind so many of these famous mascots.

CM: How would you describe the Lubbock dining scene now?

CW: Others saw what we did and followed our lead, and it feels so good to have that confirmation that we made the right decision to come back home. We're able to take care of everybody, from casual to upscale, and provide everything people are looking for. That's an incredibly good feeling.

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Experience the people and places of Lubbock yourself by planning your next vacation here.

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REVIVING THE ALAMO

Texas landmark the Alamo reclaims historic cannon from private ownership

Photo by Gower Brown/ Unsplash

A 90-pound cannon used in the Battle of the Alamo is returning to its San Antonio home.

It turns out the Alamo's original 1836 cannons are good for more than just defense — they also make a sturdy birdbath. After serving as a garden ornament for Samuel Maverick’s descendants, an authentic piece of San Antonio history is finally returning home to the revered mission.

According to an Alamo announcement, the swivel cannon weighs 90 pounds and is approximately three feet long. The relic was originally found in 1852 when Maverick built a home near the northwest corner of the battle’s site.

The lawyer and land baron was saved from death when he was urged by William Barret Travis to ride to the Texas Declaration of Independence convention in Washington-on-the-Brazos to send reinforcements. Returning to the Alamo’s grounds, he found a cache of cannons buried where the Hotel Gibbs sits today.

From there, the cannon wound up at the Maverick family’s Sunshine Ranch on the Northwest Side, where it was eventually incorporated into the garden DIY project. In 1955, the cannon was removed from the ranch, and the current location remained a mystery until the Alamo received a call from a Maverick relative in Corpus Christi.

Alamo cannon This Alamo artifact gives an idea of what the cannon will look like once restoration is complete.Photo courtesy of the Alamo.

“The relative graciously donated the cannon to the Alamo,” wrote a rep from the mission. “Alamo Senior Researcher and Historian Kolby Lanham and Head Conservator Pam Jary Rosser drove down the very next day to take this piece of history home to the Alamo.”

Although the artillery is mostly intact, it is missing its trunnions (the pivot-point protrusions on the sides of the barrel) and cascabel (the knob and neck assembly at the rear of historic muzzle-loading cannons). The parts were removed by the Mexican army to make the cannon inoperable.

Once preservation is complete, this cannon and the Alamo Collection’s other battle cannons will make their way to the upcoming Visitor Center and Museum, where they will be joined by rocker Phil Collins' collection of Alamo artifacts. The Alamo is in the midst of a $550 million preservation project, which includes conserving the Alamo Church, Long Barrack, and the mission’s original footprint. The museum is on track to debut in late 2027.

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