10
MY
ROUSES
EVERYDAY
JULY | AUGUST 2014
Tex
–
MEX
by
Pableaux Johnson
platter of marinated beef for dinner.
The fajitas sizzled as they hit the grill and
required just a few minutes on each side to
get to a perfect medium rare. I could smell
the savory fumes coming off the pit —
meaty goodness spiked with garlic, soy and
a little bit of sweet.
As the fajitas hissed over the coals, Walsh
described his summer travels, many of
which — not surprisingly — were meat-
related. The next day, he would run a
weekend Barbecue Summer Camp at Texas
A&M University. After that, a traditional
Father’s Day community barbecue in the
tiny town of Millheim, Texas. It was going
to be a busy summer.
Walsh has written about Texas food for more
than 25 years — first as restaurant critic and
food editor for the Austin Chronicle to his
current gig as reviewer for Houstonia
magazine. He’s also written twelve books
on nearly every aspect of the state’s food,
from “chuck wagon” cowboy cooking
to slow-smoked barbecue to hot
sauce to definitive cookbooks
on Tex-Mex cuisine. An avid
researcher, Walsh’s works
bring a historian’s rigor to the
stories behind the recipes.
In 2010’s
The Tex-Mex
Grill and Backyard Barbecue
Cookbook
, Walsh describes fajitas
Fire, Spice and Timing
“Y
ou’re in luck,” food writer Robb
Walsh told me over the phone,
“I got hold of some outside skirt
steak. It’s pretty rare these days. I’ll make
fajitas when you get here.”
A week later, when I pulled up to my
friend’s house in Houston, I could feel the
heat from his barrel-style grill radiating
onto the patio and see his long dining table
filled with traditional fajita fixings. After we
exchanged pleasantries and cracked open
a couple of beers, we hit the grill with a
the
Gulf Coast
issue
photo by
Eugenia Uhl
