The New State of Chilaquiles in Austin, Texas (or, what a long, strange trip it's been).

150+ plates of chilaquiles in Austin, Texas. © Ryan Schierling

As a lot of you know, we've been on a epic, epicurean quest – a grand gustatory gamble with breaking the fast deep in the heart of Texas.

We've been scouring Austin for the very best chilaquiles it has to offer. We've torn apart the town, top to bottom, for almost fifteen years sampling both highbrow and humble versions of this traditional Mexican dish. 

There are no shortage of restaurants offering up their take on what shouldn't really be more than crisp fresh-fried tortilla chips (totopos) simmered with a red or green sauce until just slightly softened, crowned with a pair of properly-cooked eggs. With such a simple preparation, you'd think it would be difficult to screw up this classic.

We weren't looking for haute cuisine a la Mexicana, we just wanted an honest, reliable, simple Sunday morning comfort-food breakfast at a joint where everyone might eventually know us (and our broken Spanish).

There were standouts, certainly, but just as often there were store-bought chips, soggy and swimming in sub-par sauces, eggs that were under-cooked, over-cooked or not even offered as an option. There were some surprises, and there were some disappointments. 

There were also some stunningly brilliant breakfasts. 

If a restaurant presented only one salsa option for chilaquiles, Julie and I would typically order the same dish. If a restaurant had both verdes (green) and rojos (red), we'd order one of each. The majority of the time, we'd order eggs over-easy. If we knew the eggs were hopefully going to be happy eggs (see $14-plus chilaquiles), I'd go for sunny-side-up. Beans, potatoes and accoutrements (if available) were taken into consideration, as was the coffee or aguas frescas. The overall experience was key, but really, it all came down to the chilaquiles. 

After eating 150-plus different restaurant and food truck plates of chilaquiles, I can say we've done our due diligence, and now, we humbly present to you establishments that Julie and I both agreed have the finest chilaquiles in Austin. These are our favorites, the places we return to time and time again. 

These chilaquiles are Austin's best of the best. 

The 'New' State of Chilaquiles in Austin, Texas.

100 plates of chilaquiles. © Ryan Schierling

(FGHD editor's note: Originally updated March 2016 for the AFBA City Guide with 100 plates of chilaquiles.)

As a lot of you know, we've been on a epic, epicurean quest – a grand gustatory gamble with breaking the fast deep in the heart of Texas.

We've been scouring Austin for the very best chilaquiles it has to offer. We've torn apart the town, top to bottom, for more than two years sampling both highbrow and humble versions of this traditional Mexican dish. 

There are no shortage of restaurants offering up their take on what shouldn't really be more than crisp fresh-fried tortilla chips (totopos) simmered with a red or green sauce until just slightly softened, crowned with a pair of properly-cooked eggs. With such a simple preparation, you'd think it would be difficult to screw up this classic.

We weren't looking for haute cuisine a la Mexicana, we just wanted an honest, reliable, simple Sunday morning comfort-food breakfast at a joint where everyone might eventually know us (and our broken Spanish).

There were standouts, certainly, but just as often there were store-bought chips, soggy and swimming in sub-par sauces, eggs that were under-cooked, over-cooked or not even offered as an option. There were some surprises, and there were some disappointments. 

There were also some stunningly brilliant breakfasts. 

If a restaurant presented only one sauce option for chilaquiles, Julie and I would typically order the same dish. If a restaurant had both verdes (green) and rojos (red), we'd order one of each. The majority of the time, we'd order eggs over-easy. If we knew the eggs were going to be happy eggs (see $9 chilaquiles), I'd go for sunny-side-up. Beans, potatoes and accoutrements (if available) were taken into consideration, as was the coffee or aguas frescas. The overall experience was key, but really, it all came down to the chilaquiles. 

After eating 100 different plates of chilaquiles, we've done our due diligence, and now, we humbly present to you ten establishments that Julie and I both agreed have the finest chilaquiles in Austin. These are our favorites, the places we return to time and time again. 

These chilaquiles are the best of the best. 

Go away, come home.

Seattle band Spanish For 100 at S&S Cafe – Emporia, Kansas. © Ryan Schierling

"It was somewhere near The Crazy Mountains in Montana – day 17 – when I began to lose my mind. The air conditioner had just given up the ghost after 14 straight hours driving out of Denver and the early July temperatures were climbing. I was moist, sticking to my clothes and my clothes were attached to a red fold-out bench seat. I had dim memories of seeing the sun coming up, but that could have been one of at least five other sleepless nights on this summer tour. 

Polaroid pictures secured to an overhead rail with strips of duct tape swung back and forth beneath the blue and brown headliner. A pink stuffed ape wearing a mortarboard sat across from me in the captain’s chair, the butt of a yellow flashlight unceremoniously shoved into a break in the stitching in it's ass. Where was the Uriah Heep that had kept us going for so long? Everyone was silent, a little lost and glassy-eyed, moving in slow motion. The energy drinks for shift-driving were gone. The ice was melted.

I tried in vain to think of some type of candy that has a crunchy exterior and a chewy center. That’s what Horchata, the Spanish For 100 bus, had become – crusty on the outside and moist and tender in the middle. We were bad nougat that was quickly heading south, churning west over mountain passes at 47 miles per hour. I couldn’t think of the damn candy."

In 2007 and 2008, I documented two consecutive summer tours for the Seattle band Spanish For 100. 

I stopped shooting live music in Seattle, for all intents and purposes, in 2005.

Ice, de-ice, baby.

(L) Arapahoe Basin, Colorado. (R) Denver International Airport. © Ryan Schierling

We haven’t been on a proper vacation in eight years, which is longer than this Foie Gras Hot Dog thing has existed and longer than we’ve been in Austin. The last time we hopped on a plane for some adventuring was 2006 when we took a week away in Hawaii – sunning, snorkeling, and sampling plate lunch and proper poke every chance we got. It’s been far too long since we travelled for play, with a side of relaxing, dining and drinking.

Back in November, we thought it might be nice to see some snow and planned ahead for a Colorado trip. I’ve got history there, and though it’s been nearly 20 years since I’ve set foot on and strapped in at Arapahoe Basin, mountain topography does not change. They’ve added a lift on the back bowl that I used to hike, there are a few new beers on tap and lift ticket prices are about $70 (!!!) more than what I remember, but The Legend is, and will always be, my absolute favorite place to ride. 

I spent the better part of the early 1990s faithfully snowboarding A-Basin two or three times a week. What is now called the “Early Riser Lot” was church at 7 a.m. Bad Religion at volume, changing into snow gear and finishing off a travel mug of black coffee before nodding at ski patrol and catching first chair behind them. From mid-mountain, it was just a hard left down to the Lenawee lift and 13,000 feet was minutes away. From there, it was a cruise to the right and a drop off Cornice Run, or left and as far as you could get traversing the East Wall before turning in and churning through powder in Land of the Giants. I rode a Burton Craig Kelly Extreme and that board, on that prominence, made a mountain man of me. Twenty years is too long to have been away.

2015 AFBA City Guide – our Top 10 chilaquiles in Austin and so much more...

We like compendiums. Who doesn’t, really? They give you a vantage point from which to make your own best judgements and begin your own adventures.

The Austin Food Blogger Alliance puts out an annual “City Guide” which draws from the rich resources of its food-obsessed members, and the 2015 AFBA City Guide is bigger and better than ever. Its mission is to highlight the best places to eat and drink in Austin, with categories by cuisine, by dish, for drinks and a wide range of other social situations.

Our particular obsession with the traditional Mexican breakfast chilaquiles led to our contribution to this year's guide. Chilaquiles are a simple dish, with fried corn tortilla pieces (totopos) that are simmered in red or green chile sauce and generally served with a bit of cheese, fried eggs and a side of refried beans. Our first post about this dish was in 2012, but this year we updated our most recent offering (from 2013) on the topic. This 2015 update for the AFBA City Guide 2015 includes an additional 15 plates of chilaquiles (and our current Top 10 recommendations) along with photos and descriptions for a total of 65 establishments in the Austin metropolitan area.
 

The best of the best chilaquiles in Austin. © Ryan Schierling

 
So, whether you are just visiting Austin or a long-time resident looking to explore a new cuisine in town, the AFBA City Guide is a great place to start your search.

LINKS
The complete compendium:  AFBA City Guide 2015
Our chilaquiles recommendations here: The "NEW" State of Chilaquiles in Austin, Texas

Don't forget to join the conversation on Twitter using hashtag #ATXBestEats

The secrets we keep – chilaquiles at El Torito.

Chilaquiles at El Torito. © Ryan Schierling

Editor's note: Sadly, El Torito has closed. 

When we first visited Anna Salinas' El Torito seven months ago, there was no information across the wood shake above the front windows, only a blank open signage slot with exposed fluorescent tubes, waiting to illuminate something, anything.

There was no banner with the tiny restaurant's name, or specials, or letting the public know that the flour and corn tortillas were hand-made. There were only large, hand-written signs in the windows that read "TACOS," "GORDITAS" and "MENUDO."

There is a larger taqueria in this same strip mall, just down the way, and an even bigger Mexican restaurant/cantina across the street where the parking lot always seems to be full. Truth be told, we're not ones for sizzling fajita specials, frozen margaritas and roving mariachi bands, and we've never been the least bit curious about either of those joints. After our first breakfast at El Torito, we were absolutely, unequivocally hooked.

The rarest chilaquiles in all of Austin.

Chilaquiles at Veracruz All Natural. © Ryan Schierling

Elusive. Exclusive. Exquisite. 

We finally stopped with 50 plates of chilaquiles. This is chilaquiles plate number 51.

Just when I thought Julie and I had closed the book on chilaquiles in Austin, Reyna Vasquez – owner of Veracruz All Natural – dropped a first-class, stunningly-good breakfast beso on us.

We had already tried a few times to get ahold of these rarified chilaquiles. The first Sunday we stopped by, the trailer was closed for repairs. I called the following week to find that the special brunch menu was served only on the first Sunday of each month – essentially making these the most elusive of all chilaquiles in Austin, offered only 12 times a year.

I had a feeling they were going to be pretty good, but I had no idea just how good. At one point, Julie took a perfectly-proportioned bite and simply started laughing. She had no words, only a giddy roll of the eyes and a slight swoon. My reaction was incredulous silence, stunned disbelief, and an immediate clearing of my calendar for all following first Sundays of the month.

Both rojo y verde are offered, plated (yes, actual plates out of a trailer) with your choice of charro, black, or refried black beans, and fried plantains. I ladled out a bit of the spicy green and rich red hot sauces that are so wonderful on the Veracruz All Natural tacos, but the salsas went unused, wholly unnecessary. The chilaquiles verde were as ideal as they get – fresh totopos with perfect tooth under a sauce so natural, bright and right, with just the slightest heat. Under the over-easy eggs were a few slivers of raw white onion and a dusting of hard-grated cheese. The red version was more mild and subtle, a little delicate, but refined and ridicously-satisfying. There were none of the overly-heavy, thickly-spiced, tomato-chile flavors we'd seen on so many plates of chilaquiles rojo before. Refried black beans (flawlessly seasoned) and sweet, crispy-edged, creamy-interior fried plantains finished the plate. 

Texas Coffee Roasters provided the café and the sandia agua fresca was amazing. 

Veracruz All Natural is now at the top of our list of the best chilaquiles in Austin. Thank you, Reyna. We'll see you again soon.

The *New* State of Chilaquiles in Austin, Texas.

65 plates of chilaquiles. © Ryan Schierling

(FGHD editor's note: Updated February 2015 for AFBA City Guide)

As a lot of you know, we've been on a epic, epicurean quest – a grand gustatory gamble with breaking the fast deep in the heart of Texas.

We've been scouring Austin for the very best chilaquiles it has to offer. We've torn apart the town, top to bottom, for more than a year sampling both highbrow and humble versions of this traditional Mexican dish. 

There are no shortage of restaurants offering up their take on what shouldn't really be more than crisp fresh-fried tortilla chips (totopos) simmered with a red or green sauce until just slightly softened, crowned with a pair of properly-cooked eggs. With such a simple preparation, you'd think it would be difficult to screw up this classic.

We weren't looking for haute cuisine a la Mexicana, we just wanted an honest, reliable, simple Sunday morning comfort-food breakfast at a joint where everyone might eventually know us (and our broken Spanish).

There were standouts, certainly, but just as often there were store-bought chips, soggy and swimming in sub-par sauces, eggs that were under-cooked, over-cooked or not even offered as an option. There were some surprises, and there were some disappointments. 

There were also some stunningly brilliant breakfasts. 

If a restaurant presented only one sauce option for chilaquiles, Julie and I would typically order the same dish. If a restaurant had both verdes (green) and rojos (red), we'd order one of each. The majority of the time, we'd order eggs over-easy. If we knew the eggs were going to be happy eggs (see $9 chilaquiles), I'd go for sunny-side-up. Beans, potatoes and accoutrements (if available) were taken into consideration, as was the coffee or aguas frescas. The overall experience was key, but really, it all came down to the chilaquiles. 

We've done our due diligence, and now, we humbly present to you ten establishments that Julie and I both agreed have the finest chilaquiles in Austin. These are our favorites, the places we return to time and time again. 

These chilaquiles are the best of the best. 

Austin Food Blogger Alliance Cookbook.

Mando Rayo's fried egg tacos. © Ryan Schierling

We love cookbooks, and believe that if you truly want a comprehensive understanding of a family or community, read one of their collected cookbooks cover to cover. Find the most dog-eared, sauce-splattered pages, cook those recipes and you will know the way to their hearts. 

Last September, we were asked to test a pair of recipes for the Austin Food Blogger Alliance cookbook, set to be published in the Spring of 2013 by History Press.

Mando Rayo of Taco Journalism has one of the most exhaustively-compiled review sites of taco trucks and taquerias in and around Austin, and we've used that vast database for years now in finding new tacos. His fried egg taco recipe produced a deliciously spicy, messy handful best served "after many tequilazos." 

Thanks 2012... you've been delicious.

A fraction of the 2012 action. © Ryan Schierling

2012 passed with such a quickness, and before we even realized it, our second calendar year here at Foie Gras Hot Dog had come to a close. 

It was an engaging, fun-filled year. We started off with a Today Show Home Chef challenge, winning enough votes to have our "papaquiles" served from the Today Show food trucks at SXSW.

We did a few things we shouldn't have. We made Oysters Jones, because in this economy, not everyone can have Oysters Rockefeller. The sequel to Bitchin' Bacon & Beef Bombs™ was... something from a low-rent neighborhood convenience store on The Island of Dr. Moreau? We still don't talk about that one much. And somehow, against all odds, I came up with Chicken-fried Chicken à la King Ranch Chicken.

Julie reverse-engineered the best ice cream sandwich on the planet - the It's-It - and then did Sopes con Platanos so well I could cry. She also made beautiful cakes for a dear friend's wedding in Seattle, and mastered the art of the Italian Meringue Buttercream. 

We don't eat out too much, but over in Montopolis, Yolanda Sanchez Cornejo served us the best Mexican food we've ever had, out of a trailer next to a laundrette. We also ate more chilaquiles than anyone in Austin proper this year, and were subsequently awarded the keys to the city. Well, not really, but if you need to know where the absolute best of the best chilaquiles are, come find us and we'll point you in the right direction (hint: see below). 

Enough with the retrospective – here are the five most popular Foie Gras Hot Dog posts from 2012, as determined by you, the readers. Our sincerest thanks to everyone who has made this delicious journey with us. We couldn't have, and wouldn't have, done it without you.

The State of Chilaquiles in Austin, Texas.

30 chilaquiles. (Click this image only if you have a gigantic monitor.) © Ryan Schierling

(FGHD editor's note: This post has been superceded – with an added 35 plates of chilaquiles – by The *New* State of Chilaquiles in Austin, Texas.)

As a lot of you know, we've been on a epic, epicurean quest – a grand gustatory gamble with breaking the fast deep in the heart of Texas.

We've been scouring Austin for the very best chilaquiles it has to offer. We've torn apart the town, top to bottom, for more than a year sampling both highbrow and humble versions of this traditional Mexican dish. 

There are no shortage of restaurants offering up their take on what shouldn't really be more than crisp fresh-fried tortilla chips (totopos) simmered with a red or green sauce until just slightly softened, crowned with a pair of properly-cooked eggs. With such a simple preparation, you'd think it would be difficult to screw up this classic.

We weren't looking for haute cuisine a la Mexicana, we just wanted an honest, reliable, simple Sunday morning comfort-food breakfast at a joint where everyone might eventually know us (and our broken Spanish).

There were standouts, certainly, but just as often there were store-bought chips, soggy and swimming in sub-par sauces, eggs that were under-cooked, over-cooked or not even offered as an option. There were some surprises, and there were some disappointments. 

There were also some stunningly brilliant breakfasts. 

If a restaurant presented only one sauce option for chilaquiles, Julie and I would typically order the same dish. If a restaurant had both verde (green) and rojo (red), we'd order one of each. The majority of the time, we'd order eggs over-easy. If we knew the eggs were going to be happy eggs (see $9 chilaquiles), I'd go for sunny-side-up. Beans, potatoes and accoutrements (if available) were taken into consideration, as was the coffee or aguas frescas. The overall experience was key, but really, it all came down to the chilaquiles. 

We've done our due diligence, and now, we humbly present to you five establishments that Julie and I both agreed have the finest chilaquiles in Austin (along with one restaurant from each of us that we feel should be included as well). These are our favorites, the places we return to time and time again. 

These chilaquiles are the best of the best. 

VOTE for our Papaquiles to be served at SXSW.

***UPDATE*** We won! Papaquiles for everyone! We are humbled and honored that our breakfast dish will be served at SXSW from the Today food truck. Thank you to Today Food, our hometown helpers here in Austin, our Seattle auxiliary, all our wonderful friends and family, and everyone on this big ol' earth with a computer and internets that voted for us! We would like to feed you! Exclamation points! (DEEP BREATH.) We'll let you know when the official announcement will be made on the Today Show on NBC, and when we go up on the Bites/Today page on MSNBC.com. Exclamation points! !!! !

Image © Today Food

The Today Show's food page on Facebook has a recurring Home Chef Challenge where recipes are submitted to fit a specific theme. The latest, an homage to Southwestern-style breakfast, was right up our alley. From the submissions, three recipes are chosen as finalists and then voted on by the general public  (you just have to "like" Today Food on Facebook to be able to vote). The winner's dish will be served by the Today Food crew out of a food truck at this year's SXSW Music Festival in Austin. 

I'm a proud papa, because our papaquiles recipe is one of the three finalists. 

So, now we need your help. Click here to vote for the hometown favorite... papaquiles, through Friday, Feb. 24.

But please don't do it just for us. Do it for the hash browns, the salsa verde, the onions and sour cream, and the runny egg that all aspire to be something bigger than they are. Do it for the harried, the hungry, and the hungover of SXSW. Do it because it's an original, and a delicious original at that. Do it because you know it's the right thing to do. 

Do it because real cowboys don't eat frittata. 

Papaquiles.

Papaquiles (the imaginary friend of chilaquiles). © Ryan Schierling

Disclaimer: The name chilaquiles comes from the Nahuatl word chil-a-quilitl, which means "herbs or greens in chile broth. "Papaquiles" is not actually a word. We made it up. That's alright, though, because this concoction bears only a passing resemblance to one of our other favorite breakfast dishes. You guessed it... chilaquiles.

Since our very first introduction to this Mexican breakfast, we've been huge fans. Fried tortillas all sauced up in red or green salsa, with sour cream or fresh crema, a little diced onion and the glorious yellow of yolks spilling from fried eggs – what's not to adore?

One weekend morning about four years ago, after we had been making chilaquiles at home for a few months, I woke up wanting all those delicious flavors. Except, I was in the mood for hash browns... and why not instead of totopos? Barely into my first cup of coffee, I articulated this to Ryan and within the hour he had created a breakfast dish that met my craving with wild success.

It's ridiculously simple, actually. Hash browns cooked to perfection with nice crispy edges, a big spoonful of salsa verde, a dollop of cool sour cream, chopped white onions for their brightness and crunch, and crowned with an over-easy egg. Finish this with a drift of your favorite hot sauce and your day is at once off to a fantastically rich and savory start.

We don't play favorites between roja and verde versions of chilaquiles, but with hash browns the salsa verde has been our mainstay and the best fit in terms of consistency and flavor. While we're still running all over Austin exploring the plethora of amazing chilaquiles at local taquerias, for breakfast at home "papaquiles" remains one of our very favorites.