Category Archives for Food.
My morning routine is simple. It starts with coffee, and eases into work. That’s true whether I’m at home or on the road. I’m drinking a little less coffee than I used to. For years I joked that you could run my blood through a still once a week to filter out caffeine byproducts, and use that to run a local taxi fleet’s alternative fuels experiment.
Coffee plays an important role in travel – from the airport to the plane, and from the hotel to the city around it.
Michelin-starred celebrity chef Aurélien Largeau, of La Table d’Aurélien Largeau at Hyatt’s Hôtel du Palais Biarritz in southwest France, has been fired after video spread online of hazing in his kitchen. A junior member of the kitchen staff (commis) was “tied to a chair naked for hours with an apple in his mouth and a carrot in his anus with all the chefs – known as the kitchen brigade – looking on, including Largeau.”
Here’s the lowdown on the best barbecue in Austin. I’ve lived in Austin for about a decade and get asked all the time by people visiting the city – and there are a lot more visitors than there used to be! – what barbecue they should seek out while they’re here?
What I’ve realized is that the restaurants that have most impressed me are headed by chefs who are constantly driving for improvement. They aren’t churning out the same meal to guests, month after month and year after year. They’re constantly experimenting, learning, and pushing themselves to higher levels.
Nationally consumers are tipping 16.9% on bills at quick-service restaurants, 19.6% on bills at full-service restaurants, and 14.5% on takeout and delivery – but it varies a lot by state. How does your state tip, and are you more or less generous than your neighbors?
The most ‘In Demand Restaurant In The United States’ right now is an omakase sushi restaurant in Austin service great fish at a bargain price point. The chef’s mentor is serving one of the most expensive sushi meals in the United States in Chicago. Both are outstanding.
An Airbnb guest at a home in Spain took to TikTok to share what he found when he arrived: an air conditioning unit that was coin operated.
The new Texas Monthly Top 50 Barbecue Places is out. It’s often referred to as ‘the bible’ of Texas barbecue, although I find its picks especially controversial this year.
Here’s what you should know to start. The most correct – and best – barbecue is Central Texas barbecue. The focus is on meat, especially beef. You may get onions, peppers or pickle slices, and white bread as an accompaniment. Put your meat on the bread between bites. It’s all served on butcher paper.
Last summer OpenTable reminded members that they planned to expire points for members who weren’t using the restaurant booking service. In many places restaurants have been closed, and even where they’re open customers have been reticent to go out to eat because of the pandemic.
They made clear to expect points expiration to come March 31. So I emailed a complaint to OpenTable, at the suggestion of a reader. They got back to me saying they’d give me my points back.
Papa Murphy’s in Anchorage, Alaska doesn’t deliver within 30 minutes, but that’s because they deliver by plane. If you live in remote Alaska, as far out as Prudhoe Bay 855 miles away, and you want pizza what else can you do?
The idea started when customers would call asking them to bring pizzas to the airport, and customers would arrange the air cargo themselves. While shipping eats into margins – they offer free shipping! – the pizza shop generally fulfill big orders (people don’t just order one pizza at a time).
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
