News you can eat
New gourmet grocery store gives downtown the royal treatment, plus more San Antonio food news
Editor's note: We get it. It can be difficult to keep up with the what’s what and who’s who of San Antonio food. But we have you covered with our regular roundup of the freshest local restaurant news.
The Rand Building is getting a new pizza joint and whisky bar in late spring with the upcoming opening of Whisky Rose at 110 E. Houston St. The restaurant is the brainchild of Caesar Zepeda, the owner and operator of Sangria on the Burg, the winner of the 2017 CultureMap Tastemaker Award for Best New Restaurant. Along with Sangria pastry chef Michelle Giusti and sous chef Mariza Betancourt, Zepeda will be cooking up pizzas with unorthodox toppings like beef brisket and dessert pies like Irish Car Bomb chocolate and cinnamon roll apple.
H-E-B Go, a new app that allows Android and iPhone customers to check out without going through the checkout line, is being piloted at two San Antonio locations: the downtown South Flores Street market and the De Zavala store at 12777 IH 10 W. The move is the latest attempt by the Texas grocery giant to match Amazon’s convenience step by step. On February 15, H-E-B announced it was acquiring Austin-based delivery service Favor.
Austin import Royal Blue Grocery is coming to the Savoy Building at the corner of Houston and Soledad streets in the fall. The chain, with several locations in the Capital City and one in Dallas, offers a variety of artisan foods, grab-and-go items, coffee, and more.
A new fusion food truck from chef Ricardo Ramirez is set to open in March. Tortugas Tortas blends culinary traditions from all over the world in dishes like the San Anto Torta, with San Antonio-style barbacoa, roasted garlic mayo, cilantro pesto, and Big Red caramelized onions, and the Puerto Rican banh mi, with mojo roasted pork shoulder, sweet plantain and bacon mustard, and carrot daikon slaw. The location has not been announced yet, but customers wanting updates can text “tortugas” to 48421.
In other food truck news, two new poke spots have recently rolled into San Antonio. Hula Poke Sushi Burrito and Poke from Rolling Fish Sushi Burrito and Poke owner Bin Lu is now open at 7315 San Pedro Ave. near the Park North shopping center. Poke Man Sushi Bowls brings the Hawaiian favorite to locations all over town. Check the truck’s Facebook page for the latest stop.
A few tickets are still available for Dinner in the Wild, a special collaborative event on March 21 between Boiler House and the Witte Museum featuring bites from Boiler House chef Jarrad Gwaltney, as well as Southerleigh’s Jeff Balfour, Tre Trattoria’s Jason Dady, The Good Kind’s Tim McDiarmid, and Bakery Lorraine’s Anne Ng and Jeremy Mandrell. The special dinner, held outdoors at the Witte’s Texas Wild Garden, will raise funds to ensure all local K-12 students will be able to enjoy field trips to see the museum’s Tricentennial exhibition, "Confluence and Culture: 300 Years of San Antonio History," free of charge.