Love and War in Texas

When I’m in TX for Christmas I want three things: BBQ, Tex-Mex and mom’s Korean food. However, this year I didn’t feel like I needed Mexican. Harlem has some really good Mexican shops and taco trucks. So scratch that. My mom made bulgogi one night and we went out for Korean noodles when my folks picked me up from the airport. Check. But when it came to Texas bbq, my mom said she wouldn’t take us to Sonny Bryant’s! I was pissed, why not? Apparently she saw on the news how smoked meat causes cancer. This makes no sense as my Dad has been burning the bulgogi and kalbi for 30 years. Whatever.
So we ended up going to Love and War in Texas. Lena had her wedding rehearsal dinner there, and it’s a pretty good place to bring kids because it’s big and loud. It’s also at the site of the Blockbuster Music where I worked for a semester when I first moved to Texas. Oh the memories.
It’s cliché, but just like the state, the portions are huge at LAW. Check out the size of the stein my mom is tasting the Shiner Heiffeweisen from. Dad wanted a beer, so I made him order the Shiner. He drinks Coors Lite and Miller Highlife, so I figured the wheat beer would be to his liking. He said it tasted like lemonade, and I drank most of it because I didn’t want him to kill us all in the car.
Since we had 2 kids, and they needed to eat immediately or suffer a melt down, we ordered the fried green bean appetizer. The crust made the green beans taste just like hush puppies and worked wonders on the nephews. They quit whining because they got to dip the fried beans into the creamy sauce. Then we ordered the family style meat dinner called the Governor’s Feast for $75. The menu says it feeds four, but that’s just silly, look how much food! Beef and chicken fajitas, shrimp, smoked venison sausage and venison bratwurst are hiding under that rack of babyback ribs. Rice, pico de gallo, sour cream, guacamole, flour tortillas and Shiner Bock beer beans accompanied the meat platter. Shiner Bock is like the Brooklyn Lager of TX, but I couldn’t taste any discernable beer flavor in that side of refried beans. However the beans were a nice glue for the tacos you made with all that meat. All the meats were quite good, you know meaty, but I missed that authentically smoked through taste of a Sonny Bryant’s rib. Maybe next time.