TGICFS.

CFS. OMG. HTS. STFU. SMDH.  © Ryan Schierling

Editor's note: As of February 2019, Hit The Spot Cafe has closed. One of the best, last, proper breakfast CFS and eggs plates is gone. 

"...so that's how I woke up with shin splints and found out I'd been banned from the community pool..."

"...I don't know what happened. I opened the front door and the light was blinding. It felt like I'd been in the house for two days instead of two hours and now the upper atmosphere was burning. It was incapacitating overexposure, hot white light that turned the insides of my cleaved eyelids bright blood red, even through the futile shade of my outstretched hand..."

"...I'd fight you right now, 'cept I don't wanna crush my cig'rettes..."

I'm not sure what to relay here. It's been a while. I really don't even want to tell you where this place is. Really. I guess if you run in the right, tight AUSTIN TEXAS CFS circles, you'll figure it out.

Your Haiku:

A breakfast stunner
Location curated, so
locals only please

SaveSave

TGICFS.

Chicken-fried steak and eggs at Cypress Grill. © Ryan Schierling

I'm still lamenting the closure of Arkie's Grill, because dollars to dunkers, that was the best chicken-fried steak and eggs in Austin. I've kind of given up on the breakfast CFS here, since no one really does it. Chicken-fried steak is always on proper Southern lunch and dinner menus, with fries or mashed potatoes and 40 other side dish options.

I want it in the A.M., damnit, with fried eggs, crispy hash browns, Texas toast, some badass cream gravy and a stiff cup of black coffee. That's it. This breakfast is Texas birthright.

Cypress Grill does it absolutely right. A pounded-out, tender cube steak, properly hand-battered and fried, topped with andouille sausage gravy, with a pair of perfectly-cooked eggs and a little wedge of buttered toast to sop up leftover gravy and egg yolk. If they had hash browns instead of home fries, we could have had a brunch love affair, and I would have ordered plate after plate until they kicked me out.

Bonus points for their infused Bloody Mary, which is the second best I've had in the city, just behind Cafe Malta's Bloody Hell.

Now, here's your obligatory TGICFS haiku:

A New Orleans brunch
Adept, tender kitchen hands
Soothe my quondam wounds.

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.

I'm going to Wichita / Far from this opera forever more.

Chicken-fried steak and eggs at Jimmy's Egg. © Ryan Schierling

We do not eat poorly. Truly. 

But when we're on the road, any and all respectable regimens of normal dietary discipline go out the window at 75-miles per hour, sometimes even before we leave Austin proper. I'd like to think that I can blame it on genetics – mom always packed boxes of Cheez-Its for vacations, and dad had to make pit-stops for Dr Pepper and peanuts – but the truth is, the road is kind of like the bottle. "It don't make you do a thing, it just lets you."*

Wichita, Kansas is 543 miles from Austin, Texas. There are a number of other, perhaps more desirable destinations within that 543-mile radius. Tampico, Chihuahua and Ciudad Juarez in Mexico. New Orleans, Louisiana. Mobile, Alabama. Jackson, Mississippi. Las Cruces, New Mexico. Certainly these are all more favorable locales than the largest city in Kansas? Perhaps. Depends on your history, and what your motivations are. We are headed to Wichita.

TGICFS.

Chicken-fried steak and eggs at Monument Cafe. © Ryan Schierling

There aren't too many old-school diners in Austin proper. The last, best place to get chicken-fried steak and eggs for breakfast was Arkie's Grill over on E. Cesar Chavez, but their temporary closure for remodeling turned permanent, and now the space is slated for a "New Orleans-inspired diner serving classy Texas comfort food with a Louisiana flare." Whenever I hear "classy" and "comfort food" in the same sentence, I default to "overpriced comfort food." I will miss Arkie's, but I guess the world keeps on turning.

We trekked 30 minutes north to Monument Cafe in Georgetown for breakfast, and it was worth the drive. While the four-ounce CFS was a bit slight by typical Texas standards (pounded-out, plate-sized behemoths), it was well-breaded, pleasantly-seasoned and served with delicious cream gravy. Julie's revered Florentine Benedict, a classic, simple dish easily screwed up by crab or diced tomatoes or spicy hollandaise, was so nicely done – and served with proper hash browns – that she nearly wept tears of joy. 

A tender moment
between beef and cream gravy
My fork is content 

TGICFS.

Chicken-fried steak and eggs at Rise & Shine - Arlington, Texas. © Ryan Schierling

Texas CFS, it's been a while.

I've had some time to think about things. We've had a lot of fun together, you and I, but I guess I've just got to put this out there...

I think I need to see other breakfast options.

When you're good, you're really, really good. Sometimes amazing. But those times have been few and far between, and I expect the best of you here in this great state. I mean, this is your stomping grounds. It's where you came from.

You were certainly stunning (even after breakfast hours) in Blanco, leaving any lusty thoughts of an on-the-road, one-morning-stand in Wallace, Idaho behind (I was just passing through, on tour with this rock band from Seattle... no hard feelings). But you've been distant of late. Inconsistent. A little sloppy. If we only see each other infrequently, I want those meetings, those delicious liaisons, to be fireworks and waving flags, and cholesterol tests be damned. I want to wake up with you, start the day with you.

I'm sorry, Texas chicken-fried steak. Unless you can show me that you want to be with me for breakfast on the regular, I'm going to have to move on.

Wondrous homemade bread
cast a breakfast pall on you,
Sysco CFS

TGICFS.

Chicken fried steak at Top Notch. © Ryan Schierling

Given the stellar track record Top Notch has with their fried chicken, I had no qualms about trying out the chicken-fried steak on a recent visit with friends. They ordered their burgers, fries and onion rings, while I went for CFS with fries and salad. Sadly, a few dazed and confused bites into what looked and tasted like a pre-breaded, formerly-frozen steak-patty, I was glancing longingly at my compadres' burgers, knowing I'd made a huge mistake. Next time, I'll return to my Top Notch usual - the #4 Longhorn Special.

Plastic utensils
portend pretend CFS.
JKL, Top Notch.

TGICFS.

Chicken-fried steak @ Evangeline Cafe. © Ryan Schierling

I would have never thought to order CFS at a Cajun/Creole restaurant. Evangeline Cafe is in our south Austin neighborhood, and no matter how hard I try to order something different on the occasions we visit, my go-to always ends up being an oyster po' boy with fries. I'm a simple man, with simple needs, and Evangeline does a very nice sandwich. 

But the last time we stopped in for lunch I was feeling like a little chicken-fried steak, and man, did they deliver. I thought I was surreptitiously taking a photo at our outside table when the waitress came back and surprised me with some more sweet tea. She cocked her head and queried, "Photos?" I stammered that I, uh, took photographs of all the chicken-fried steaks I eat, and that's not really a weird thing, and I, uh, really really liked chicken-fried steaks, and that this was an especially handsome rendition, and, and (that breading, damn!) trying to retreat a bit from my CFS-fanboy stance, I cleared my throat and in a slightly-deeper voice told her to "uhm, give my regards to the chef for such a... visually-pleasing plate." 

She smiled politely, probably thought to herself that I was a huge dork, and quickly finished refilling my tea. 

The CFS? It tasted even better than it looked. 

Louisiana
and Texas had a fist-fight...
settled to a draw(l).

TGICFS.

CFS and eggs at Arkie's Grill. © Ryan Schierling

Traditionally, TGICFS has been a weekend installment here at Foie Gras Hot Dog. There's just nothing better than clearing Sunday morning cobwebs with a cup of black coffee – and if I have my way – comforting the belly with a plate of chicken-fried steak and eggs.

I've been wanting to try the CFS at Arkie's Grill for a while now. The problem is, they're not bloody open on Sundays.

So, I took a mid-week morning for myself and snuck off after Julie went to work, just to give Arkie's a shot.

Situated in a well-worn Eastside neighborhood and surrounded by automotive, junk and machine shops, Arkie's Grill is an old-school, truck stop-type diner of the best sort. It looks like not much has been changed since they opened 64 years ago, and the menu offers tried and true classics – burgers, fried chicken, and daily specials with your choice of three out of four available sides (hint, you tell your waitress the one you don't want). Arkie's breakfast offering is what I came for, and while the chicken-fried steak doesn't best the Blanco Bowling Club Cafe for my number one spot, it is by far the tastiest CFS and eggs I've had in Austin proper.

Wiz Khalifa got
nothing on the table like
old school brown and white.

TGICFS.

Chicken-fried steak and eggs @ Trudy's. © Ryan Schierling

One of my favorite things about living in Austin is eating breakfast at Mexican restaurants. The nine-year-old in me absolutely loves the concept of starting your day with a basket of warm tortilla chips and a variety of fiery, cobweb-clearing salsas. 

We've been stepping out quite a bit for chilaquiles, unofficially looking for the best in town, so my chicken-fried steak streak has wavered. Recently, we were feeling conventional (read as: chain restaurant) and tried Trudy's, a Tex-Mex joint more famous for their syrupy-sweet Mexican Martini than anything on their food menu. I was a little bit wary when we walked into the place. If Jim's Restaurant was a respite for oldsters and nostalgia over coffee on a Sunday morning, Trudy's seemed to be the place where every good-looking twenty-something was sipping their Bloody Mary breakfast at the enormous bar, and the only nostalgia was in trying to remember last night. Our very cool waiter didn't hesitate to enthusiastically mention the six different incredible drink specials they had, but when I ordered black coffee and asked how the CFS was he could only shrug and say "Yeah... it's alright?" 

I wondered if maybe I'd be better off with chilaquiles? 

Chips and salsa arrived with our black blood of the gods, and I set aside my reservations and hesitations. When the CFS came, it looked promising – a generous portion of round steak with all the requisite nooks and crannies that a hand-breaded CFS should have. Jalapeño cream gravy was served on the side. The over-easy eggs were over-cooked, the hash-browned square of potatoes looked crispy but were sadly soggy. The pico de gallo side baffled me a bit, and I wasn't quite sure what to eat it with. The steak itself was better than the waiter had let on, and certainly not the worst I've had on this quest – properly cooked, a touch tough, but seasoned well. It would get me by for a bit (and my chips and salsa-stuffed inner nine-year-old) until we could wrangle and round up the next breakfast CFS.

No, NO. I don't want
the Mexican Martini.
I'm old, humor me.

TGICFS.

CFS w/ eggs and potatoes @ Dart Bowl. © Ryan Schierling

I learned a few things this Sunday.

I learned that the chicken-fried steak and eggs at Dart Bowl runs an anemic, distant third place to the blue-ribbon Tex-Mex cheese enchiladas (topped with proper chili-gravy and over-easy eggs) they are wildly famous for. Runner-up goes to the basket of homemade Texas toast with tiny paper condiment cups of butter already flipped over upside-down and melting onto the toast. Bringing up the rear sadly, a scrawny, wheezing, flat-footed CFS.

I learned that Julie didn't know the bowling terminology "turkey," where someone bowls three strikes in a row and a round of Wild Turkey shots is purchased. Even if it's only 11 a.m.

I learned that drinking Wild Turkey in the morning is even less glamorous when the 1 oz. shot is served in an 8 oz. plastic cup, but that $2.25 cans of Pearl are a dandy chaser.

I learned that I can throw a 14-pound bowling ball 23.62 miles-per-hour down the lane.

TGICFS.

CFS w/ mashed potatoes and cream gravy. © Ryan Schierling

According to The Rolling Stones, you can't always get what you want. But if you try sometimes you just might find you get what you need.

I always want CFS and eggs over-easy, with a side of hash browns and toast. Always.

We arrived at the Blanco Bowling Club too late for breakfast, and too early to watch the locals do a little nine-pin bowling. But, the kitchen was churning out what looked and smelled like homemade small-town Americana by the plateful so we sat down, got ourselves some iced tea and took a look at the menu.

Call it a hunch, but I knew the chicken-fried steak was going to be good. It had to be. There are many paths to CFS enlightenment in the state of Texas and at least a few of those paths – according to those in the know – end in Blanco, at this well-seasoned bowling alley, cafe and community center that's been around since 1947.

I ordered the "large," which was two hand-breaded cuts of beef, with a side of mashed potatoes, a salad, and homemade bread.

The crust was crispy, with crunchy ridges that yielded nicely to the fork and revealed a tender, cooked-medium cube steak that immediately made me forget all about the over-easy eggs and hash browns I tend to prefer with CFS. Some joints drown their steaks in gravy, hoping to hide flaws and imperfections, but the Blanco Bowling Club Cafe puts their chicken-fried glory on display with just enough cream gravy on the side to swipe forkfuls of beef through. The mashed potatoes were real, the salad was ubiquitous diner iceberg mix and the ranch dressing on the table in a clear squeezy bottle was exactly what I wanted to top it with.

I saved a piece of homemade bread to squeegee any remaining potatoes and gravy mixed with bits of CFS crust shrapnel, leaving my plate spotless for an easy arc straight from the bus bin to the dishwasher. Hey, I do what I can.

And in case you were wondering, Aaron, Chris, Corey and Ross, this one beats my former number one CFS in Wallace, Idaho.

We eat bowling shoes
at hands of lesser artists
A masterpiece, this

TGICFS.

Chicken fried steak and eggs @ The Frisco. © Ryan Schierling

This was another morning beginning with high hopes for chicken-fried steak and eggs, only to be disappointed by The Frisco Shop's offering. The storied restaurant's historic decor led us to believe we were going to, at last, sit down and get ourselves an honest, simple and delicious breakfast. But looks can be deceiving... and that sad parsley is the breakfast equivalent of a death knell.

textural query:
where does the limp meat begin
and bland gravy end?

TGICFS.

Star Seeds Cafe - Austin, Texas. © Ryan Schierling

There's been a bit of a "Thank God It's Chicken-Fried Sunday" hiatus because we've had a lot going on over the last month, and just haven't had the opportunity to continue hunting for the be-all, end-all of breakfast CFS. I'm happy to report we were back on the trail Sunday morning, at Star Seeds Cafe.

The place is a loud, dimly-lit dive (expected), the service is tepid and imperious (nine of ten online reviewers agree), and the food is mostly passable (thankfully). The freshly-ground coffee and wheat toast – with what looked and tasted like homemade bread – were the highlights of the morning. With the majority of restaurants serving CFS only doing so for lunch and dinner, I'm having a harder time finding the breakfast offerings I'm looking for. Anyone in Austin got a favorite breakfast chicken-fried steak joint I should know about?

The coffee sustains
but you're going to have to
do better than this.

TGICFS.

CFS and eggs @ Bakehouse Restaurant & Bar. © Ryan Schierling

I had high hopes for this one. 

Sunday mornings I usually spend a few moments looking over my CFS potentials list and then cross reference online to see if that particular restaurant serves a Florentine Benedict. 

Julie's taken too many to count for the team when it comes to the meatses – quietly eating sides when I'm shoving barbecue into my face or patiently picking at pancakes when I'm all about the morning chicken-fried steak hunt. She's been denied her favorite breakfast too many times in the quest for my favorite breakfast. 

She wanted Magnolia this morning. Specifically, she wanted the Florentine Benedict that they'd featured on their specials menu a while back. The menu online for Bakehouse purported to have four different Hollandaise egg dishes – with fresh, from scratch Hollandaise sauce – and it didn't take much arm-twisting before we were heading up Manchaca to try a new breakfast spot. 

The Bakehouse front of the house is bar. The Bakehouse back of the house is restaurant, with deep booths and dim lighting. Illuminated globes hang above each table and a giant map of the world adorns the north wall opposite the banquettes. Menus claim to take your taste buds on a global adventure, with dishes from cuisines in Italy, Mexico, China, France, Japan, Morroco, India, Switzerland, along with regional Cajun and Texas fare. 

That all seems a bit of a stretch for a bar/restaurant, but how hard is it to make a solid American breakfast, deep in the heart of Texas? In this case, it was a struggle. 

The CFS is hand-battered to order, and mine had the perfect texture and tenderness, but both beef and gravy were woefully under-salted. And there was something off about the battered, fried crust. Tasted by itself, it was... bitter. Bitter batter. I've never experienced anything like it with CFS, and was disappointed because the textures were so right on. The home fries were forgettable, my over-easy eggs actually undercooked. J's breakfast was, in her words, "blech, blech blech blech. Blech." 

To disappoint with 
astringent unsavory
I steered you wrong, love

TGICFS.

Union Street Station - New Braunfels, Texas. © Ryan Schierling

I never met a chicken-fried steak I didn't like. 

I guess that means I really haven't had bad CFS yet. And by bad, I mean completely mediocre – a TV-dinner-quality piece of gristly meat, with greasy, soggy breading and a bland, pasty glue of a gravy that I wouldn't even bother to take more than two bites of. I'm certain it will happen one day. 

But today, here in New Braunfels, is not that day.  

Brown and white food groups
Red-checked tablecloth landscape
Familiar comfort

TGICFS.

Dan's Hamburgers. © Ryan Schierling

Dan's Hamburgers is legendary in Austin. Fran's Hamburgers is legendary in Austin. 

A long time ago, there used to be Dan and Fran's Hamburgers, when they were married. But, Dan and Fran split up. Now there are separate restaurants serving exactly the same menus. I'm not one to choose sides where matters of the heart are concerned. However, choosing sides when it comes to the southern staple of "meat and two," matters of the heart are cast aside, obviously. Fry it, and put gravy on all of it. Please. 

The breakfast menu at Dan's (and Fran's, since they're eerily, matrimonially, exactly similar) is pretty utilitarian and mostly meat-heavy. No one would look at you sideways if you ordered an omelet stuffed with bacon, ham and sausage, with bacon bits on top. But ask for a fruit cup and you'd be out of luck. 

Actually, they were ridiculously accommodating. Chicken-fried steak is not on the breakfast menu, so it went sort of like this: 

Me: "Can I get a chicken-fried steak, with two eggs over easy, two biscuits and hash browns?"
Our waitress: "#6 (2 Eggs of Your Choice w/ 2 Sides) plus CFS, you got it."
Me: "I am very excited."
Our waitress: (smirk)
Julie: "Okay, I don't mean to be difficult...but, what I'm craving this morning is a grilled cheese sandwich with two eggs and hash browns."
Our waitress, smiling and shaking her head a little: "Okay. We can do that." 

The coffee was as expected – and turned out to be – best-case truck stop, worst-case all-night diner. But it kept coming fresh and hot well after we'd completely decimated our plates and were sitting there badgering about whether or not it was too late to put more tomato plants into the garden. The hash browns and eggs made me want to kiss whoever did, or didn't, clean the well-seasoned flat-top every night. Fluffy – not flaky – biscuits were nicely buttered and salty and too large for me to finish both. 

Salt of the earth joint
Beefy anticipation
drowning in gravy

TGICFS.

CFS & eggs. Jim's Restaurant - Austin, Texas. © Ryan Schierling

There are a lot of pre-breaded, frozen chicken fried steaks out there. They are unceremoniously thrown into a basket and dropped into a Fryolator. Only by virtue of their peppered cream gravy embrace and immediate egg and hash-browned brothers, can they be elevated to breakfast greatness. Sometimes it takes more than that... sometimes it takes great coffee. Sometimes it takes honest-to-goodness salted real sweet cream butter on just-right toast. 

Some times it just isn't possible to be great, but it's possible to be satisfying. It's possible to be comforting and pleasantly satisfactory. Early on a Sunday morning, I don't always demand greatness. Some times I just demand your honest ingredients, whatever they are and wherever they come from, hot and properly prepared, served with a genuine smile. 

The oldsters are here...

Nostalgia is a fleeting

dream in the morning.

TGICFS.

Rancher's Plate. Cafe 290 - Manor, Texas. © Ryan Schierling

Thank God it's Chicken Fried Sunday. Considering all of my favorite food groups are brown and white, it should be no surprise that I am taking advantage of living in the state where chicken fried steak originated. (I'm also considering investing in a gym membership, and/or Lipitor, because this quest for the holy grail of CFS is not for the faint of heart or slight of artery.)

Roughly every other Sunday, I will partake of the best, and probably some of the worst, chicken fried steak in Austin and surrounding areas. There are a million opinions (and that's just in Texas) about this breakfast, lunch and dinner staple, so I'm not going to push any holier-than-thou CFS religious views upon you. I'll keep it simple and just give you a CFS haiku for each restaurant's offering.

(Cafe 290 in Manor, Texas – Chicken fried steak w/ eggs over-easy, home fries and biscuits.)

Perfect beef is love
that the loose, limber meat sock

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