Food fight

San Antonio mayor scoffs as Dallas declares itself the 'Taco City' of Texas

Mi Tierra Cafe and Bakery restaurant tacos San Antonio

After a D Magazine article declared Dallas "Taco City," San Antonio is again on the front lines of a taco war.

Mi Tierra Cafe & Bakery/Facebook

Just as San Antonio begins to heal from the ravages of the great Austin taco war of 2016, a new enemy combatant has moved in to makes claims on Alamo City’s most beloved food.

The first shots were fired when Tim Rogers, the editor of D Magazine, tweeted a sneak peek of the cover of the September issue on August 17. The clear piece of propaganda not only boldly declared Dallas as Taco City, but said they had 37 tacos to prove it. Once news of the northern aggression hit San Antonio, citizens were understandably up in arms.

Replying to the tweet, Signature chef Andrew Weissman blew off the scandalous assertion, saying, “The rest of Texas just let out a collective belly laugh. Y’all probably have the best lobster rolls in the country as well.”

But tensions really started to flare when San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg got involved in the kerfuffle. With a Rihanna-level of social media savageness, Nirenberg simply responded “LOL.”

That really got Rogers’ dander up. On August 23, he delivered a letter to the mayor’s team, immediately going for the jugular with mentions of civic disasters like former Spurs star Kawhi Leonard’s recent betrayal and the devastating August 21 fire at Northeast Side restaurant Chacho's & Chalucci’s.

“I’ll get right to the point,” he wrote. “You totally dissed the entire city of Dallas when you LOL’ed in your retweet ... Now, there are two ways we can go from here. Either we can prolong this beef between out two cities ... OR you can come up here and eat some tacos.”

Rogers went on to invite the mayor on a complimentary taco tour of the city with the author of the Taco City piece, José Ralat, and Dallas mayor Mike Rawlings. Wildly asserting that Nirenberg would no longer LOL after agreeing to the diplomatic mission, Rogers offered a glowing feature and Dallas Wings star Liz Cambage (presumably unaware of her fealty to the aviator-wearing editor) should Nirenberg not eat his words.

Ever the capable general, Nirenberg responded to Rogers in a tweeted three-letter salvo, thus delivering one final blow: “SMH.”

tacos

NYT loves AUS

Pastry chef from San Antonio makes New York Times Best Bakeries list

Comadre Panadería/Instagram

Comadre Panadería is known for nostalgic Mexican bakes with feminine flair.

The New York Times has once again shined its spotlight on Austin’s culinary scene. It included Comadre Panadería, an Austin bakery by San Antonio native Mariela Camacho, on its new list of the 22 of the Best Bakeries Across the U.S. Right Now.

Interim food critic Priya Krishna praises pastry chef Camacho’s pastries that include conchas and her signature pink cake. “Despite their saccharine appearances, not one of the desserts is overly cloying, and even the coffee drinks (Texas pecan horchata! Cranberry vanilla agua fresca!) strike the playful tone of the pastries,” she writes.

Comadre Panadería has been widely recognized, including by this publication; Camacho, who is now based in Ausitn, won Pastry Chef of the Year in the 2023 CultureMap Austin Tastemaker Awards. She also earned a 2024 James Beard Award semifinalist nomination for Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker.

Camacho and Comadre as a whole are both invested in using baked goods to make a more equitable world, from the bakery's early days as a fundraiser for disaster relief, to a current insistence on charging enough to support ethical and organic foods, and paying staff enough to keep up with rising costs in Austin.

Although Camacho was born in San Antonio and started her baking career there, she also spent a significant time in Seattle, Washington, where Comadre started as a pop-up. According to Austin Monthly, she then moved back to San Antonio, and then to Austin. But no matter where she is, the Mexican cooking traditions of her ancestors take precedent.

Mariela Camacho of Comadre Panaderia in Austin Mariela Camacho, Comadre Panaderia. Courtesy photo

The Times also recognized Houston's Koffeteria. Krishna hails the bakery for pastry chef-owner Vanarin Kuch’s creative fare that includes dishes such as beef pho kolaches, Chinese sausage breakfast tacos, and butter mochi.

“Some of Mr. Kuch’s offerings are rooted in his Cambodian American identity — he makes cornbread with the coconutty, scallion-forward flavors of Cambodian street corn — while others are odes to Houston’s multicultural makeup. But most of the fun of Koffeteria is having no idea what Mr. Kuch will do next, and eagerly awaiting his next innovation,” Krishna writes.

Open since 2019, Koffeteria has been riding high this year. It earned a James Beard Award semifinalist nomination for Outstanding Bakery and a CultureMap Houston Tastemaker Award for Pastry Chef of the Year.

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Comadre Panadería and Koffeteria are the only Texas establishments to make the Times’ list. Only California and New York City, which each have three representatives, earn more recognition.

lists media desserts koffeteria new york times