The Dallas Food Marathon

Destination weddings usually mean a fun vacation, Facebook-worthy pictures and a rented tuxedo. When the friend getting married was one of the original food marathoners and the destination city was Dallas, it meant three days of ridiculously big eating. Texas, one of the few states big enough to satisfy my insatiable appetite.

Wasting no time we went directly from the airport to the most famous BBQ joint in Dallas, Sonny Bryan’s.

Food GPS recommended the Inwood location because they have school desk style seating, so the marathon began there.

Brisket sandwich, onion rings, potato salad, baby back ribs and root beer. They bottle their sauce, warm in Coronita bottles. The sauce is fantastic with a sweet, spicy tang.

We hopped in a cab and headed to Bubba’s Cooks Country, a Yelp favorite.

We ordered, sat and then noticed that our cab driver (probably curious about two guys heading from one restaurant to another) stayed to order food as well. The fried chicken, black eyed peas, mashed potatoes, biscuits and lemonade.

Our cab driver was so impressed with his meal that he ordered a sack full of fried chicken to bring home to his family. We joked about how it takes foodie tourists from LA to introduce a Dallas native to his own city’s best food. We noticed Peggy Sue BBQ as we drove off and put it on the list for the next day.

For dinner we had an epic spread from Capital Grille that included amazing spicy calamari, oysters, Wagyu beef carpaccio, a chopped salad and a seriously delicious (and large) steak. We followed that with drinks at Nobu.

The next day we brought the other groomsmen to Bubba’s while we headed to Peggy Sue’s for baby back ribs and sausage. Another great sauce, tender ribs, but the sausage was a bit mushy. I wanted more crunch.

We grabbed cookies from J.D.’s Chippery, another Yelp referral, and boxed them for our next stop. Located in a converted gas station, Taqueria la Paloma was the closest to an LA taco shop that we’d seen in Dallas.

I went with tacos al pastor, lengua and barbacoa. A cantaloupe agua fresca washed it down.

As if that wasn’t sweet enough, J.D.’s cookies were phenomenal. Soft and gooey the way I like them.

Day three started at Cafe Brazil

for migas (chorizo, onions, bell peppers, jalapenos, scrambled eggs, torilla chips, topped with cheese and salsa)

and pancrepes (crepes dipped in cinnamon egg batter, grilled and topped with Crème Anglaise, raspberry sauce, walnuts and powdered sugar).

I wasn’t that impressed with either. I actually liked the breakfast sandwich with turkey best.

Next up was a tour of the Cowboy’s new $1.5B stadium.

It has a very large TV, that I’m pretty sure was built specifically for watching No Reservations.

Rushing to get to the wedding in time, we squeezed in two more stops. The first was Snuffer’s for cheese fries and a bacon cheeseburger.

Yes, that’s also ranch dressing on the side because cheese fries need ranch dressing…

The last stop was Manny’s Uptown for brisket tacos.

Unfortunately we had to rush through, but this seemed like a terrific Tex-Mex restaurant that deserves a full meal.

We had 20 minutes to spare at the aiport, so I grabbed a copy of the Wall Street Journal and waited for my plane…. Yeah, right. Are you new? We proceeded directly past the newsstand to get some last minute BBQ at Dickey’s.

Overall the fried chicken was the best thing I ate in Dallas. I’m sure there are a lot of restaurants in the south that could beat it, but Bubba’s definitely beats LA’s best.