It’s really cheating for me to write anything for The Wayfarer because I’m a big fan of my comfort zone and try not to leave it too much. And my “comfort zone” is particularly small when it comes to food. However, our oldest daughter (Kennedy) is a fan of Man vs. Food and not really a fan of car trips, so Brent charged her with finding a bunch of cool/weird/funky places for us to eat while on a family trip to Austin. She hit the internet running, found 6-8 Austin eateries that had been featured on the show, and printed out maps and menus for each place. Each day she was the Meal Queen-telling us what weird things we would be eating that day.
So come check out some of the weird stuff we ate and watch the slideshow below. I think we all put on a couple pounds!
1. Louisiana Longhorn Café in Round Rock: This place gave all of us a chance to get our Louisiana on. We ate jambalaya, etouffee, gumbo, butterbeans, fettuccine alfredo, and some sinful desserts with no legitimate link to anything Cajun/Louisian
2. Gourdoughs Big.Fat.Donuts: holy carnal sin. We actually stopped here twice so we could try more weird donut combinations. The first time, we tried the following donuts.
The Flying Pig — bacon with maple syrup icing. This was everyone’s favorite except for me.
Granny’s Pie — caramel, pecans, banana, and graham crackers. Delish!
ODB — cream filled donut holes with icing rolled in coconut. To die for!
Funky Monkey — grilled bananas with cream cheese icing and brown sugar. So good!
The second time went back, we got:
The Flying Pig again.
Razzle Dazzle — raspberry filling with fudge icing. My favorite.
3. Big Bites — near UT campus. I got a Thai chicken wrap (Boo! Not adventuresome, but still tasty), but did TRY both of their sandwiches and was pleasantly surprised. Little Stuart (who usually does not have even the tiniest smidgen of adventure in his little body) ordered something really weird.
4. Juan in a Million: The food was delicious, but we had to eat outside and it was seriously 100 degrees. Marin was very bothered by the birds that were flying all over the patio.
5. Holy Cacao: a little dessert trailer in the heart of Austin. We got a delicious blueberry cake ball on a stick and two cake shakes. Marin loved her cake shake, but the rest of us didn’t love these.
6. Round Rock Donuts: here, we ordered two “Texas-sized donuts”-one plain glazed and one chocolate. By the time we arrived at our destination, 3 hours later, both donuts were gone. Needless to say, they were delicious.
So what about you? When you travel, do you try to find interesting, local places to eat, do you pack a lunch, or do you stick with what you know?
![img_5100](https://dovesandserpents.org/wp-content/gallery/austin-eateries-wayfarer/img_5100.jpg "Stuart is our only legitimate \\"coon ass\\"--having been born in Baton Rouge.")
![img_5118](https://dovesandserpents.org/wp-content/gallery/austin-eateries-wayfarer/img_5118.jpg "Kennedy wrote \\"Geaux\\" and Stuart wrote \\"SFA Sucks\\" on this dollar bill that they stapled to the wall--a restaurant tradition.")
![img_5136_0](https://dovesandserpents.org/wp-content/gallery/austin-eateries-wayfarer/img_5136_0.jpg "The kids were scratching their heads over this ad for a \\"nude improv.\\" Nac is quite conservative compared to Austin!")
![img_5564_0](https://dovesandserpents.org/wp-content/gallery/austin-eateries-wayfarer/img_5564_0.jpg "Marin demonstrating the actual size of the \\"Texas-sized\\" donut")
I am also strangely attracted to Man v. Food, and I wonder what dark part of my character enjoys watching competitive eating contests where people gorge until they hurt themselves. Which is to say that I totally understand your daughter, and when I travel I sometimes make a point to visit a restaurant that has been featured on the T.V. show. Not my proudest moment: Once when I got news that a relative had died and I was making plans to attend the funeral, one of the first thoughts through my mind was “Oh, good. While we’re there we can go to ________to eat”.
I’ve been mildly surprised to see how many places have Louisiana restaurants catering to expats from the Mudbug Republic. It’s cool to go places where “Coonass” is a compliment!
Hilarious, Mark!! Loved reading your comments.
Indeed–what does it say about us??? We hit our first Man vs. Food restaurant over Christmas in Denver–another Mexican place with a MASSIVE burrito. Seriously, the leftovers (after 4-5 of us ate parts of it) filled a 13 X 9 lasagna pan. Yikes! But it was definitely memorable and a great way to engage our teenage daughter!
The kids LOVED all the LSU stuff. I think for them, it makes them feel cool in a counter-culture type way to be LSU/Louisiana fans now that we’re in Texas. Everyone here is an Aggie or a Longhorn, so they like being something OTHER than that.
Rememer that pie place we stopped at on the way to the river Christmas 2009?? We bought 6 or 8 pies. – Mom
Yeah, Mom–the pie place was awesome! Royer’s, I think it was called?
I love the pictures, and the way your family is helping you blog! So fun.
OMG, those donuts were HUGEEEEE