Queens of the Stone Age, with Peaches and …And You Will Know Us By Our Trail of Dead
Somehow it seemed wholly appropriate when, at an English club listening party for the Queens’ new record, Songs for the Deaf, a befuddled group of more than 30 hearing-impaired folks showed up expecting a program of lyrics set to sign language. They may not have appreciated the twisted irony, but…
Best Bartender
Chris Wolfe has been at the original Berryhill Hot Tamales for the last four and a half years. New patrons hear his singsong “Hi, I’m Chris, what can I get you?” then are amazed as the sandy-haired, all-American boy rattles off instructions in Spanish to the kitchen staff while filling…
Best Underground Movie Theater
In the past, the Rice Cinema has flown under the public’s radar, yet has been responsible for lining up some of the most innovative selections around. In addition to many collaborations with the Museum of Fine Arts and other theaters on such projects as the Latin American Film Festival and…
Best Actor
In the Alley Theatre’s production of August Wilson’s Jitney this past winter, Wayne DeHart played the drunk Fielding with the scene-stealing grace of a truly great character actor. Before succumbing to the ravages of drink, Fielding was a fine tailor to such rich and famous jazzmen as Count Basie. But…
Best Whistle-Blower
The beauty of Houston, in a perverted way, is the wealth of opportunities for individuals to rise up amid corruption and misconduct and take their moral stand, consequences be damned. Just in the last year, there was the implosion of Enron, the callous cunning of Arthur Andersen and the market…
Best Civil Judge
Harris County’s state district courts were in big trouble in 1997, when the judicial ethics commission in effect bounced then-judge William Bell from the 281st Court bench. Stepping in after that mess was quiet newcomer Jane Bland, a pregnant lawyer who was only 32 — and looked about ten years…
Best Place to Wait for Traffic to Die Down
Just around the corner, human temperatures and internal-combustion exhaust rise to a rush-hour crescendo. Travis teems with idling autos, igniting road-rage fuses at the pace of a few feet per minute. Solero, however, is the place that has known how to tame the savage commuter since the antebellum era. It’s…
Best Landlord
Ted Callaway is the kind of landlord who leaves flowers in the apartment on move-in day and drops off a bottle of wine for your housewarming party. But that’s not why we’re naming him Best Landlord. He gets the honor for the buildings he has bought and preserved: ramshackle old…
Best Artist
Sad and Pissed, Rachel Hecker’s standout show at Texas Gallery, turned a relationship gone wrong into a powerful, poignant and witty body of work starring Hello Kitty spin-off characters. The show was punctuated by “explosion” paintings that riffed on Batman fight scene graphics, with “OOF!” and “POW!” replaced by succinct…
Best Graffiti
Graffito. Most people don’t recognize the word, the singular form of graffiti. Even fewer recognize the vernacular term, graf. However, many a Montrose pedestrian or driver recognizes the dour face of Chicken Boy, whether they know the name or not. Wooden cutouts of the cartoony yellow-faced guy with a red…
Best Democrat
This 40-year-old native Houstonian went public with his battle with severe depression in 1994, and since then he’s become a leader in public health care legislation. He’s been repeatedly lauded by Texas Monthly in its yearly evaluation of lawmakers and honored by the Texas Medical Association. After disclosing his illness,…
Best Beer Selection
With 57 draft beers and 52 in bottles, The Ginger Man has something to please even the most discerning drinker. It also has the best selection of ciders in Houston. Draft selections include our locally brewed cask-conditioned St. Arnold’s Amber, as well as a wonderfully refreshing Paulaner Hefeweizen (Germany) wheat…
Best Guitar Teacher
Dave Payne can do just about anything when it comes to the guitar. Besides his own beautiful playing and singing, which runs the gamut from classical to funk, he’s got enough patience and good grace to teach anybody else how to follow his lead. Everybody from middle-aged engineers looking to…
Best Novelty Store
Walk in nice, walk out naughty. This store has more selection than a buffet on Sunday brunch — from complete drag-queen attire to standard dildos and edible underpants to sinfully seductive latex nurse outfits and she-devil getups. They also carry every prop you might possibly need to carry out any…
Best Manicure/Pedicure
Sister act Peggy and Maggie Lu run Instyle Nails like Donald Trump runs real estate. In the past four years they’ve had to add more spa chairs thanks to increasing demand. As any local woman knows, a spa (vibrating chair and foot whirlpool) mani/pedi is $25 at practically every shop…
Best Dog Trainer
It’s not so much that she has done an excellent job of training a particular canine, it’s that Patricia Mercer has been instrumental in ensuring hundreds of dogs a happy relationship with their new owners. As executive director of the SPCA, Mercer oversees a training program that gives larger dogs…
Best Steak House
Palm on Westheimer (the cognoscenti don’t say “the”) has a lot of special memories for Houstonians. When it opened in 1977, it epitomized the “anything goes” spirit of the oil boom. And it’s still a boisterous joint with big steaks, big Bordeaux and few inhibitions. The Houston restaurant’s walls are…
Best Vegetarian Restaurant
We know what you meat lovers are thinking: It’s not “naturally mine” unless it’s made with flesh! Well, you can dine on hormone-free cattle products here, too, but the shining stars on the menu are Naturally Yours’s vegan dishes: smothered Stakelets, the juicy Garvey burger (loaded with fresh veggies, soy…
Best Middle Eastern Restaurant
A fusion restaurant that brings together Persian, Indian, Mediterranean and American dishes, this place serves the most ferociously seasoned Middle Eastern food you’ve ever eaten. All the meats are halal, the Muslim equivalent of kosher. Standouts include the Mix Grill Dos, with two kinds of tandoori chicken; a half skewer…
Best Texan
There is no position more unsung in major professional sports than that of the offensive lineman, so let us sing the praises of one: Tony Boselli. The first player drafted by the Texans in their expansion draft, Boselli is, of course, huge; he’s six foot seven and 320 pounds. He’s…
Best Chinese Restaurant
Unlike so many outstanding Asian restaurants, which are dotted across the Bellaire archipelago, this one has been hiding right inside the Loop. It’s an upscale Hong Kong-style seafood restaurant where large groups of Asians sit at big round tables with lazy Susans in the middle. There are so many fascinating-looking…
Best Socioanthropological Study
Come for the cheap and excellent food, but come back for the bizarre mix of Heights yuppies, ethnic groups, gay couples and long-haul trucker types that populate this second location, the first one being the much smaller version on Irvington. With the Aztec mural on the wall, the Mexican soaps…
Best Place to Fly a Kite
Since their invention in China, kites have been used to carry messages, to ward off spirits and as instruments of war. Their principles of aerodynamics led to the airplane. Now, they’re just for sport. The city doesn’t offer many spacious areas for flying, and Houston’s air is relatively still. For…
Best Park
The great explorer Christopher Columbus stands at one end of the park, pointing to the Italian Cultural and Community Center. Nonetheless, this respite from the noise and traffic of the Museum District, this diminutive stretch of trees and grass, remains undiscovered (or at least unnoticed) by many Inner Loopers. Not…
Best Place to Spot Celebs
Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt, Cher, P. Diddy, Gwen Stefani, Busta Rhymes, Shirley Manson, the Goo Goo Dolls…Everybody who’s anybody stays at Hotel Derek when they come through Houston. But how can you get a peek at the stars without staking out their hotel rooms and looking like a psychotic…
Best Stone Crabs
Truluck’s stone crabs are flown in every day from company beds in Florida. If they were any fresher, these crustaceans would arrive at your table fighting. They’re kept on ice for the journey but never frozen. This yields a watery, stringy stone crab. Novices take note: You should eat only…
Best Chimichanga
There’s an undeniable truth in cooking: Deep frying makes everything better. The law behind it is simple. Frying adds fat — lots of it — to anything, and fat means flavor. Exhibit A: the chimichanga. The chimichanga is a beautiful thing, in a horrifying way, like a chicken-fried steak. Take…
Best Dance and Club Wear Designer
We’ve got a horde of fine club dancers in this town. Somebody’s gotta dress ’em. If there were still any raves around, chances are you’d see many shirts out there created by this man. Akindele’s brand of clothing, Enjoymusic Enjoylife (EMEL), featuring that all-important musical-note insignia, has been the favorite…
Best Back Store
Sufferers of long-term neck and back pain will try anything to find relief, even if it’s just temporary. At Relax The Back, you’ll find all the equipment and reference materials you need to provide relief from pain and to help keep you in good shape. The furniture offerings include ergonomic…
Best Source of Free Stock Information
What does a city full of businesspeople need? How about a radio station that follows the stock market? Brent Clanton’s morning drive-time show updates listeners on yesterday’s market movement so they’ll be ready for the opening bell. Street Talk, the afternoon drive-time show with investment planner-financial adviser Lance Roberts, wraps…
Best Cheap Thrill
Whether you’re going north or south, get your kicks for free anytime you like with hot merging action. Spin out into the frenetic traffic after taking a hairpin curve on this wily on-ramp. Feel your senses come alive with the zooms, whirs and honks of passersby. Recent landscaping on the…
Best Chiropractor
The beautiful people stroll regularly through Kenneth Lester’s door, perhaps because of his reputation, perhaps because of his location, in the Page Parkes building in River Oaks. But while Lester is appropriately fabulous, there is substance to his style. For years the med student-turned-triathlete-turned-chiropractor has been breaking his back to…
Best Vintage Sounds
When the dispiriting present is too much with you, set your Packard’s radio dial to Star 790, KBME. That’s AM, of course. KBME (“BME” stands for best music ever) exists in a time warp before FM ruled the airwaves, in the American past somewhere between the Great War and the…
Best Museum
For years, Union Pacific map maker D.D. Smalley’s eccentric attic museum delighted children and adults alike with the residue of his myriad hobbies. Petrified dinosaur dung was shelved cheek-by-jowl with, among thousands of other things, model ships, homemade objets d’art, an extensive arrowhead collection and cigar boxes full of hundreds…
Best New Microcinema
Houston has already gotten some national attention in the realm of microcinema for possessing the eccentric little converted church known as Aurora Picture Show. Another well-known outlet for independent short films, Independent Exposure, has held screenings all over the United States and across the globe. (One event was held in…
Best Local Girl Gone Bad
Soudavar flew back from a visit with her Iranian relatives to find a greeting party of HPD robbery detectives at Bush Intercontinental Airport awaiting her arrival. A friend, Christina Girard, had ratted Soudavar out to the police for allegedly stealing some pricey earrings and a watch from her home and…
Best Landlord
Ted Callaway is the kind of landlord who leaves flowers in the apartment on move-in day and drops off a bottle of wine for your housewarming party. But that’s not why we’re naming him Best Landlord. He gets the honor for the buildings he has bought and preserved: ramshackle old…
Best Band
Like the city it came from, Jug o’ Lightnin’ is zoning-free. You can’t peg its blues-rock-bluegrass-country sound with a few pithy words — it has shades of all but is none of the above. What it is is moss-draped, gutbucket, raw and in-the-pocket. When Aaron Loesch, Chris King and “Mopar”…
Best Director
Brian Jucha is one of the best things that has happened to Infernal Bridegroom Productions. The artistic director of New York City’s Via Theater, an avant-garde company known in the Big Apple for its neo-Expressionist style, brought his original take on theater to Houston this past spring with his production…
S&M Secretary?
Lee Holloway (Maggie Gyllenhaal) is released from a mental institution the day of her older sister’s wedding. One afternoon with her dysfunctional family and she’s ready for rehab again. No such luck, however, so instead, Lee turns — or returns — to her favorite pastime: self-mutilation. Based on a short…
Best Band
Like the city it came from, Jug o’ Lightnin’ is zoning-free. You can’t peg its blues-rock-bluegrass-country sound with a few pithy words — it has shades of all but is none of the above. What it is is moss-draped, gutbucket, raw and in-the-pocket. When Aaron Loesch, Chris King and “Mopar”…
Best Director
Brian Jucha is one of the best things that has happened to Infernal Bridegroom Productions. The artistic director of New York City’s Via Theater, an avant-garde company known in the Big Apple for its neo-Expressionist style, brought his original take on theater to Houston this past spring with his production…
Best Effort to Inject Culture into Houston
Houston’s Writers in the Schools project is about to celebrate its 20th anniversary, and it deserves all the plaudits that come with lasting that long. It started with four writers getting “residencies” in Houston public schools, where they did all they could to encourage kids to enjoy reading and writing…
Best Activist
Bob “Alwalee” Lee proclaims himself “Da Mayor of Fifth Ward.” This retired social worker is already a legend in his northeast Houston community for his person-to-person efforts to help the disabled and elderly. And he’s backed by a prime political connection. His brother is none other than Harris County Commissioner…
Best Court Ruling
Too bad for Harris County and the state of Texas. Those damned technicalities keep getting in the way of another good execution! All the law asks is that defendants get a fair trial and adequate legal representation. And it’s exactly those onerous standards that have stymied the county and state…
Best Swells of Houston Pride
As you watch Jennifer Garner kick a guy square in the jaw while wearing thigh-high vinyl boots with that peach of a heinie wrapped in a rubber cocktail dress, do you think to yourself, ‘That girl is doing Houston proud’? Probably not, but as the second season of the baffling…
Best Reminder of Houston’s Industrial Roots
There was a time several decades ago when Houstonians bore their city’s brute industrialism with pride rather than shame. We bragged about the black gold we refined. On the stench of this process, we just told sneering outsiders, “That’s the smell of money, buddy.” Those days are long gone, as…
Best Museum
For years, Union Pacific map maker D.D. Smalley’s eccentric attic museum delighted children and adults alike with the residue of his myriad hobbies. Petrified dinosaur dung was shelved cheek-by-jowl with, among thousands of other things, model ships, homemade objets d’art, an extensive arrowhead collection and cigar boxes full of hundreds…
Best New Microcinema
Houston has already gotten some national attention in the realm of microcinema for possessing the eccentric little converted church known as Aurora Picture Show. Another well-known outlet for independent short films, Independent Exposure, has held screenings all over the United States and across the globe. (One event was held in…
Best Gadfly
Shelley Sekula-Gibbs feels compelled to add her personal two cents to anything any citizen happens to say during the City Council public session. A dermatologist, Sekula-Gibbs has also appointed herself the resident expert on all matters medical. Like any gadfly, she means well but can drive colleagues up the wall…
Best Horchata
Sometimes in Houston you need to fight fire with ice — and the right thing to put over that ice is horchata, the Mexican agua fresca made from rice and sugar. Sure, there are pleasant versions flavored with vanilla or cinnamon, but the best of all is coconut. The deli…
Best Landscaper
Some people kill plants. Some overwater their petunias until they turn to mush. Some just don’t want to dig in the dirt. So they hire other people to make their backyards pretty. It’s too hard and too hot to plant plumerias and palm trees yourself. It’s time to call Vicente…
Best Surf Shop
A recent transplant from Southern California was shocked when we told her that people really do surf here in Texas. She would have died laughing if we had shown her our pick for Houston’s best surf shop. It’s true that the outside of the Surfhouse isn’t what you might expect…
Best Vintage Clothing Store
A relative newcomer to the Westheimer vintage strip, Leopard Lounge is a welcome young upstart. The leopard-print motif and blaring hip-hop music let you know this is not your mother’s consignment shop. The usual suspects are well covered: bellbottom jeans, ’50s dresses, tight-fitting team T-shirts from the ’70s and so…
Best Watch Repair
If these guys can fix a glockenspiel music-box clock built in 1800 with all-wood mechanisms (which they can), just imagine what wonders they can work with that collection of old watches that’s sitting in your bathroom drawer. Serving time since 1947, the shop has six folks on staff with degrees…
Best Sushi Bar
Chef Kubo (short for Hajime Kubokawa) made this the best sushi bar in Houston. But Kubo doesn’t work here anymore. Luckily, Hori (short for Manubu Horiuchi), the new head chef at Kubo’s and Kubokawa’s former second-in-command, is extremely talented in his own right. If you have any doubts, sit at…
Best Vietnamese Restaurant
It’s such fun to take people who think of ethnic restaurants as tacky little dumps to the palatial Ba Ky and watch their eyes pop out of their heads. French colonial furniture, columns of giant bamboo stalks and tropical flowers greet you at the front door. Clay pot dishes, Vietnamese…
Best Long Lunch
The decor is romantic excess, the oversize chairs are well upholstered, and the carpets are extra-plush. Once you get seated, you know you’re going to be here awhile. There’s no menu. There’s no waiter, either. There’s just Aldo Elsharif. The talkative chef comes to your table in his sauce-stained whites…
Best Astro
Daryle Ward’s 2002 season wasn’t the breakout year everyone was hoping for, but his struggles exemplified the twin strands of frustration and elation that bind every Astros fan. God obviously didn’t intend for the chunky Ward to be an outfielder, or He would have given him more willpower. Still, Ward…
Best Creole Restaurant
The fact that there are always people standing in line at Frenchy’s guarantees that every piece of chicken you get has just come out of the fryer. But Frenchy’s is more than a chicken shack. Since 1969, Percy Creuzot has turned out the tastiest greens, the most satisfying andouille-studded red…
Best Atmosphere
Whatever its name, The Fish (formerly known as Blowfish) is exceptionally titillating. It’s identified on the outside solely by the abstract image of a spiny puffer fish. And on the inside, the color scheme is repeated in everything from the waitstaff’s red ties and black shirts to the black napkins…
Best Weekend Getaway
Picture it. You’re sitting on the front porch of your rustic cabin, which is perched on a bluff over the Frio River’s crystal-clear headwaters. You’re sipping a Shiner Blonde on a hot summer day, and all you can hear is the Frio rushing over the nearby crossing and the wind…
Best Place to Fly a Kite
Since their invention in China, kites have been used to carry messages, to ward off spirits and as instruments of war. Their principles of aerodynamics led to the airplane. Now, they’re just for sport. The city doesn’t offer many spacious areas for flying, and Houston’s air is relatively still. For…
Best Backyard
Once upon a time, Dr. Richard Patt had a teddy bear in his front yard. It reached 20 feet, give or take, into the sky. His neighbors hated it. But it wasn’t enough. The backyard was empty and boring. So he and Joe DiPaulo, the man who designed the park…
Best Bread
The challah is braided and brown on the outside and golden with egg yolks in the middle — take some home and make French toast with it and your breakfast will take on a whole new dimension. If you’re thinking of making roast beef sandwiches, you’ll want to build them…
Best Coffee Beans
House of Coffee Beans has been Houston’s gourmet coffee roaster for almost 30 years. You can smell the roasting beans before you’re even through the door. The secret to their success is simple: They focus on doing one thing and being the best in their class. They purchase the best…
Best Downtown Parking Garage
If you’ve ever wanted to feel like Alice down the rabbit hole, take a few hours out of your life and go underground here. You can emerge at any number of downtown spots, from office buildings to the Wortham to the Angelika Film Center. If you’re smart, you’ll take note…
Best Resale Shop
It’s hard to figure out why the cars are crawling to a stop and little old ladies are fighting for parking along Dunlavy. With no obvious signs to flag you down, you could drive right by the Guild Shop without even noticing. Variety and good deals are the key to…
Best Traffic Reports
Where in the world is traffic reporter Susie Loucks (a.k.a. Elaine Closure) after the Clear Channel blowout? (And to make things perfectly clear, she was not fired but replaced by Clear Channel’s own in-house traffic service.) These days, you can find her wild and wacky style of traffic reporting on…
Best Flood Recovery
After Tropical Storm Allison, the Wortham Theater Center, home of the ballet and opera, had six feet of water in its basement. The two bottom floors of the Alley Theatre were totally submerged, ruining the stage, rehearsal hall and electrical systems. Jones Hall, home of Society for the Performing Arts…
Best Electrolysis Practioner
Those Aussies who make Nads are big dirty liars. No, Crocodile Dundee, we do not like putting Nads on our face, our hairy back, or anywhere. It hurts. Dear Lord, it hurts. That’s why we turn to electrolysis’s technologically advanced younger sister, laser hair removal, and to the bedside manner…
Best Actor
In the Alley Theatre’s production of August Wilson’s Jitney this past winter, Wayne DeHart played the drunk Fielding with the scene-stealing grace of a truly great character actor. Before succumbing to the ravages of drink, Fielding was a fine tailor to such rich and famous jazzmen as Count Basie. But…
Best Place for Aspiring Writers
Got one of those must-be-told stories buried deep inside your soul? There’s no place better for burgeoning writers to be these days than an Inprint class. There, some of Houston’s finest authors (past instructors include award-winning novelists such as Farnoosh Moshiri, Gail Storey and Olive Hershey) will teach you everything…
Best Local TV Commercials
You’re not looking for slickness when it comes to local television ads. You’re also not looking for rock-bottom cheapness, with one salesman shouting maniacally into an unmoving camera. Instead, you want to revel in the “Let’s put on a show!” atmosphere where it looks like the advertiser’s girlfriend and beer…
Best Zoo Animal
Bo is his real name, Pumbaa his stage name. Our zoo was able to acquire the five-year-old critter from a Denver zoo with a little help from Disney. The corporation felt, not unreasonably, that the Lion King franchise would benefit if thousands of parents dragged their offspring past his pen…
Best Reminder of Houston’s Industrial Roots
There was a time several decades ago when Houstonians bore their city’s brute industrialism with pride rather than shame. We bragged about the black gold we refined. On the stench of this process, we just told sneering outsiders, “That’s the smell of money, buddy.” Those days are long gone, as…
Best Unsigned Musician
Ambient modern popster Arthur Yoria has a special gift: a Buckleyish high tenor coupled with the ability to craft smart arrangements and melodies that are impossible to banish. What’s more, he wraps that gift in some exceptionally pretty paper — his band is one of the best in town. Matt…
Best Independent B Movie Made in Houston
Although this low-budget debut from filmmaker A.B. Harris boasts a cast that includes the cream of Houston’s African-American poetry talent (Angie G., Black Snow, Tosha Terry, Black Poet), the real star of the show isn’t even human. During a hot and heavy orgy scene nearly four minutes into the film,…
Dropped in the Reese
No there’s no confusion, the star of Sweet Home Alabama is Reese Witherspoon, who graces the film’s poster in full-body pout and appears on the press kit in close-up mug-shot smirk; any closer, and we’d shoot up her nostrils and exit through her pores. Of course, there’s a great deal…
Best Unsigned Musician
Ambient modern popster Arthur Yoria has a special gift: a Buckleyish high tenor coupled with the ability to craft smart arrangements and melodies that are impossible to banish. What’s more, he wraps that gift in some exceptionally pretty paper — his band is one of the best in town. Matt…
Best Independent B Movie Made in Houston
Although this low-budget debut from filmmaker A.B. Harris boasts a cast that includes the cream of Houston’s African-American poetry talent (Angie G., Black Snow, Tosha Terry, Black Poet), the real star of the show isn’t even human. During a hot and heavy orgy scene nearly four minutes into the film,…
Best Open-Mike Night
If all you want is a few minutes in front of a working microphone, this odd little venue has nearly cornered the market on the open-mike night. Their weekly 8:30 p.m. Wednesday slot has hosted everyone from Native American poet Soldier Blue to the “Gay Poet Laureate” Howard Mikehael, and…
Best Fetishist
Most fixations require cross-dressing midgets, trailer-park love triangles or an element of Satan worship to be worthy of the tabloid TV circuit. But the odd obsession of this industrial filmmaker is a touchy-feely affair. Yaqi, who derives his name from Carlos Castaneda’s Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of…
Best Lawyer
A severely mentally ill Andrea Yates had drowned her five young children. Her competency was the supposed issue, but it was hard to find much sanity anywhere in these weird proceedings. Into all that madness came attorney George Parnham. Along with defense co-counsel Wendell Odom Jr., Parnham brought a soothing…
Best Architect
The architect’s architect, Carlos Jimenez is a local lad — graduated from the University of Houston, tenured at Rice — of Puerto Rican extraction, who unfortunately is better known outside of Houston. With a slew of awards, visiting professor positions, competitions to which he has been invited, exhibitions and published…
Best Place for a Last Date
So the bloom’s gone off the rose, has it? Her laughter has become annoyingly loud. She ends every sentence with a verbal question mark. You can’t bear to watch another episode of Sex and the City. It’s time for you to move on. But you also have a healthy fear…
Best Place for Aspiring Writers
Got one of those must-be-told stories buried deep inside your soul? There’s no place better for burgeoning writers to be these days than an Inprint class. There, some of Houston’s finest authors (past instructors include award-winning novelists such as Farnoosh Moshiri, Gail Storey and Olive Hershey) will teach you everything…
Best Local TV Commercials
You’re not looking for slickness when it comes to local television ads. You’re also not looking for rock-bottom cheapness, with one salesman shouting maniacally into an unmoving camera. Instead, you want to revel in the “Let’s put on a show!” atmosphere where it looks like the advertiser’s girlfriend and beer…
Best Dumplings
Mama Tran makes the dumplings at this quirky little family-run Vietnamese restaurant in the Old Chinatown neighborhood near the intersection of Highways 45 and 59. The dumplings are awesome, and the noodles are pretty good, too. Owner Jenni Tran-Weaver (Mama Tran’s daughter) makes the homemade Vietnamese desserts. But that’s not…
Best Milk Shake
Over at the Hard Rock, it’s not all about framed trinkets of rock-and-roll days gone by and a stocked gift shop. They also serve delicious food that’s worth eating under a glass display of Rick Springfield’s surgical scrubs from General Hospital. And believe it or not, one of their best…
Best Place to Buy Plants
Contrary to what The New York Times Magazine seems to think, Houston is green, not brown. But God didn’t make it that way, the Teas family did. By 1951, according to the Teas Web site, the nursery and landscaping company had planted more than one million trees in Houston. They…
Best Discount Bookstore
To think, a whole generation has grown up believing that bookstores are supposed to be run by boards of directors, serve 80 kinds of coffee and loom as large as airplane hangars. Yes, the megaplexes do have every book on every subject known to man, and yes, it’s nice to…
Best Fabric Store
Even if you don’t sew, this fabric store is worth a visit. There’s a whole room devoted to silks that makes you realize fabric designing is a true profession. The customers are dead serious in their searches. Brides-to-be walk dutifully, following their dressmakers with anxious looks and hands full of…
Best Overall Restaurant
There isn’t another Italian restaurant in Houston that’s even in the same league with Da Marco. The place can be compared only to cosmopolitan outposts such as Babbo, the impossible-to-get-into Italian restaurant in Greenwich Village. Like Babbo’s chef, Mario Batali, chef Marco Wiles spares no effort or expense to get…
Best Thai Restaurant
Recently reopened under new “old” management, Bangkok Place continues to churn out top notch Thai food. At $6.95, for both the lunch and dinner buffets, it’s one of the best values in town. Starters include two different soups (tom yam or sweet-and-sour), pad kee mao or clear noodle salad, fresh…
Best Neighborhood Spot Downtown
A city work crew, bright vests glowing in the dim early morning, makes its way through a breakfast of eggs and bacon. Along the window-side counter, two young professionals fight to overcome the martinis of the previous night with eye-opening cups of coffee. Just outside, the downtown trolley brakes to…
Best Late-Night Dining
Tucked away in a corner of the Heights, this all-night Tex-Mex mix offers fantastic, affordable food to all walks of life. Wander in around 3 a.m. You’ll see barhoppers getting that fatty high-protein burrito fix necessary to whittling away the effects of too many martinis. You’ll find artists taking a…
Best Yoga Studio
City life got the best of you? Sundance Yoga Studio offers beginner through advanced classes (levels 1-4) and Power Yoga classes for graduate students. Each class includes pranayama (proper breathing techniques), asanas (postures for flexibility, balance, coordination, strengthening) and meditation. They also offer monthly workshops that are open to the…
Best Deli
When the original owners of Nielsen’s first came to Houston from Denmark, they tried to sell the famous Danish open-faced sandwiches called smorrebrod. But customers didn’t know how to eat the messy sandwiches (Danes use a fork and knife) and the health department wouldn’t let them be displayed without some…
Best Place to See Bambi
Living in the sweltering silver city, there are few places where you can get in touch with your inner Daniel Boone. But just outside of town, before you get to the ocean, there’s a place where you can pretend you’re going over the river and through the woods to Grandmother’s…
Best Thing You’ll Ever See on a Racetrack
Shorty, Oscar Meyer, Razzle, Slinky and Conan. They’re wiener dogs, dachshunds, charging down a greyhound track, their long low-to-the-ground bodies undulating, their floppy ears flapping, their pointy muzzles yapping, to the amusement of anyone willing to make the trip to La Marque. You don’t normally hear laughter at a race…
Best Weekend Getaway
Picture it. You’re sitting on the front porch of your rustic cabin, which is perched on a bluff over the Frio River’s crystal-clear headwaters. You’re sipping a Shiner Blonde on a hot summer day, and all you can hear is the Frio rushing over the nearby crossing and the wind…
Best Lobbyist
This Houston assistant city attorney took over direction of the city lobbying team last year and had a promising maiden session. The 42-year-old neophyte impressed capitol veterans with a low-key approach combined with a tenacity that belies her five-foot-one, 110-pound frame. Grace volunteered for the job when her boss, City…
Best Smoked Oysters
We’re willing to bet that Oysters Gilhooley are the best barbecued oysters on the entire Gulf Coast. The fresh-shucked oysters are topped with cheese and sauce and then smoked over a pecan-and-oak fire. The shells get partially blackened and the oysters pick up a strong smoky flavor while remaining juicy…
Best Cure for a Cold
Screw the NyQuil. When you’re sick, you need Jewish penicillin. We recommend Kenny & Ziggy’s Mish Mosh. Their matzo balls are light and fluffy. You can slice your spoon straight through these tasty dumplings. (That’s a sign they’re probably unhealthy; the only way to get really light and fluffy matzo…
Best Texas Stuff
Why buy your “How to Talk Texas” books, Houston skyline postcards and Lone Star flag barbecue aprons at some sterile mall when you can do so in the heart of the city, at the foot of the statue of Sam Houston himself? Those who say downtown is a vacuum for…
Best Shoe Store
It may be in the heart of River Oaks, but women from all over town know this is the place to buy those Sex in the City, midlife crisis, hot-date-tonight shoes. Divine Donald Pliners, gorgeous Goffredo Fantinis, majestic Mezlans and charming Charles Jordans, all to die for. Towering stilettos and…
Best Religious Leader
Quick, finish this sentence: “We believe in new beginnings, we…” If you answered “believe in you” without skipping a beat, you are one of the thousands who have gladly been sucked in with one of the best marketing campaigns in Houston history — that of Lakewood Church. The catchy jingle…
Best Not-So-Cheap Thrill
Galveston needed a four-star hotel, and the San Luis gave it one, complete with a truly fabulous steak house (one of the top ten in Texas), a completely redesigned pool area with swim-up bar, and all the little niceties any sophisticate would expect. What you might not expect, but what…
Best Dog Trainer
It’s not so much that she has done an excellent job of training a particular canine, it’s that Patricia Mercer has been instrumental in ensuring hundreds of dogs a happy relationship with their new owners. As executive director of the SPCA, Mercer oversees a training program that gives larger dogs…
Best Effort to Inject Culture into Houston
Houston’s Writers in the Schools project is about to celebrate its 20th anniversary, and it deserves all the plaudits that come with lasting that long. It started with four writers getting “residencies” in Houston public schools, where they did all they could to encourage kids to enjoy reading and writing…
Best Comedian
The St. Louis transplant with a degree from Rice University mixes clever quips with celebrity impersonations, all the while keeping his material at a 12th-grade level — okay, maybe a remedial 12th-grade level. In just a few years as a stand-up, he’s already headlined his own show at Houston’s only…
Best New Name for a Theater Troupe
Apparently there’s a bit of a debate over how Houston’s newest theater company, Mildred’s Umbrella, got its odd name. Founding members Jennifer Decker and John Harvey tell the story two different ways. She says they were perusing a literature book, looking for a name that was really interesting, when they…
Best Architect
The architect’s architect, Carlos Jimenez is a local lad — graduated from the University of Houston, tenured at Rice — of Puerto Rican extraction, who unfortunately is better known outside of Houston. With a slew of awards, visiting professor positions, competitions to which he has been invited, exhibitions and published…
Best Place for a Last Date
So the bloom’s gone off the rose, has it? Her laughter has become annoyingly loud. She ends every sentence with a verbal question mark. You can’t bear to watch another episode of Sex and the City. It’s time for you to move on. But you also have a healthy fear…
Best Band Name
Great band names are significantly less common than bad ones. Many are pretentious. Still more are just plain stupid. Or goofy. Or snide. For example, an Austin band in the ’90s conjured up a wonderful moment in TV history where racists clashed with a pretentious talk show host. That band,…
Best Happy Hour
Every night from four to nine, happy hour at The Tavern is on like Donkey Kong! With $4 domestic pitchers, $3 bellinis and margaritas and lots of people to make friends with, you can play pool, Ping-Pong or the ubiquitous Golden Tee. Eye-catching waitresses and cute bartenders turn out slamming…
Buzzkill
The opening-night hoopla for Blood Wedding started in the lobby of Stages Repertory Theatre, where it seemed everyone was ready to swoon over Federico García Lorca’s famous play of passion and poetry. Many theatergoers arrived (some in limos) “dressed for the occasion,” as one woman gushed to another. They were…
Best Band Name
Great band names are significantly less common than bad ones. Many are pretentious. Still more are just plain stupid. Or goofy. Or snide. For example, an Austin band in the ’90s conjured up a wonderful moment in TV history where racists clashed with a pretentious talk show host. That band,…
Best Happy Hour
Every night from four to nine, happy hour at The Tavern is on like Donkey Kong! With $4 domestic pitchers, $3 bellinis and margaritas and lots of people to make friends with, you can play pool, Ping-Pong or the ubiquitous Golden Tee. Eye-catching waitresses and cute bartenders turn out slamming…
Best Nude Scene
When beautiful badass Karen Finely came to town, theatergoers lined up at the door for a ticket to Theater LaB to see the woman that British tabloids have called “the high priestess of pornography.” It was clear that some of the lone men who stood in the moonlight waiting to…
Best Local Girl Gone Bad
Soudavar flew back from a visit with her Iranian relatives to find a greeting party of HPD robbery detectives at Bush Intercontinental Airport awaiting her arrival. A friend, Christina Girard, had ratted Soudavar out to the police for allegedly stealing some pricey earrings and a watch from her home and…
Best School
Stepping into the large building of T.H. Rogers school a mile or so west of the Galleria is almost always an uplifting experience. First there’s the incredible mix of students: The school’s a magnet program, so every socioeconomic level is represented; it’s both an elementary and a middle school, so…
Best Antidote to Enron
Back not so long ago, when Ken Lay was God in Houston and Enron was regarded as a collection of corporate geniuses rather than crooks, David Berg helped torpedo a city push to award a billion-dollar wastewater plant contract to an Enron subsidiary. As chairman of the Houston Area Water…
Best Houstonian You Didn’t Know Was a Houstonian
You’re probably saying to yourself, “Who the hell is Jeff Martin?” Well, there’s a good chance the man, a highly successful television comedy writer, has made you laugh on more than one occasion. After all, this is a former Houstonian (and former AstroWorld employee) who started out writing for that…
Best Comedian
The St. Louis transplant with a degree from Rice University mixes clever quips with celebrity impersonations, all the while keeping his material at a 12th-grade level — okay, maybe a remedial 12th-grade level. In just a few years as a stand-up, he’s already headlined his own show at Houston’s only…
Best New Name for a Theater Troupe
Apparently there’s a bit of a debate over how Houston’s newest theater company, Mildred’s Umbrella, got its odd name. Founding members Jennifer Decker and John Harvey tell the story two different ways. She says they were perusing a literature book, looking for a name that was really interesting, when they…
Best Exotic Food
Plum sauce is mundane in these surroundings. If the toddy palm drink, fresh seaweed, spicy sliced pork ear and stomach, or fish balls aren’t exotic enough for you, try the mochi chocolate pai, karela, tidora or moo, none of which comes with a translation. Then there’s the fruit-flavored beef jerky…
Best Espresso
At least four things have to be right to make the perfect espresso. First, the ingredient: finely ground Italian espresso-roasted coffee. Second, the equipment: a machine capable of bringing the water to 2000 degrees and delivering the right pressure. Third: the know-how, in the form of an experienced barista who…
Best Mosquito Control
Summer in a swampland means clawing at your skin, scratching hundreds of mosquito bites. It means every dinner you eat outdoors has to be lit with citronella candles. And it means the constant sound of blue bug lights zapping. Add to that reports of mosquitoes in the Houston area carrying…
Best Children’s Bookstore
Some parents regard their children as an extension of themselves, so show all your friends you’re better than they are by improving your kids. How? Expand their minds. Take the time to read to them. And if you want to really blow the Joneses out of the water, find unique…
Best Designer Boutique
Want to find the styles of the moment? At Tootsies you’ll be surrounded by crazy-cool clothes and CZ jewelry that’s a great knockoff of the real thing. From Via Spiga shoes to Ralph Lauren haute couture, Tootsies has got you covered. Looking for that diamond horseshoe necklace that Carrie wears…
Best New Restaurant
It’s hard to find the little white castle with the round tower and black witch’s-hat roof unless you’re looking for it. It’s hidden under some trees on Memorial Drive near Beltway 8; nevertheless, discerning diners from all over the country are turning up here. That’s because Indika has already earned…
Best Vegetarian Restaurant
We know what you meat lovers are thinking: It’s not “naturally mine” unless it’s made with flesh! Well, you can dine on hormone-free cattle products here, too, but the shining stars on the menu are Naturally Yours’s vegan dishes: smothered Stakelets, the juicy Garvey burger (loaded with fresh veggies, soy…
Best Neighborhood Spot in Montrose
Celebrating its tenth year this December, Barnaby’s is a landmark in the Montrose. Named in memory of principal owner Jeffrey Gale’s beloved sheepdog, the restaurant is adorned with cute images of the pooch. And the menu, consisting primarily of good ol’ fashioned comfort food, reflects the people of the neighborhood…
Best (Big) Menu
With close to 200 items on the menu, if you can’t find something to eat here, there’s something seriously wrong with you. It’s the largest menu in town. Fortunately, they’ve organized the menu into logical sections; nevertheless, it will probably take you longer to decide what to eat than to…
Best Sporting Goods Store
Sports is just too personal an endeavor for you to shop in a megachain that’s missing personality. Sun & Ski Sports has multiple outlets, certainly. And visitors won’t find diddly in the way of golf drivers with oversized heads or softball bats of metals exotic enough to make NASA envious…
Best Middle Eastern Restaurant
A fusion restaurant that brings together Persian, Indian, Mediterranean and American dishes, this place serves the most ferociously seasoned Middle Eastern food you’ve ever eaten. All the meats are halal, the Muslim equivalent of kosher. Standouts include the Mix Grill Dos, with two kinds of tandoori chicken; a half skewer…
Best Texan
There is no position more unsung in major professional sports than that of the offensive lineman, so let us sing the praises of one: Tony Boselli. The first player drafted by the Texans in their expansion draft, Boselli is, of course, huge; he’s six foot seven and 320 pounds. He’s…
Best Comet
Last season, Houston Comets forward Sheryl Swoopes heard the three most dreaded letters known to an athlete: ACL. Those three letters stand for a sports injury that often means the end of a career. But while Swoopes missed all last season with a torn ligament in her knee, she returned…
Best Thing You’ll Ever See on a Racetrack
Shorty, Oscar Meyer, Razzle, Slinky and Conan. They’re wiener dogs, dachshunds, charging down a greyhound track, their long low-to-the-ground bodies undulating, their floppy ears flapping, their pointy muzzles yapping, to the amusement of anyone willing to make the trip to La Marque. You don’t normally hear laughter at a race…
Best Local TV News
When it comes to local news in the Houston market, Channel 11 truly stands alone in terms of quality. That doesn’t mean it’s great: Local TV news around the country has been in a general decline for some time. KHOU is fighting that decline better than anyone else around here,…
Best Stuffed Mushrooms
And on the eighth day, God created Istanbul Grill’s stuffed mushrooms. Yes, they really are that good. The popular Turkish restaurant in the Rice Village is known for a lot of great dishes, but it’s the stuffed mushroom appetizer that is an absolute must-have. The dish comes with four medium-sized…
Best Comic Book Store
For a comic-book novice — and by that we mean someone who has a few books in their collection, as opposed to 20 to 30 boxes filled with intricately filed volumes — it must be a burden going to a comic-book store these days. Clerks and employees who work at…
Best DVD Selection
It took a while for the folks at this proudly independent music and video store to get a DVD rental section going, even after bigwig video chains Blockbuster and Hollywood beat ’em to the punch. But once they did, theirs turned out to be the definitive DVD section for die-hard…
Best Sole Revival
It’s a delicate business, salvaging footwear that costs as much as a used Honda, but Barry and Ellen Croft handle the art of shoe repair with an aw-shucks mirth that cuts through the pomp of Prada. Barry, who started Shoe Savers years ago, has become the official cobbler for Inner…
Best Church for Atheists
Why let a little thing like a lack of belief in God keep you from going to church? The Houston Church of Freethought has been hosting monthly services, minus the religion, since 2000. Sunday-school sermons can cover such topics as the inclusion of “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance…
Best Houston Info on the Web
If you want to see really funny pictures of your friends, and possibly yourself, making waves in Houston’s nightlife, this is the site to visit. There are pages and pages of pics from Houston’s clubs and their raucous partyers. From the Lotus Lounge to the Social, you can peruse photo…
Best Watch Repair
If these guys can fix a glockenspiel music-box clock built in 1800 with all-wood mechanisms (which they can), just imagine what wonders they can work with that collection of old watches that’s sitting in your bathroom drawer. Serving time since 1947, the shop has six folks on staff with degrees…
Best Open-Mike Night
If all you want is a few minutes in front of a working microphone, this odd little venue has nearly cornered the market on the open-mike night. Their weekly 8:30 p.m. Wednesday slot has hosted everyone from Native American poet Soldier Blue to the “Gay Poet Laureate” Howard Mikehael, and…
Best Show
Before the privileged daughter of an aristocratic Japanese family crossed paths with a working-class lad from Liverpool, she was an artist who put the “avant” in avant-garde. Loosely associated with the Fluxus movement, Yoko Ono made works ranging from socially and artistically provocative performances like Cut Piece (1964), which invited…
Best Shortcut
Take entrance no. 2 off Main, mosey through Rice campus and see what they’ve done to the place. Rice has one of the few college campuses that you can actually drive through without being accosted by the police or hitting a dead end every 20 feet. If you don’t lose…
Best Antidote to Enron
Back not so long ago, when Ken Lay was God in Houston and Enron was regarded as a collection of corporate geniuses rather than crooks, David Berg helped torpedo a city push to award a billion-dollar wastewater plant contract to an Enron subsidiary. As chairman of the Houston Area Water…
Chris Bell
It isn’t every day a politician wins the inside track to one office by getting beaten in a race for another. But that’s exactly what happened to attorney and former at-large Houston city councilman Chris Bell, who turned a third-place finish for mayor in 2001 into a front-running candidacy as…
Best Band to Break Up
After three years, a boatload of Press music awards and more than 100 local gigs, Houston’s very own Marxist synth-pop sextet is no more. Their epitaph: “Let the record state, we kicked nature’s ass.” Front man Tex Kerschen is now hovering about in his new underground supergroup, Swarm of Angels,…
Best Radio Station
“Jazz in All Its Colors” is the motto of Texas Southern University’s radio voice, and they live up to those fine words. Not many stations can boast a palette quite like KTSU’s rainbow of gospel, jazz (Latin and Anglo), hip-hop, blues, zydeco, R&B, oldies, soul and reggae. There are also…
A Soaring Butterfly
Houston Ballet’s second offering of the season was a clash of cultures: East and West in Stanton Welch’s Madame Butterfly, and old and new in Butterfly versus artistic director Ben Stevenson’s Five Poems. Despite a torrential downpour and late curtain on opening night last week, the Brown Theater at the…
Best Band to Break Up
After three years, a boatload of Press music awards and more than 100 local gigs, Houston’s very own Marxist synth-pop sextet is no more. Their epitaph: “Let the record state, we kicked nature’s ass.” Front man Tex Kerschen is now hovering about in his new underground supergroup, Swarm of Angels,…
Best Radio Station
“Jazz in All Its Colors” is the motto of Texas Southern University’s radio voice, and they live up to those fine words. Not many stations can boast a palette quite like KTSU’s rainbow of gospel, jazz (Latin and Anglo), hip-hop, blues, zydeco, R&B, oldies, soul and reggae. There are also…
Best Art Opening
They all turned out for the opening: clowns, artists, drunks, Santa Clauses, strippers…and none of those categories was mutually exclusive. Organized by Paul Horn and Dolan Smith (sporting a ringmaster costume), the one-night-only Vegas-meets-Ringling Bros. art extravaganza/bacchanal took over the entire 80th floor of the Holiday Inn Select, except for…
Best Zoo Animal
Bo is his real name, Pumbaa his stage name. Our zoo was able to acquire the five-year-old critter from a Denver zoo with a little help from Disney. The corporation felt, not unreasonably, that the Lion King franchise would benefit if thousands of parents dragged their offspring past his pen…
Best Place to Hang Out with High Schoolers
Directly across the street from Lamar High School is the place to find out what the kids are wearing, what they’re listening to and what’s cool. Rid your mind of all of the negative press about teenagers these days, and go hang out at 31 Flavors. You’ll meet friendly, open,…
Best Elevator
1600 SmithThe 732-foot sparkling white Continental building, designed by Morris-Aubry, is a Houston hallmark. But we bet you don’t know who Fujitec America Inc. is. Give up? It’s the company responsible for the building’s lovely elevators. These babies will take you all the way to the 53rd floor in style…
Best Shotgun Shack
4739 Buck RoadTucked at the end of Buck Road in the Fifth Ward is the oddest but coolest shotgun house in Texas. World-renowned Houston artist Bert Long, known to many for his massive public ice sculptures, lives there with his partner Joan Batson, a painter from Scotland. The house, rehabbed…
Best Show
Before the privileged daughter of an aristocratic Japanese family crossed paths with a working-class lad from Liverpool, she was an artist who put the “avant” in avant-garde. Loosely associated with the Fluxus movement, Yoko Ono made works ranging from socially and artistically provocative performances like Cut Piece (1964), which invited…
Chris Bell
It isn’t every day a politician wins the inside track to one office by getting beaten in a race for another. But that’s exactly what happened to attorney and former at-large Houston city councilman Chris Bell, who turned a third-place finish for mayor in 2001 into a front-running candidacy as…
Best Mashed Potatoes
When you query the folks at Zydeco Louisiana Diner as to just why their mashed potatoes taste so good, they look at you quizzically and reply, “They’re real.” Duh. Of course they are. There’s simply no way instant taters could provide such pleasure. Creamed soft but not so soft you…
Best Mojito
“What’s in this?” we asked, taking a sip of our first ever mojito. “Heavenly goodness,” a friend said. A mojito is a Cuban drink made with rum, soda and simple syrup. A delectable muddle of mint leaves and lime sits at the bottom. Saba adds to the sugar-water sweetness of…
Best Pet Store
Yes, Petco is a chain, but it doesn’t feel like one. Walk in with your pet, whatever it may be. This store is friendly, convenient and fast. It carries the biggest selection of pet products from the finest brands, as well as lizards, birds, tropical fish, snakes, spiders and all…
Best Astrologer
Ever toyed with the idea of seeking career counseling from a psychic or an astrologer but been put off by the garishly muu-muu’ed, incense-burning, turban-coiffed mystic promising to solve your love woes as you choke on perfumed smoke? Well, if you want career guidance from someone who not only talks…
Best Place to Buy Roses
Poet Dorothy Parker once scorned her lover’s gift of “one perfect rose.” Perhaps her boyfriend’s mistake was not going to Buchanan’s to buy his present. The beautiful Heights plant-and-flower shop offers so many different types of roses it would have been hard for him to stop at just one. The…
Best Drive-Thru
Barbecue is messy eatin’. The fewer people to see you go ballistic on ribs, the better. Even though Houston is a drive-thru town, most of us aren’t aware the ubiquitous Pappas restaurants offer window service. Try the daily special choice of three meats and two sides for $8.99, and you’ll…
Best Vietnamese Restaurant
It’s such fun to take people who think of ethnic restaurants as tacky little dumps to the palatial Ba Ky and watch their eyes pop out of their heads. French colonial furniture, columns of giant bamboo stalks and tropical flowers greet you at the front door. Clay pot dishes, Vietnamese…
Best Neighborhood Spot in Bellaire
Even foodies will agree that sometimes comfort means more than cuisine, though the elegantly casual Auntie Pasto’s offers a solid mix of both. It’s not surprising that pasta reigns supreme here, with the 22 menu offerings ranging from black bean pasta (a Southwestern mix of cilantro, peppers, black beans, goat…
Best Diner with Waitresses to Give You Wholesome Dreams
People put a lot of faith in the cooks, servers and busboys who work at their favorite diner. Patrons want to know that when they place their order and get their meal, they’re in good hands. They wanna look in that waitress’s eyes and know they have nothing to worry…
Best Skate Park
Sanctuary! Tony Hawk wannabes who are tired of getting kicked out of downtown have a 30,000-plus-square-foot refuge they can call their own. Vans Skatepark — part of a national chain of skateboard facilities — boasts an impressive indoor/outdoor collection of ramps, pools, rails and ledges where future X Games contestants…
Best Long Lunch
The decor is romantic excess, the oversize chairs are well upholstered, and the carpets are extra-plush. Once you get seated, you know you’re going to be here awhile. There’s no menu. There’s no waiter, either. There’s just Aldo Elsharif. The talkative chef comes to your table in his sauce-stained whites…
Best Astro
Daryle Ward’s 2002 season wasn’t the breakout year everyone was hoping for, but his struggles exemplified the twin strands of frustration and elation that bind every Astros fan. God obviously didn’t intend for the chunky Ward to be an outfielder, or He would have given him more willpower. Still, Ward…
Best Play-by-Play Announcer
Baseball announcers have traditionally been genial, low-key companions who take you through a hot, lazy summer night. But more and more are turning into Dick Vitale-like screamers shouting, “There’s a looooong fly ball that has a chance! — but it’s caught by the shortstop.” Luckily, Astros fans have someone from…
Best Comet
Last season, Houston Comets forward Sheryl Swoopes heard the three most dreaded letters known to an athlete: ACL. Those three letters stand for a sports injury that often means the end of a career. But while Swoopes missed all last season with a torn ligament in her knee, she returned…
Best Flack
This former KTRH reporter left journalism and signed on to flack for legal giant Vinson & Elkins. He then took a sabbatical to help the Lee Brown mayoral campaign sweat out a narrow victory over Orlando Sanchez. Then he had the good sense to leave V&E just before the heat…
Best Place to Drink Guinness
With an outdoor walk-up bar, you don’t even have to go inside to quench your thirst at our new favorite pub in the Village. You can sit on a stool outside and have a pint and watch passersby. Even inside, the place has an outdoor feel — the place doesn’t…
Best Designer
Houstonian Chloé Dao spent eight years in New York City, including a stint at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Now she’s brought her talents home. She and sister Kim opened Lot 8 in the Rice Village at 6127 Kirby Drive two years ago, specializing in off-the-rack trendy clothes and local…
Best Anime Purveyors
Houston, Texas, a portal city for Japanese anime? Yes, thanks to forward-thinking ADV founders John Ledford and Matt Greenfield. For the uninitiated, anime is Japanese animation for adults, too, not just kids. It’s extremely popular in its home country and increasingly so all over the world. Recently spotted at the…
Best Laundromat
Maybe it’s the goofy messages posted on the sign (“We Make Good Scents,” for example). Or perhaps it’s the odd collection of celebrities painted on the front of the building (David Letterman, Tom Hanks, Jerry Seinfeld and Roseanne — you figure it out). Maybe it’s the cheesy rock stations permanently…
Best Consumer Advocates
Some BBBs have standards that hardly go beyond mounting membership plaques correctly. And Houston has historically lagged behind more progressive areas in policing scam artists. But the current aggressive bureau has stepped in repeatedly to warn naive consumers about schemes and scams before they can be ripped off. The feat…
Best Bathroom for Bowser
Face it. Even the friskiest Fido eventually gets bored doing those leg lifts in the same old neighborhood spots. And the Great Dane becomes mundane when marking the same trees day in, day out. The leash, uh, least one can do is break the monotony with a pilgrimage to every…
Best Overall Restaurant
There isn’t another Italian restaurant in Houston that’s even in the same league with Da Marco. The place can be compared only to cosmopolitan outposts such as Babbo, the impossible-to-get-into Italian restaurant in Greenwich Village. Like Babbo’s chef, Mario Batali, chef Marco Wiles spares no effort or expense to get…
Best Nude Scene
When beautiful badass Karen Finely came to town, theatergoers lined up at the door for a ticket to Theater LaB to see the woman that British tabloids have called “the high priestess of pornography.” It was clear that some of the lone men who stood in the moonlight waiting to…
Best Shrine to the Abnormal
Donations of every imaginable variety show up weekly: horns, doll heads, a film canister of Tommy Lee Jones’s spit, balls of Saran Wrap, clumps of hair, an appendix, color photos of fallopian tubes and contemporary art of a disquieting nature. Artist/nutball Dolan Smith has turned his Heights bungalow into a…
Best Local Boy Gone Bad
Andy Fastow was the creator of those infamous outside partnerships with the Star Wars names that diverted millions from the company to his family foundation and the bank accounts of fellow employees. After winning a conviction of accounting giant Arthur Andersen for illegally shredding Enron documents, government prosecutors have given…
Best Elevator
1600 SmithThe 732-foot sparkling white Continental building, designed by Morris-Aubry, is a Houston hallmark. But we bet you don’t know who Fujitec America Inc. is. Give up? It’s the company responsible for the building’s lovely elevators. These babies will take you all the way to the 53rd floor in style…
Dan Hunt, co-owner, TOC Bar
Tropical Storm Allison reigned over downtown like a nightmare turned horribly real. How did the folks over at TOC Bar deal with the aftermath of this pernicious force of nature? With complete and utter denial. “We never closed,” declares co-owner Dan Hunt. “We always stayed open. We didn’t give people…
Best CD by Local Musicians
Normally the words “rap rock” and “sounds like the Red Hot Chili Peppers” set off alarm bells. Uh-oh, we think, another bunch of loud, heavily tattooed white kids who can’t rap or play guitar, jumping around on stage in their briefs bellowing about blunts and the porn starlet du jour…
Best Film Series
For most movies, you might as well wait till they come out on videotape. Goldmember’s scatological jokes are just as hilarious at home, and Harrison Ford’s Russian accent in K-19 sounds equally fake on DVD. But some films merit a trip to the movie theater. Ironically, the films that are…
Much Ado About Cussin’
The dawn of November 3, 2000, ushered in a bad day in the decade-long tenure of Houston Police Chief Clarence O. Bradford. He hadn’t even settled into his morning routine when he received the urgent phone call from his boss, Mayor Lee Brown. Where, the furious mayor demanded to know,…
Plastic Makes It Possible
It looks like he robbed a dollar store,” remarked one observer matter-of-factly. Paul Horn’s “DEATH METAL 2000: Prehistoria” is full of crap. If plastic hadn’t been invented, this show wouldn’t exist. Best known as the organizer of the raucous “Million Dollar Hotel” party and the quirky Friendly Mart convenience store…
Best CD by Local Musicians
Normally the words “rap rock” and “sounds like the Red Hot Chili Peppers” set off alarm bells. Uh-oh, we think, another bunch of loud, heavily tattooed white kids who can’t rap or play guitar, jumping around on stage in their briefs bellowing about blunts and the porn starlet du jour…
Best Film Series
For most movies, you might as well wait till they come out on videotape. Goldmember’s scatological jokes are just as hilarious at home, and Harrison Ford’s Russian accent in K-19 sounds equally fake on DVD. But some films merit a trip to the movie theater. Ironically, the films that are…
Best Dancer/Choreographer/Social Advocate
The level of local contemporary dance rose several notches when Jane Weiner came to town in 1997. She brought with her ten years of dancing with Doug Elkins’s company and gave generously of her art and talent. She danced, she taught, she networked with other artists. She created her own…
Best Drag Queen
Drag. Some have attempted to explain the source of the word as Shakespearean. Bard Willie would often leave the costume directions “dressed as girl” in his scripts. Others say it’s a reference to cross-dressing actors’ long frocks dragging across the stage. The roots of the word (bleached, highlighted, tinted or…
Best Trophy Room
Okay, it’s not really a room, per se, but the huge trophy case next to the front entrance of this old school holds bizarre and fascinating pieces of Houston memorabilia. Track-and-field trophies from the ’20s sit alongside photographs of generations of local junior-highers with funny haircuts who brought home the…
Best Place to Take a Stroll with Your Camera
If you’re looking for a quiet, peaceful place to take a walk and snap a few pics, you can’t do much better than Glenwood Cemetery. The final resting place for some of Houston’s most famous names, including billionaire Howard Hughes, Glenwood boasts a collection of gorgeous monuments scattered over its…
Best Company to Work For
As the fall TV season approaches, the ultimate worth of Houston Medical remains under debate. But one thing is certain: The media has picked up on our Med Center excellence. Case in point: Fortune magazine, that bastion of biz lists, heralded St. Luke’s Episcopal Health System as one of the…
Best Shrine to the Abnormal
Donations of every imaginable variety show up weekly: horns, doll heads, a film canister of Tommy Lee Jones’s spit, balls of Saran Wrap, clumps of hair, an appendix, color photos of fallopian tubes and contemporary art of a disquieting nature. Artist/nutball Dolan Smith has turned his Heights bungalow into a…
Dan Hunt, co-owner, TOC Bar
Tropical Storm Allison reigned over downtown like a nightmare turned horribly real. How did the folks over at TOC Bar deal with the aftermath of this pernicious force of nature? With complete and utter denial. “We never closed,” declares co-owner Dan Hunt. “We always stayed open. We didn’t give people…
Best Gumbo
Sam Segari’s gumbo is murky, mysterious and full of character — just like everything else in this crazy little joint. The soup is loaded with fresh shrimp, and the dark roux is just spicy enough to keep your lips warm. Sam prefers to serve the gumbo as an appetizer. The…
Best Bulgogi
If you only kind of feel like cooking — but definitely want to get out of the house — Seoul Garden is the place to go. The bulgogi is brought to your table. This fantastic Korean beef tastes as though it’s been marinating since JFK was alive and is sliced…
Best Attention to Detail
Little things mean a lot, especially when the family pet leaves big messes in your yard. With both parents working, it’s hard to keep up with the cooking and cleaning and lawn care, let alone enjoy home life. But Scoop le Poop makes having a dog that much easier. For…
Best Toy Store
Stepping into this little orange-and-brown shop in the Rice Village is like stepping back into 1954. Makes sense. That’s when G&G moved into its current location. The cozy, jam-packed store has an endearing, musty quality to it. But the selection is second to none. Anything you ever wanted in model…
Best Wine Store
Owner Scott Spencer renamed his store, formerly Wines of America, because the name no longer reflected his product offerings. This little gem of a wine shop carries selections from all over the world and reflects what you can do with your shelves when you have limited space but excellent taste…
Best Family Restaurant
Yes, it’s loud and gimmicky, but they season the food well. The family-style servings, plus the mix of old favorites with moderately interesting dishes, guarantee an option to make almost any palate happy. Finicky kiddies who like their food simple can have the spaghetti bolognese; grown-ups who prefer a little…
Best Neighborhood Spot Downtown
A city work crew, bright vests glowing in the dim early morning, makes its way through a breakfast of eggs and bacon. Along the window-side counter, two young professionals fight to overcome the martinis of the previous night with eye-opening cups of coffee. Just outside, the downtown trolley brakes to…
Best Neighborhood Spot in the Galleria Area
We know what you’re thinking. You saw “Galleria” and imagined meals at Morton’s Steakhouse, or Cafe Annie or any number of high-dollar restaurants. That’s why Chacho’s is a natural choice. Located just down the street from the Galleria in a faux adobe building with bright pastel colors, Chacho’s offers first-rate…
Best Diner with Waitresses to Give You Perverted Dreams
This may sound like we’re bad-mouthing the fine, upstanding ladies who work their butts off at the House of Pies, but trust us, we’re just giving ’em their props. Because, fellas, the 59 Diner may have waitresses you could take home to your parents, but the gals over at the…
Best Public Golf Course
Golfing vacations have become all the rage in recent years. Young power players and old gummers alike are paying top dollar for package trips that whisk them over the ocean — and back in time — to Saint Andrews or some other hallowed shrine of shankers everywhere. Houston doesn’t lay…
Best Late-Night Dining
Tucked away in a corner of the Heights, this all-night Tex-Mex mix offers fantastic, affordable food to all walks of life. Wander in around 3 a.m. You’ll see barhoppers getting that fatty high-protein burrito fix necessary to whittling away the effects of too many martinis. You’ll find artists taking a…
Best Yoga Studio
City life got the best of you? Sundance Yoga Studio offers beginner through advanced classes (levels 1-4) and Power Yoga classes for graduate students. Each class includes pranayama (proper breathing techniques), asanas (postures for flexibility, balance, coordination, strengthening) and meditation. They also offer monthly workshops that are open to the…
Best Sports Radio Talk Show
There used to be many more sports-talk shows on the radio in Houston, but thankfully the best has survived. Rich Lord and Charlie Pallilo have the afternoon-drive slot on all-sports KILT, and they’ve made many a rush hour less frustrating for Houstonians. Lord’s a bit of a goof, and Pallilo’s…
Best Play-by-Play Announcer
Baseball announcers have traditionally been genial, low-key companions who take you through a hot, lazy summer night. But more and more are turning into Dick Vitale-like screamers shouting, “There’s a looooong fly ball that has a chance! — but it’s caught by the shortstop.” Luckily, Astros fans have someone from…
Best Fried Chicken
They fry your chicken to order at Henderson’s Chicken Shack. It takes about 20 minutes. Henderson’s isn’t a franchise or a chain. It’s owned by a Creole woman named Ann Henderson, who was born in New Iberia, Louisiana. Cooking the chicken to order seems like a nuisance when you’re waiting,…
Best Use of Eggplant
The eggplant is a fine-looking fruit (yes, technically it’s a fruit). It’s big and round and dressed up in royal purple. But let’s admit it, most of us are at a loss as to what to do with it in the kitchen. So why not leave that task up to…
Best Tailor
With Ann’s help, you can buy off the rack and look like you’re wearing a designer original. You walk in, step behind the green velvet curtain, take off your clothes and try on the outfit you like. Then she measures and pins and makes it so that your horrible oversized…
Best Adult Videos
We’ve all seen those boring, windowless wooden shacks on the side of the freeway with such original names as Adult MegaPlexxx. And if it’s just porn you want, then those places are probably your best bet. But what if you’re itching to grab a copy of High Society magazine and,…
Best Accordion Teacher
Susan Jackson has one of those high-beam smiles that could blind you if it didn’t make you feel so good inside. That’s part of her power as a music teacher. There’s also something about her tiny attic studio that makes you feel really, well, arty. It’s filled with instruments, because…
Best Nonprofit Organization
At a time when most organizations are paring down, Big Brothers Big Sisters is pouring it on. Under the guidance of president Deborah Ortiz, Houston-based BBBS has expanded into an incredible 31 counties that stretch from the Gulf Coast upward into East Texas. The organization manages to be dead serious…
Best Secret
The legend is so old that some of the current students don’t even know the sordid past of their school’s basketball court. But we do. The High School for Performing and Visual Arts is located in the older section of the Montrose that used to be all houses. Legend has…
Best New Restaurant
It’s hard to find the little white castle with the round tower and black witch’s-hat roof unless you’re looking for it. It’s hidden under some trees on Memorial Drive near Beltway 8; nevertheless, discerning diners from all over the country are turning up here. That’s because Indika has already earned…
Best Art Opening
They all turned out for the opening: clowns, artists, drunks, Santa Clauses, strippers…and none of those categories was mutually exclusive. Organized by Paul Horn and Dolan Smith (sporting a ringmaster costume), the one-night-only Vegas-meets-Ringling Bros. art extravaganza/bacchanal took over the entire 80th floor of the Holiday Inn Select, except for…
Best (and Only) New Performing Arts Center
Usually we’re depressed by Houston’s headlong rush to tear down every vestige of its past and replace it with something modern. But let’s face it, the old Music Hall was a dump. The roof leaked, the offstage areas were cramped, and there wasn’t much charm in its pedestrian design. The…
Best Local Boy Made Good
After years of successfully defending local celebrity clients like QB Warren Moon (spousal abuse) and Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich (DWI), former Harris County prosecutor Rusty Hardin finally jumped to the major leagues with national coverage of his roles in the Anna Nicole Smith probate jamboree and the Arthur Andersen shredding…
Best Place to Take a Stroll with Your Camera
If you’re looking for a quiet, peaceful place to take a walk and snap a few pics, you can’t do much better than Glenwood Cemetery. The final resting place for some of Houston’s most famous names, including billionaire Howard Hughes, Glenwood boasts a collection of gorgeous monuments scattered over its…
Infernal Bridegroom Productions’ Jason Nodler
Back in the early ’90s, The Axiom was the coolest hellhole in Houston. In a best-of issue of its own, Details magazine listed the bar (in its Catal Hüyük incarnation) as the punk place to visit when in town. Skanky, dark and perpetually sticky, the punk rock bar hunkered on…
Best Blues Club
For years, Dowling Street was Houston’s home of the blues. Lightnin’ Hopkins and company plied their trade at any number of bars along the strip, which was once the main artery of black Houston south of Buffalo Bayou. But by the ’70s, Dowling was in the doldrums. Several years ago,…
Best Cast
Beautiful, big-skied Laramie, Wyoming, was the place where gay college student Matthew Shepard was brutally murdered. It’s also the backdrop for Moises Kaufman’s powerful docudrama, The Laramie Project, based on interviews with 60 townspeople who lived in the Midwestern town. This past January, at Stages Repertory Theatre, Rob Bundy directed…
Best Run
A Weekend of Texas Contemporary Dance, known for showcasing new works and new artists, goes interactive this year, inviting the public on stage for a community performance of Earth Run, by avant-garde choreographer Anna Halprin. Karen Stokes, director of dance at the University of Houston’s School of Theatre, is coordinating…
The Art of the Drink
It was a hoity-toity affair, an opening celebration of the city’s visual arts scene on the Terrace at the acclaimed Warwick Hotel (5701 Main Street, 713-526-1991). Curators, gallery owners, buyers and assorted hangers-on munched on delicious fish tacos and slurped down trays of watered-down margaritas. I couldn’t even finish my…
Best Blues Club
For years, Dowling Street was Houston’s home of the blues. Lightnin’ Hopkins and company plied their trade at any number of bars along the strip, which was once the main artery of black Houston south of Buffalo Bayou. But by the ’70s, Dowling was in the doldrums. Several years ago,…
Best Cast
Beautiful, big-skied Laramie, Wyoming, was the place where gay college student Matthew Shepard was brutally murdered. It’s also the backdrop for Moises Kaufman’s powerful docudrama, The Laramie Project, based on interviews with 60 townspeople who lived in the Midwestern town. This past January, at Stages Repertory Theatre, Rob Bundy directed…
Best Book by a Local Author
Native Dubliner Robert Cremins is an English teacher at Strake Jesuit College Prep, and likely the sort of man of whom his alter ego, Tom Iremonger, would not have approved. Iremonger, the protagonist in Cremins’s A Sort of Homecoming, is a pill-popping, hard-drinking, womanizing, inheritance-squandering young nihilist fresh back in…
Best Local TV News Anchor
Gina Gaston tried for the big time, leaving Houston three years ago to take a job with MSNBC in New York, and ended up coming back last year. Given how few people tune in to MSNBC these days, she probably got out while the getting was good. At any rate,…
Best Place for a Kid’s Birthday Party
As the song goes, “Ain’t nothin’ like the real thing.” If you’re doing a dino-party, you really can’t beat the ambience of celebrating amid actual dinosaurs. Consider the price regularly paid to set up moonwalks and hire magicians and hungover clowns. Then consider cleaning it all up off a suburban…
Best Grocery Store Music
Who’da thunk it? This modest Montrose favorite has the ass-kickingest soundtrack around. You can sniff the ripe mangos to Blood Sweat & Tears, grab a six-pack of Sierra Nevada while jamming to Stevie Wonder, and squeeze the Charmin while gettin’ your Beatles on. And there’s no Muzak in this joint…
Best Place to People-Watch
Usually the animals aren’t up to much. Anybody ever seen one of those gators so much as blink? Some time back, it was even revealed that one of the snakes in the reptile house was made of rubber, and nobody cottoned on for more than a year. Far more fascinating…
Best (and Only) New Performing Arts Center
Usually we’re depressed by Houston’s headlong rush to tear down every vestige of its past and replace it with something modern. But let’s face it, the old Music Hall was a dump. The roof leaked, the offstage areas were cramped, and there wasn’t much charm in its pedestrian design. The…
Infernal Bridegroom Productions’ Jason Nodler
Back in the early ’90s, The Axiom was the coolest hellhole in Houston. In a best-of issue of its own, Details magazine listed the bar (in its Catal Hüyük incarnation) as the punk place to visit when in town. Skanky, dark and perpetually sticky, the punk rock bar hunkered on…
Best Olive Bar
Our favorite feature of the olive bar at Whole Foods is that samples are freely available, so it’s easy to try some new and exotic olives before you buy. Tucked away at the back of the store, near the cheese counter, the bar offers an excellent array of olives from…
Best Sangria
If you listen to KIKK FM, you’ve probably heard Jerry Jeff Walker’s “Sangria Wine” about 73 times. Sangria is most easily described as fruity trash-can punch. But it’s hard to find a place that puts real fruit in it, not to mention the difficulty in finding someone who doesn’t use…
Best Auto Mechanic
It’s mostly the employees of Fluor Enterprises who know about the affordable, honest wizardry of nearby Auto Tech, but it’s also open to the public at large. The original owner, Joe, and his knowledgeable staff could make even the most rickety engine purr like a kitten in no time. Before…
Best Jewelry
Call up this jewelry store and ask, “Where are you located?” and don’t be surprised if the person on the other end answers, “Houston, just between New Orleans and Austin.” Fly High Little Bunny is a goofy place, and not just because of its good-natured staff. There’s the bizarre but…
Best Cheese Selection
With a full-time cheese buyer who spends most of her time visiting local farms worldwide, a full-time department head, and a full-time cheesemonger who may spend 15 to 20 minutes with a customer helping him match up the perfect cheese-and-wine combination, it’s easy to see how Central Market manages to…
Best German Restaurant
6510 Del Monte, 713-268-1115Nowhere in Houston will you encounter so many deutsch speakers. The daily specials are the thing to order, especially the long-simmered meats. German food usually doesn’t sound appealing in the hot summer months, but the cold dishes here are exceptional as well. AnneMarie, the German-born proprietor and…
Best Malaysian Restaurant
Okay, so there are only two Malaysian restaurants in town. But at Malaysia Restaurant, the food is great and the prices are low. Malaysian food is the original fusion cuisine. The strategic peninsula has been ruled by countless colonizers. And every one of them brought along something to eat. There’s…
Best Bistro
The best thing about Mockingbird Bistro is the unpretentious menu. This is the perfect place to enjoy a big fat steak with french fries and an earthy Rhône red wine or a hamburger and a cold beer. In many cases, the quality of the ingredients elevates simple dishes to unexpected…
Best Bang for the Buck
“Under $25” is the title of a column Eric Asimov writes about inexpensive restaurants for The New York Times. They think that’s cheap? At Darband Shish Kabob on Hillcroft, you can feed your whole family for $25 and have enough change left over to take them to Dairy Queen for…
Best Neighborhood Spot in Montrose
Celebrating its tenth year this December, Barnaby’s is a landmark in the Montrose. Named in memory of principal owner Jeffrey Gale’s beloved sheepdog, the restaurant is adorned with cute images of the pooch. And the menu, consisting primarily of good ol’ fashioned comfort food, reflects the people of the neighborhood…
Best (Big) Menu
With close to 200 items on the menu, if you can’t find something to eat here, there’s something seriously wrong with you. It’s the largest menu in town. Fortunately, they’ve organized the menu into logical sections; nevertheless, it will probably take you longer to decide what to eat than to…
Best Sporting Goods Store
Sports is just too personal an endeavor for you to shop in a megachain that’s missing personality. Sun & Ski Sports has multiple outlets, certainly. And visitors won’t find diddly in the way of golf drivers with oversized heads or softball bats of metals exotic enough to make NASA envious…
Best Sports Columnist
Picking a Best Sports Columnist in Houston is no easy matter. And it’s not exactly because there’s a wealth of riches to choose from. So our winners tend to be somewhat of a cheat — they’ve not been the paper’s regular sports columnists, they’ve been the beat guys who do…
Best Sports Radio Talk Show
There used to be many more sports-talk shows on the radio in Houston, but thankfully the best has survived. Rich Lord and Charlie Pallilo have the afternoon-drive slot on all-sports KILT, and they’ve made many a rush hour less frustrating for Houstonians. Lord’s a bit of a goof, and Pallilo’s…
Best Asian/Cajun Crawfish
Cajun Corner sells boiled Cajun-style crawfish all year round in its Vietnamese neighborhood. Gulf Coast Vietnamese-Americans are wild about Cajun-style boiled crawfish — the spicier the better. There’s a condiment bar where patrons stir up insanely hot dipping sauces made out of pure cayenne powder with a dash of ketchup…
Best Beer Selection
With 57 draft beers and 52 in bottles, The Ginger Man has something to please even the most discerning drinker. It also has the best selection of ciders in Houston. Draft selections include our locally brewed cask-conditioned St. Arnold’s Amber, as well as a wonderfully refreshing Paulaner Hefeweizen (Germany) wheat…
Best Guitar Teacher
Dave Payne can do just about anything when it comes to the guitar. Besides his own beautiful playing and singing, which runs the gamut from classical to funk, he’s got enough patience and good grace to teach anybody else how to follow his lead. Everybody from middle-aged engineers looking to…
Best Novelty Store
Walk in nice, walk out naughty. This store has more selection than a buffet on Sunday brunch — from complete drag-queen attire to standard dildos and edible underpants to sinfully seductive latex nurse outfits and she-devil getups. They also carry every prop you might possibly need to carry out any…
Best Manicure/Pedicure
Sister act Peggy and Maggie Lu run Instyle Nails like Donald Trump runs real estate. In the past four years they’ve had to add more spa chairs thanks to increasing demand. As any local woman knows, a spa (vibrating chair and foot whirlpool) mani/pedi is $25 at practically every shop…
Best Local Girl Made Good
Although she’s technically not a whistle-blower, Enron executive Sherron Watkins’s memo to Ken Lay warning him of the coming catastrophe last fall made her the Cassandra of the biggest business scandal ever to hit the city. Watkins managed to stay on the Enron payroll while becoming a national hero through…
Best Hidden Neighborhood
While driving through the maddening traffic of West Gray from Waugh to Montrose, take a turn down Van Buren. What you will find is an enchanting little neighborhood, filled with duplexes, fourplexes, gingerbread houses and pink stucco homes that would fit in well in Bermuda. The residents are mostly young…
Best Drive-Thru
Barbecue is messy eatin’. The fewer people to see you go ballistic on ribs, the better. Even though Houston is a drive-thru town, most of us aren’t aware the ubiquitous Pappas restaurants offer window service. Try the daily special choice of three meats and two sides for $8.99, and you’ll…
Best Dancer/Choreographer/Social Advocate
The level of local contemporary dance rose several notches when Jane Weiner came to town in 1997. She brought with her ten years of dancing with Doug Elkins’s company and gave generously of her art and talent. She danced, she taught, she networked with other artists. She created her own…
Best Spectacle
The beauty of all open mikes, whether it be for poetry, comedy or music, is that they’re open to anyone with the nerve or lack of ego to take a shot at five minutes of fame. You get the professionals, the diamonds in the rough or, if you’re lucky, the…
Best Polling Place
God bless that American tradition of elections — those august times when the populace flows into frayed schoolhouse hallways or churches or even humble homes or garages to exercise their voting rights. But the downtown crowd, at least the Republicans, got a better deal on this democratic notion in the…
Best Grocery Store Music
Who’da thunk it? This modest Montrose favorite has the ass-kickingest soundtrack around. You can sniff the ripe mangos to Blood Sweat & Tears, grab a six-pack of Sierra Nevada while jamming to Stevie Wonder, and squeeze the Charmin while gettin’ your Beatles on. And there’s no Muzak in this joint…
Astro Alan Zinter
To a lot of people, perhaps, the scene was desultory: a mid-June game between two teams far below .500, the seventh inning of a 7-1 blowout, Milwaukee’s Miller Park two-thirds empty. Houston Astro Alan Zinter waited in the on-deck circle. To the fans barely paying attention in the stands, Zinter…
Best Triumph over Tragedy
Gonzo country singer-songwriter Greg Wood couldn’t exactly be said to have been riding high, but he certainly was percolating along. His critically acclaimed band Horseshoe was gigging all over the city, their third album in the can. Justice Records agreed to nationally distribute King of the World, their second album,…
Best Movie Shot on Location
Pearl Harbor wasn’t even in the running, and though VH1’s Warning: Parental Advisory had a certain kitsch value, we had to go with this charming little independent flick. Rob Gladstone and Jason Fischer were working at the same brokerage firm, but deep down they wanted to make movies. So, with…
Best Buy-the-Book Event
The first time anybody paid Alvaro Saar Rios for his words was when the Houston-based playwright won $27,000 for spelling out “Totally Blew Me Away” on Wheel of Fortune. That wasn’t exactly poetry, but the winnings did give him enough money to live on for the next two years while…
The Squeaky Wheel
The menu at The Black Labrador (4100 Montrose, 713-529-1199) has a quaint description of the British comfort food known as bubble and squeak ($7.50). It says the dish gets its name from the sounds the ingredients make while cooking. But any British schoolboy will tell you what bubble and squeak…
Best Triumph over Tragedy
Gonzo country singer-songwriter Greg Wood couldn’t exactly be said to have been riding high, but he certainly was percolating along. His critically acclaimed band Horseshoe was gigging all over the city, their third album in the can. Justice Records agreed to nationally distribute King of the World, their second album,…
Best Movie Shot on Location
Pearl Harbor wasn’t even in the running, and though VH1’s Warning: Parental Advisory had a certain kitsch value, we had to go with this charming little independent flick. Rob Gladstone and Jason Fischer were working at the same brokerage firm, but deep down they wanted to make movies. So, with…
Best Dive
This bar is located in the heart of River Oaks, and we’re always leery of anyplace called a “saloon” that sits amid so much gentrification. But our doubts vanished the moment we saw the sign off San Felipe boasting a “large TV.” Next, when the barmaid announced, “What can I…
Best Source of Free Stock Information
What does a city full of businesspeople need? How about a radio station that follows the stock market? Brent Clanton’s morning drive-time show updates listeners on yesterday’s market movement so they’ll be ready for the opening bell. Street Talk, the afternoon drive-time show with investment planner-financial adviser Lance Roberts, wraps…
Best Kids’ Thrill
The Nutcracker ballet matinee performance just before Christmas is kid central. Any fidgeting, screaming, crying or other nontraditional theater behavior by your offspring will disturb only the other, already harried, parents. Afterward, take them backstage to meet the dancers. All are welcome. A six-year-old we know got her ballet shoes…
Best Place to Feel Zen
Stressed? Tired? Tired of feeling stressed and tired? Walk past all the people on blankets soaking up the sun in the boring part of the park and stroll into the Japanese gardens. There’s a suggested donation, but we’ve yet to see someone sitting in the booth. When you walk in,…
Best Roadside Memorial
Hit the southern tip of the Piney Woods of East Texas and turn the car north through the town of Kountze. As the Sonic and the Dairy Queen dissolve in the rearview mirror, the highway takes on a rural tone. And just beyond the city limits, the humble shrine shows…
Best Spectacle
The beauty of all open mikes, whether it be for poetry, comedy or music, is that they’re open to anyone with the nerve or lack of ego to take a shot at five minutes of fame. You get the professionals, the diamonds in the rough or, if you’re lucky, the…
Astro Alan Zinter
To a lot of people, perhaps, the scene was desultory: a mid-June game between two teams far below .500, the seventh inning of a 7-1 blowout, Milwaukee’s Miller Park two-thirds empty. Houston Astro Alan Zinter waited in the on-deck circle. To the fans barely paying attention in the stands, Zinter…
Best Smoked Fish
The counter men wear New York Fire Department gimme caps and talk with that unmistakable Big Apple accent. The menu hanging on the wall behind the counter includes a Yiddish glossary, just in case you’re wondering about authenticity. Yes, these guys are genuine meshuga New Yorkers, and the big doughy,…
Best Cabrito
When you walk in the front door of this place, the aroma of goat smacks you in the nose. Or is it mutton? Chivito asado al pastor (spit-roasted goat) and barbacoa de borrego estilo Hidalgo (Hidalgo-style lamb slow-cooked in maguey leaves) are two of the restaurant’s specialties; if it’s Friday…
Best Hardware Store
Many hardware stores are so enormous, they’re more of a hindrance than a help. Who wants to hike two miles to find a one-and-a-half-inch beveled polywasher for the kitchen sink, then another mile searching for one-eighth-inch mirror brackets? Then there’s the attitude. Unlike contractors, we usually don’t know what we’re…
Best Fish Market
Sure, it’s the largest retailer of crunchy stuff, but there’s more to Whole Foods than bulk granola and Gardenburgers. For example, it’s also the best place to snag a live lobster, a tuna steak or wild salmon. The tattooed guys behind the counter are friendly and knowledgeable. They know their…
Best Place to Buy an Engagement Ring
Eleanor Roosevelt’s solitaire came from Tiffany’s; Dennis Oppenheim created a sculpture in New York based on their engagement ring designs; George Peppard had a plastic ring from a box of Cracker Jack engraved by them in the classic Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Since 1837, these experts have been dealing in rings…
Best Greasy Spoon
There are several sure signs of a great greasy spoon: Pickup trucks outnumber SUVs, “Texas toast” is a staple food, you feel the need to check your fork for stray remnants; and you leave feeling guilty yet satisfied. The Pig Stand easily meets all the criteria. Piggy No. 7 (yes,…
Best Mexican Restaurant
Chef Hugo Ortega, long the top toque at Backstreet Cafe, is now turning out cutting-edge Mexican food at this stunning new spot on Westheimer’s restaurant row. You won’t find any nachos, fajitas or chips and salsa here. What you will find is roasted rabbit in guajillo adobo with mashed sweet…
Best Neighborhood Spot in the Heights
“It’s such a nice night, why don’t you have a seat on the patio and have a glass of wine while you look at the menu?” the kindly old man advises as you walk up the front steps. If owner Sammy Patrenella seems at home here in this big old…
Best Place to Turn Back the Hands of Time
People say we’re elitist. Oh, sure, we only eat our steaks Pittsburgh-style and drink our Russian vodka chilled. But dammit, we also go to James Coney Island, just like everyone else in Houston. Why? Because it’s a slice of Americana. It’s a captured childhood moment. Remember those summer days of…
Best Neighborhood Spot in Bellaire
Even foodies will agree that sometimes comfort means more than cuisine, though the elegantly casual Auntie Pasto’s offers a solid mix of both. It’s not surprising that pasta reigns supreme here, with the 22 menu offerings ranging from black bean pasta (a Southwestern mix of cilantro, peppers, black beans, goat…
Best Diner with Waitresses to Give You Wholesome Dreams
People put a lot of faith in the cooks, servers and busboys who work at their favorite diner. Patrons want to know that when they place their order and get their meal, they’re in good hands. They wanna look in that waitress’s eyes and know they have nothing to worry…
Best Skate Park
Sanctuary! Tony Hawk wannabes who are tired of getting kicked out of downtown have a 30,000-plus-square-foot refuge they can call their own. Vans Skatepark — part of a national chain of skateboard facilities — boasts an impressive indoor/outdoor collection of ramps, pools, rails and ledges where future X Games contestants…
Best Sports Broadcaster
Channel 26, KRIVWhen it comes to breaking sports news in Houston, few folks do it better than Channel 26’s Mark Berman. There’s more than a bit of truth to that ad the station runs showing rivals watching Fox’s 9 p.m. news to see what they’ll need to catch up on…
Best Sports Columnist
Picking a Best Sports Columnist in Houston is no easy matter. And it’s not exactly because there’s a wealth of riches to choose from. So our winners tend to be somewhat of a cheat — they’ve not been the paper’s regular sports columnists, they’ve been the beat guys who do…
Best Bagels
They’re large, always warm and have just the right balance of firmness, chewiness and doughiness. The bagels at Manhattan Bagels run golden-brown rings around the others. More than 20 different varieties are always available, including all of the standards, plus rye, whole wheat, egg, jalapeño, spinach, cinnamon and raisin, cranberry…
Best Horchata
Sometimes in Houston you need to fight fire with ice — and the right thing to put over that ice is horchata, the Mexican agua fresca made from rice and sugar. Sure, there are pleasant versions flavored with vanilla or cinnamon, but the best of all is coconut. The deli…
Best Landscaper
Some people kill plants. Some overwater their petunias until they turn to mush. Some just don’t want to dig in the dirt. So they hire other people to make their backyards pretty. It’s too hard and too hot to plant plumerias and palm trees yourself. It’s time to call Vicente…
Best Surf Shop
A recent transplant from Southern California was shocked when we told her that people really do surf here in Texas. She would have died laughing if we had shown her our pick for Houston’s best surf shop. It’s true that the outside of the Surfhouse isn’t what you might expect…
Best Vintage Clothing Store
A relative newcomer to the Westheimer vintage strip, Leopard Lounge is a welcome young upstart. The leopard-print motif and blaring hip-hop music let you know this is not your mother’s consignment shop. The usual suspects are well covered: bellbottom jeans, ’50s dresses, tight-fitting team T-shirts from the ’70s and so…
Best Criminal Judge
Republican Lynn Hughes hardly blinked when he advanced from his state district court (a civil one, no less) to the federal bench some 12 years ago. That characteristic aplomb has yet to be erased by some of the most demanding cases at the federal courthouse. He’s coupled a healthy disdain…
Best Lost Landmark
It was a place for sipping fruity cocktails from the thatched-roof bar by the pool, partying with the band after a great downtown gig, spotting Bill Murray during the filming of Rushmore, watching the fireworks over the bayou on the Fourth of July, getting away from the usual Montrose haunts…
Best Family Restaurant
Yes, it’s loud and gimmicky, but they season the food well. The family-style servings, plus the mix of old favorites with moderately interesting dishes, guarantee an option to make almost any palate happy. Finicky kiddies who like their food simple can have the spaghetti bolognese; grown-ups who prefer a little…
Best Book by a Local Author
Native Dubliner Robert Cremins is an English teacher at Strake Jesuit College Prep, and likely the sort of man of whom his alter ego, Tom Iremonger, would not have approved. Iremonger, the protagonist in Cremins’s A Sort of Homecoming, is a pill-popping, hard-drinking, womanizing, inheritance-squandering young nihilist fresh back in…
Best One-Man Show
Houston’s own Rob Nash just keeps delivering the goods, from his first show, Freshman Year Sucks, to his most recent madcap caper, his take on a production of the Bard’s venerable play at the fictional Holy Cross High. Unlike many one-person shows, which are all too often portraits of some…
Best Politician
East End native Carol Alvarado has been crusading for other people’s municipal campaigns ever since she could walk, and last fall she finally won her own place on Houston City Council. The former aide to Mayor Lee Brown weathered an acrimonious contest against two opponents to win the District I…
Best Place to Feel Zen
Stressed? Tired? Tired of feeling stressed and tired? Walk past all the people on blankets soaking up the sun in the boring part of the park and stroll into the Japanese gardens. There’s a suggested donation, but we’ve yet to see someone sitting in the booth. When you walk in,…
Gilbert Johnson, co-owner, The Chocolate Bar
That’s right, folks, chocolate’s making a comeback. Did it ever go away? you may ask. Well, for most of us, no. But health-conscious types now have a new reason to indulge: Chocolate is good for you. A recent Penn State review says cocoa beans are loaded with flavonoids, which have…
Best Flashback
With a little imagination, concertgoers might have transported themselves back to the ’60s, when the Astrodome was the brand-new wonder of the sports world and the young Dylan was a messianic folksinger with a global following. The Dome may be ready for scrap, but Dylan proved he’s still got plenty…
Best Nightlife Idea that Should Come Back
Sure, they ripped off the name, idea and even the marketing plan from a New York-based nightclub chain that sets up clubs inside old beauty shops, but the beautiful ones over at Tifosi Beauty & Day Spa couldn’t pass up the chance to bring this kind of unorthodox hobnobbing to…
Moorer Better Blues
“I don’t think I’m a cynical person. I don’t think I’m a pessimistic person,” Allison Moorer says. “It’s just that I’m not an idiot. When was the last time you tripped through the daisies?” Okay, so Moorer, who just released her third album, Miss Fortune, may not be the sunniest…
Dim Sum 101
Asian women in dark blue baseball caps and light blue shirts wheel shiny stainless-steel dim sum carts around the enormous upstairs dining room of Ocean Palace in the Hong Kong City Mall. Halfway down the far left aisle, a Chinese woman with a name tag that reads “Dorothy Huang” is…
Best Flashback
With a little imagination, concertgoers might have transported themselves back to the ’60s, when the Astrodome was the brand-new wonder of the sports world and the young Dylan was a messianic folksinger with a global following. The Dome may be ready for scrap, but Dylan proved he’s still got plenty…
Best Nightlife Idea that Should Come Back
Sure, they ripped off the name, idea and even the marketing plan from a New York-based nightclub chain that sets up clubs inside old beauty shops, but the beautiful ones over at Tifosi Beauty & Day Spa couldn’t pass up the chance to bring this kind of unorthodox hobnobbing to…
Best “Boring” Dance
Choreographer Jennifer Wood set out to be boring, and instead created her most provocative piece of the year. Go figure. Midway through Suchu’s The Dirty Show, the dancers simply stood facing the audience for a full two minutes. Wood says she had to force herself not to throw in any…
Best Local TV News Reporter
Wayne Dolcefino has become a brand name in Houston — the name that government bureaucrats hate to see on their “While You Were Out” message pads. His melodramatic touches can be a bit much — and Lord knows he doesn’t need to do anymore strip-club pieces — but the fact…
Best Cheap Thrill
Whether you’re going north or south, get your kicks for free anytime you like with hot merging action. Spin out into the frenetic traffic after taking a hairpin curve on this wily on-ramp. Feel your senses come alive with the zooms, whirs and honks of passersby. Recent landscaping on the…
Best Lemons to Lemonade
All right, all right. We know what you’re thinking. But remember, this is the issue where we’re supposed to be nice. And anyway, who fits this award better? Linda Lay knew she wasn’t winning any fans after her Tammy Faye Bakker moment on the Today show (“We’ve lost everything!”). So…
Best Place to Spot Celebs
Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt, Cher, P. Diddy, Gwen Stefani, Busta Rhymes, Shirley Manson, the Goo Goo Dolls…Everybody who’s anybody stays at Hotel Derek when they come through Houston. But how can you get a peek at the stars without staking out their hotel rooms and looking like a psychotic…
Best One-Man Show
Houston’s own Rob Nash just keeps delivering the goods, from his first show, Freshman Year Sucks, to his most recent madcap caper, his take on a production of the Bard’s venerable play at the fictional Holy Cross High. Unlike many one-person shows, which are all too often portraits of some…
Gilbert Johnson, co-owner, The Chocolate Bar
That’s right, folks, chocolate’s making a comeback. Did it ever go away? you may ask. Well, for most of us, no. But health-conscious types now have a new reason to indulge: Chocolate is good for you. A recent Penn State review says cocoa beans are loaded with flavonoids, which have…
Best Salsa
Is there smack in this salsa? No, of course not. But the addictive quality of El Pueblito’s version of the condiment will make you wonder. At this Guatemalan/Mexican restaurant, owned by Eduardo and Monica Lopez, the salsa is more than just something to dip the chips in while waiting for…
Best Cheeseburger
Watch out! The innocent-looking paper-wrapped package they hand you when you ask for a cheeseburger at Adrian’s is actually a delicious mess waiting to happen. The giant hand-formed meat patty is topped with a sloppy mountain of lettuce, tomatoes, onion and pickles. The burgers are fried to order, so they’re…
Best Car Wash
Your ride’s looking a little shabby. It wants to get spruced up and feel pretty. But you’re particular about what touches your car. You’re not keen on some automated gas station drive-thru scratching the gloss on your ClearCoat. And who knows where those frazzled brushes at the coin-operated self-wash places…
Best Farmers Market
Don’t let yourself be overly distracted by the incredibly good selection of produce, vinegars and bulk beans. The real bargains are way in the back, where the growers have the discount stuff fresh off the trucks. Get red peppers for a buck a pound, jalapeos for pennies, and some really…
Best Place for a Wedding
Humble Oil founder W.W. Fondren never imagined his 1923 home would become one of the finest little luxury hotels in the world. But hey, this is Houston; we could have torn it down. Luckily, Steve Zimmerman not only retained the mansion’s elegance but also added the 8,000-square-foot Grand Salon de…
Best Latin Restaurant
“Colorful” is perhaps the best word to describe the offerings served at Café Red Onion, a blend of foods from Mexico and Central America. The culinary melting pot begins with the one-of-a-kind pineapple salsa and plantain chips and ends (at least it should) with the chocolate empanada. Owner and chef…
Best Retro Tex-Mex Restaurant
Neon beer signs glow brightly in the cool darkness. The taco and tostada are made of old-fashioned ground beef with a minimum of seasonings and a maximum of chopped iceberg. The tamale and rice and beans are served swimming in chili gravy. Larry’s seems indistinguishable from dozens of other vintage…
Best Breakfast
Catfish and grits may sound odd to you, but it’s a popular breakfast dish in the Southeast, particularly in Georgia and the Carolinas. And while Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles in L.A. made that kooky combination famous, it was actually invented by jazz musicians in New York during the…
Best Cheap Seafood
Heading west on 610 from Reliant Stadium, you’ll see J&J’s “fresh seafood” sign poking up over the elevated section of the highway. Unfortunately, by the time you see the sign, it’s too late to get off at the Stella Link exit, where this classic “you buy it, we fry it”…
Best Neighborhood Spot in the Galleria Area
We know what you’re thinking. You saw “Galleria” and imagined meals at Morton’s Steakhouse, or Cafe Annie or any number of high-dollar restaurants. That’s why Chacho’s is a natural choice. Located just down the street from the Galleria in a faux adobe building with bright pastel colors, Chacho’s offers first-rate…
Best Diner with Waitresses to Give You Perverted Dreams
This may sound like we’re bad-mouthing the fine, upstanding ladies who work their butts off at the House of Pies, but trust us, we’re just giving ’em their props. Because, fellas, the 59 Diner may have waitresses you could take home to your parents, but the gals over at the…
Best Public Golf Course
Golfing vacations have become all the rage in recent years. Young power players and old gummers alike are paying top dollar for package trips that whisk them over the ocean — and back in time — to Saint Andrews or some other hallowed shrine of shankers everywhere. Houston doesn’t lay…
Best Scuba Instructor
Scuba Bob is so badass that he once bit a nurse shark on the dorsal fin just so his students would see that they shouldn’t be afraid to swim with sharks. “I kissed it after I got through biting it,” he says. “I petted it, too.” Scuba Bob estimates he’s…
Best Sports Broadcaster
Channel 26, KRIVWhen it comes to breaking sports news in Houston, few folks do it better than Channel 26’s Mark Berman. There’s more than a bit of truth to that ad the station runs showing rivals watching Fox’s 9 p.m. news to see what they’ll need to catch up on…
Best Dumplings
Mama Tran makes the dumplings at this quirky little family-run Vietnamese restaurant in the Old Chinatown neighborhood near the intersection of Highways 45 and 59. The dumplings are awesome, and the noodles are pretty good, too. Owner Jenni Tran-Weaver (Mama Tran’s daughter) makes the homemade Vietnamese desserts. But that’s not…
Best Milk Shake
Over at the Hard Rock, it’s not all about framed trinkets of rock-and-roll days gone by and a stocked gift shop. They also serve delicious food that’s worth eating under a glass display of Rick Springfield’s surgical scrubs from General Hospital. And believe it or not, one of their best…
Best Place to Buy Plants
Contrary to what The New York Times Magazine seems to think, Houston is green, not brown. But God didn’t make it that way, the Teas family did. By 1951, according to the Teas Web site, the nursery and landscaping company had planted more than one million trees in Houston. They…
Best Discount Bookstore
To think, a whole generation has grown up believing that bookstores are supposed to be run by boards of directors, serve 80 kinds of coffee and loom as large as airplane hangars. Yes, the megaplexes do have every book on every subject known to man, and yes, it’s nice to…
Best Fabric Store
Even if you don’t sew, this fabric store is worth a visit. There’s a whole room devoted to silks that makes you realize fabric designing is a true profession. The customers are dead serious in their searches. Brides-to-be walk dutifully, following their dressmakers with anxious looks and hands full of…
Best Civil Judge
Harris County’s state district courts were in big trouble in 1997, when the judicial ethics commission in effect bounced then-judge William Bell from the 281st Court bench. Stepping in after that mess was quiet newcomer Jane Bland, a pregnant lawyer who was only 32 — and looked about ten years…
Best Place to Wait for Traffic to Die Down
Just around the corner, human temperatures and internal-combustion exhaust rise to a rush-hour crescendo. Travis teems with idling autos, igniting road-rage fuses at the pace of a few feet per minute. Solero, however, is the place that has known how to tame the savage commuter since the antebellum era. It’s…
Best German Restaurant
6510 Del Monte, 713-268-1115Nowhere in Houston will you encounter so many deutsch speakers. The daily specials are the thing to order, especially the long-simmered meats. German food usually doesn’t sound appealing in the hot summer months, but the cold dishes here are exceptional as well. AnneMarie, the German-born proprietor and…
Best Dive
This bar is located in the heart of River Oaks, and we’re always leery of anyplace called a “saloon” that sits amid so much gentrification. But our doubts vanished the moment we saw the sign off San Felipe boasting a “large TV.” Next, when the barmaid announced, “What can I…
Best Original Show
Politics and theater can make boring bedfellows. The result is usually a bunch of soapboxing badly disguised as art. Of course, if you’re Brian Jucha and you want to write about the horrors of 9/11, the whole world — including any usual standards about what happens when art and politics…
Best Republican
Kyle Janek, a West U anesthesiologist, knocked off former GOP county chair Gary Polland by a decisive 66-34 percent margin in the spring primary for State Senate District 17, effectively putting to sleep Polland’s incipient political career. Janek also may have ended Polland’s reign as political payout king of the…
Best Lemons to Lemonade
All right, all right. We know what you’re thinking. But remember, this is the issue where we’re supposed to be nice. And anyway, who fits this award better? Linda Lay knew she wasn’t winning any fans after her Tammy Faye Bakker moment on the Today show (“We’ve lost everything!”). So…
Chef Mark Johnston and general manager Soufiane Elaamili, Charley’s 517
“Back in the ’80s, people used to tell me I had the best restaurant downtown,” says Clive Berkman, owner of Charley’s 517. “I would laugh and mutter under my breath, ‘I have the only restaurant downtown.’ ” Charley’s 517, which opened in 1971, was originally an old-school dinner house, with…
Best Gay-Themed Show
What if we got that Adam-and-Eve-in-the-Garden thing all wrong? What if it was actually Adam and Steve who named the animals, along with some help from Jane and Mabel, who lived just down the Garden path? That’s the premise behind Paul Rudnick’s hysterical The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, brought…
Best Place to Genuflect Before Seeing a Movie
The Aurora Picture Show is the Holy Grail of microcinemas, one of a handful of tiny theaters sparsely scattered around the country, showcasing noncommercial films and video. The right reverend Andrea Grover, the Aurora’s executive director, is possibly the hardest-working person in the self-sacrificing world of nonprofit arts organizations. At…
California Dreamin’
People of faith will tell you that they communicate with their deity every day, but not many encounters with the Almighty involve Him drinking a Diet Coke. That’s how Robert Schneider, the singer/guitarist/songwriter for the power-pop band Apples in Stereo saw his Personal Jesus. “It was the most incredible, watershed,…
BEST OF HOUSTON® 2002:
Better Than Ever Floods? Terrorist threats? Long, nasty court cases and horrible business scandals? A failed Olympic bid? A second year atop the nation’s fattest cities list? These things might be the downfall of some cities, but not ours. With its notorious do-it-yourself style, Houston answers bad news with a…
Best Gay-Themed Show
What if we got that Adam-and-Eve-in-the-Garden thing all wrong? What if it was actually Adam and Steve who named the animals, along with some help from Jane and Mabel, who lived just down the Garden path? That’s the premise behind Paul Rudnick’s hysterical The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told, brought…
Best Place to Genuflect Before Seeing a Movie
The Aurora Picture Show is the Holy Grail of microcinemas, one of a handful of tiny theaters sparsely scattered around the country, showcasing noncommercial films and video. The right reverend Andrea Grover, the Aurora’s executive director, is possibly the hardest-working person in the self-sacrificing world of nonprofit arts organizations. At…
Best Art Gallery
Inman Gallery is nothing if not hip, so hip it’s been included in New York’s Amory Show, that commercial mecca of über-cool contemporary art, for the past two years. Inman focuses on emerging artists with an emphasis on Texan talent, and their openings are attended by a roll call of…
Best Traffic Reports
Where in the world is traffic reporter Susie Loucks (a.k.a. Elaine Closure) after the Clear Channel blowout? (And to make things perfectly clear, she was not fired but replaced by Clear Channel’s own in-house traffic service.) These days, you can find her wild and wacky style of traffic reporting on…
Best Flood Recovery
After Tropical Storm Allison, the Wortham Theater Center, home of the ballet and opera, had six feet of water in its basement. The two bottom floors of the Alley Theatre were totally submerged, ruining the stage, rehearsal hall and electrical systems. Jones Hall, home of Society for the Performing Arts…
Best Lobby
This is how bank lobbies are supposed to be: gilded, titanic, chock-full of patterned marble and with a ceiling as soaring as a newly minted MBA’s ambition. The ceiling of this grand banking hall is a full six stories above the worker ants below. It’s clear that Jesse Jones –…
Best Backyard
Once upon a time, Dr. Richard Patt had a teddy bear in his front yard. It reached 20 feet, give or take, into the sky. His neighbors hated it. But it wasn’t enough. The backyard was empty and boring. So he and Joe DiPaulo, the man who designed the park…
Best Original Show
Politics and theater can make boring bedfellows. The result is usually a bunch of soapboxing badly disguised as art. Of course, if you’re Brian Jucha and you want to write about the horrors of 9/11, the whole world — including any usual standards about what happens when art and politics…
Chef Mark Johnston and general manager Soufiane Elaamili, Charley’s 517
“Back in the ’80s, people used to tell me I had the best restaurant downtown,” says Clive Berkman, owner of Charley’s 517. “I would laugh and mutter under my breath, ‘I have the only restaurant downtown.’ “Charley’s 517, which opened in 1971, was originally an old-school dinner house, with waiters…
Best Salad
The lunch salad with scallops, listed on the menu as “pancetta-wrapped Maine diver scallops, warm salad of watercress, jicama and wild mushrooms,” tastes as big as its name. First you notice the scallops: three big fat ones, wrapped in pancetta, and the salty Italian bacon pairs beautifully with the sweet…
Best Chicken-Fried Steak
Smaller than a hubcap but bigger than your face, the chicken-fried steak at Rio Ranch is actually a thin-cut sirloin steak that has been dipped in buttermilk, hand-dredged in seasoned flour and fried until it’s crispier than Grandma’s chicken wings. It’s served atop a large pile of steaming mashed potatoes…
Best Place to Get a Car Wash, a Haircut and a Brisket
Imagine: An angry ex has poured garbage all over your new sports car. You haven’t slept for months, and your hair has become a bit unruly. What’s more, you’re hungry, dammit. Well, have we got the place for you. It goes by many names. Call it Pop’s Exquisite Bar-B-Q, where…
Best Camera Store
A visit to the Houston Camera Exchange is kind of like those commercials for Circuit City, where the technophile runs through the store in ecstasy. On a recent visit to the place, we intended to duck in quickly and check out the selection of books on black-and-white photography. But plans…
Best Hotel
Built in 1925, the Warwick is another of those rare Houston gems from time gone by. Old World elegance combined with a recent face-lift make for splendid accommodations: fabulous rooms, a great lobby and the most informed concierge in town, plus the elegant Hunt Room, with its marble fireplace and…
Best Malaysian Restaurant
Okay, so there are only two Malaysian restaurants in town. But at Malaysia Restaurant, the food is great and the prices are low. Malaysian food is the original fusion cuisine. The strategic peninsula has been ruled by countless colonizers. And every one of them brought along something to eat. There’s…
Best Polish Restaurant
This cozy little restaurant a few blocks from Our Lady of Czestochowa, the Polish Catholic church, is the place to catch up on the doings of the Eastern European community over blintzes and tea. Be prepared for a long wait if you arrive during the post-church scene on Sunday afternoon…
Best Brunch
Turtle soup, champagne and gospel music; it’s a heady combination on an early Sunday afternoon. You can’t help feeling like you’re in New Orleans when you walk in the front door, and Brennan’s plays the Crescent City card for all it’s worth. The Houston outpost of that legendary New Orleans…
Best Pre- or Post-Theater Restaurant
Legend has it that the word bistro comes from a Russian word for “quick,” or “hurry up!” How fitting that one of the best restaurants in the Theater District should be a bistro, since speedy service is exactly what theatergoers are looking for. The menu at Papillon features lots of…
Best Bistro
The best thing about Mockingbird Bistro is the unpretentious menu. This is the perfect place to enjoy a big fat steak with french fries and an earthy Rhône red wine or a hamburger and a cold beer. In many cases, the quality of the ingredients elevates simple dishes to unexpected…
Best Bang for the Buck
“Under $25” is the title of a column Eric Asimov writes about inexpensive restaurants for The New York Times. They think that’s cheap? At Darband Shish Kabob on Hillcroft, you can feed your whole family for $25 and have enough change left over to take them to Dairy Queen for…
Best Disc Golf Course
When we first disclosed to a friend that we occasionally enjoyed a round of disc golf on the weekends, his reply was “That’s so…collegiate.” True, we did pick up the sport during our undergrad years, but its appeal hasn’t waned a bit. And with great courses in Houston like the…
Best Motivator
It’s 4:30 p.m., and you’ve had one of those days at the office. You know you need to go work out. You also know you could go straight home and work out the cushions of your oversized, overstuffed sofa. Then you remember that he’ll be at the gym. You suit…
Best Scuba Instructor
Scuba Bob is so badass that he once bit a nurse shark on the dorsal fin just so his students would see that they shouldn’t be afraid to swim with sharks. “I kissed it after I got through biting it,” he says. “I petted it, too.” Scuba Bob estimates he’s…
Best Exotic Food
Plum sauce is mundane in these surroundings. If the toddy palm drink, fresh seaweed, spicy sliced pork ear and stomach, or fish balls aren’t exotic enough for you, try the mochi chocolate pai, karela, tidora or moo, none of which comes with a translation. Then there’s the fruit-flavored beef jerky…
Best Espresso
At least four things have to be right to make the perfect espresso. First, the ingredient: finely ground Italian espresso-roasted coffee. Second, the equipment: a machine capable of bringing the water to 2000 degrees and delivering the right pressure. Third: the know-how, in the form of an experienced barista who…
Best Mosquito Control
Summer in a swampland means clawing at your skin, scratching hundreds of mosquito bites. It means every dinner you eat outdoors has to be lit with citronella candles. And it means the constant sound of blue bug lights zapping. Add to that reports of mosquitoes in the Houston area carrying…
Best Children’s Bookstore
Some parents regard their children as an extension of themselves, so show all your friends you’re better than they are by improving your kids. How? Expand their minds. Take the time to read to them. And if you want to really blow the Joneses out of the water, find unique…
Best Designer Boutique
Want to find the styles of the moment? At Tootsies you’ll be surrounded by crazy-cool clothes and CZ jewelry that’s a great knockoff of the real thing. From Via Spiga shoes to Ralph Lauren haute couture, Tootsies has got you covered. Looking for that diamond horseshoe necklace that Carrie wears…
Best Court Ruling
Too bad for Harris County and the state of Texas. Those damned technicalities keep getting in the way of another good execution! All the law asks is that defendants get a fair trial and adequate legal representation. And it’s exactly those onerous standards that have stymied the county and state…
Best Swells of Houston Pride
As you watch Jennifer Garner kick a guy square in the jaw while wearing thigh-high vinyl boots with that peach of a heinie wrapped in a rubber cocktail dress, do you think to yourself, ‘That girl is doing Houston proud’? Probably not, but as the second season of the baffling…
Best Greasy Spoon
There are several sure signs of a great greasy spoon: Pickup trucks outnumber SUVs, “Texas toast” is a staple food, you feel the need to check your fork for stray remnants; and you leave feeling guilty yet satisfied. The Pig Stand easily meets all the criteria. Piggy No. 7 (yes,…
Best “Boring” Dance
Choreographer Jennifer Wood set out to be boring, and instead created her most provocative piece of the year. Go figure. Midway through Suchu’s The Dirty Show, the dancers simply stood facing the audience for a full two minutes. Wood says she had to force herself not to throw in any…
Best Protest by Disgruntled Employees
When the bubble burst in 1929, so many stockbrokers took a dive themselves that it brought the euphemism defenestration (the act of throwing a person or thing out of a window) back into the lexicon. More recently, post office employees showed the need for anger management in the workplace. But…
Best Democrat
This 40-year-old native Houstonian went public with his battle with severe depression in 1994, and since then he’s become a leader in public health care legislation. He’s been repeatedly lauded by Texas Monthly in its yearly evaluation of lawmakers and honored by the Texas Medical Association. After disclosing his illness,…
Best Lobby
This is how bank lobbies are supposed to be: gilded, titanic, chock-full of patterned marble and with a ceiling as soaring as a newly minted MBA’s ambition. The ceiling of this grand banking hall is a full six stories above the worker ants below. It’s clear that Jesse Jones –…
Best New Club
The jewel in Pam Robinson’s Washington Avenue crown — and the nerve center in the three-club cluster she calls Pamland Central — Walter’s is less a nightclub than a neighborhood bar with a stage. On that stage, the music comes from both near and far, the musicians both semifamous and…
Best Concert Poster Artist
Yep, one of the most renowned concert poster artists in the country lives right here in our own backyard. Jermaine Rogers was creating posters for the Strokes long before they were hyped to the eyeballs. And his list of clients reads as a who’s who of hip and cool music:…
Best Local TV News Reporter
Wayne Dolcefino has become a brand name in Houston — the name that government bureaucrats hate to see on their “While You Were Out” message pads. His melodramatic touches can be a bit much — and Lord knows he doesn’t need to do anymore strip-club pieces — but the fact…
Chemical Kids
There isn’t much margin for error if you’re zigzagging across the stage at Fitzgerald’s while peering through a five-foot foam rubber vagina. Yet Faceplant’s Bryan Broussard seems to have this rare skill mastered as he darts past other members of the band, not to mention a cloister of stage divers…
Best New Club
The jewel in Pam Robinson’s Washington Avenue crown — and the nerve center in the three-club cluster she calls Pamland Central — Walter’s is less a nightclub than a neighborhood bar with a stage. On that stage, the music comes from both near and far, the musicians both semifamous and…
Best Concert Poster Artist
Yep, one of the most renowned concert poster artists in the country lives right here in our own backyard. Jermaine Rogers was creating posters for the Strokes long before they were hyped to the eyeballs. And his list of clients reads as a who’s who of hip and cool music:…
Best Radio Personality
At the stroke of midnight from Monday to Friday, KCOH jock Paris Eley spins part of an electrifying sermon from legendary Memphis Baptist preacher Jasper Williams. As his congregation shouts out words of agreement, the Reverend Williams dwells at length in stunning rhythmic cadence on the nature of midnight, saying…
Best Installation
What can you do with a flood-damaged bungalow? Mold remediation, schmold remediation. Turn some artists loose in it. Slumber House, organized by Poissant Gallery, transformed a decrepit, mildewed structure into an installation-art venue filled with work by ten artists. Jewel Baird Gleeson transformed the pink tile bathroom into the scene…
Best Religious Leader
Quick, finish this sentence: “We believe in new beginnings, we…” If you answered “believe in you” without skipping a beat, you are one of the thousands who have gladly been sucked in with one of the best marketing campaigns in Houston history — that of Lakewood Church. The catchy jingle…
Best Not-So-Cheap Thrill
Galveston needed a four-star hotel, and the San Luis gave it one, complete with a truly fabulous steak house (one of the top ten in Texas), a completely redesigned pool area with swim-up bar, and all the little niceties any sophisticate would expect. What you might not expect, but what…
Best Place to Pretend You’re Rich
This is where the rich people go. The place looks like a plantation. As soon as you drive up under the towering oaks, you expect someone to rush out and hand you a mint julep or a big straw hat and a cane. This is a place where the locker…
Best Lobbyist
This Houston assistant city attorney took over direction of the city lobbying team last year and had a promising maiden session. The 42-year-old neophyte impressed capitol veterans with a low-key approach combined with a tenacity that belies her five-foot-one, 110-pound frame. Grace volunteered for the job when her boss, City…
Best Protest by Disgruntled Employees
When the bubble burst in 1929, so many stockbrokers took a dive themselves that it brought the euphemism defenestration (the act of throwing a person or thing out of a window) back into the lexicon. More recently, post office employees showed the need for anger management in the workplace. But…
Best Shortcut
Take entrance no. 2 off Main, mosey through Rice campus and see what they’ve done to the place. Rice has one of the few college campuses that you can actually drive through without being accosted by the police or hitting a dead end every 20 feet. If you don’t lose…
Best Stone Crabs
Truluck’s stone crabs are flown in every day from company beds in Florida. If they were any fresher, these crustaceans would arrive at your table fighting. They’re kept on ice for the journey but never frozen. This yields a watery, stringy stone crab. Novices take note: You should eat only…
Best Chimichanga
There’s an undeniable truth in cooking: Deep frying makes everything better. The law behind it is simple. Frying adds fat — lots of it — to anything, and fat means flavor. Exhibit A: the chimichanga. The chimichanga is a beautiful thing, in a horrifying way, like a chicken-fried steak. Take…
Best Dance and Club Wear Designer
We’ve got a horde of fine club dancers in this town. Somebody’s gotta dress ’em. If there were still any raves around, chances are you’d see many shirts out there created by this man. Akindele’s brand of clothing, Enjoymusic Enjoylife (EMEL), featuring that all-important musical-note insignia, has been the favorite…
Best Back Store
Sufferers of long-term neck and back pain will try anything to find relief, even if it’s just temporary. At Relax The Back, you’ll find all the equipment and reference materials you need to provide relief from pain and to help keep you in good shape. The furniture offerings include ergonomic…
Best Masseur
Bob Lemmon’s massage room is a magical mini-oasis. There are fountains, mystical music, candles, incense and Bob. Bob is the best part. This man’s hands will drain every ounce of stress out of any body. His regimen includes oils, hot rocks, soothing lavender lotion, even warm water poured over your…
Best Mexican Restaurant
Chef Hugo Ortega, long the top toque at Backstreet Cafe, is now turning out cutting-edge Mexican food at this stunning new spot on Westheimer’s restaurant row. You won’t find any nachos, fajitas or chips and salsa here. What you will find is roasted rabbit in guajillo adobo with mashed sweet…
Best Salvadoran Restaurant
Why would a Salvadoran restaurant choose a name like Super La Mexicana? Well, it didn’t really. This part-convenience store part-luncheonette already had that name when the current proprietors bought it. The new owners decided it was too expensive to change the signage, so they just changed the menu instead. Now…
Best Burger Joint
The junk-store decor of this waterside burger bar draws an odd mix of bikers and moms with toddlers. Seabrook is a scenic drive down Highway 146, past the majestic bayside refineries whose smokestacks stand as straight and tall as palm trees. You forget all about alfalfa sprouts and textured tofu…
Best Place to Pig Out
This Brazilian meat eater’s paradise includes a 40-foot all-you-can-eat salad buffet with such exotic fare as quail eggs, crab salad and feijoada, a mixture of black beans and rice along with thinly sliced meats and collard greens. Choose only the salad bar for $17.99 or go for the complete buffet…
Best Neighborhood Spot in the Heights
“It’s such a nice night, why don’t you have a seat on the patio and have a glass of wine while you look at the menu?” the kindly old man advises as you walk up the front steps. If owner Sammy Patrenella seems at home here in this big old…
Best Place to Turn Back the Hands of Time
People say we’re elitist. Oh, sure, we only eat our steaks Pittsburgh-style and drink our Russian vodka chilled. But dammit, we also go to James Coney Island, just like everyone else in Houston. Why? Because it’s a slice of Americana. It’s a captured childhood moment. Remember those summer days of…
Best Place to Shoot Up
When you just have to shoot someone, this little forest hideaway is the safest way to go. Just inside Beltway 8, these woods are still secluded enough that crews have used them to film the wilderness scenes for Blind Fury and Born on the Fourth of July. It also happens…
Best Disc Golf Course
When we first disclosed to a friend that we occasionally enjoyed a round of disc golf on the weekends, his reply was “That’s so…collegiate.” True, we did pick up the sport during our undergrad years, but its appeal hasn’t waned a bit. And with great courses in Houston like the…
Best Motivator
It’s 4:30 p.m., and you’ve had one of those days at the office. You know you need to go work out. You also know you could go straight home and work out the cushions of your oversized, overstuffed sofa. Then you remember that he’ll be at the gym. You suit…
Best Mashed Potatoes
When you query the folks at Zydeco Louisiana Diner as to just why their mashed potatoes taste so good, they look at you quizzically and reply, “They’re real.” Duh. Of course they are. There’s simply no way instant taters could provide such pleasure. Creamed soft but not so soft you…
Best Mojito
“What’s in this?” we asked, taking a sip of our first ever mojito. “Heavenly goodness,” a friend said. A mojito is a Cuban drink made with rum, soda and simple syrup. A delectable muddle of mint leaves and lime sits at the bottom. Saba adds to the sugar-water sweetness of…
Best Pet Store
Yes, Petco is a chain, but it doesn’t feel like one. Walk in with your pet, whatever it may be. This store is friendly, convenient and fast. It carries the biggest selection of pet products from the finest brands, as well as lizards, birds, tropical fish, snakes, spiders and all…
Best Astrologer
Ever toyed with the idea of seeking career counseling from a psychic or an astrologer but been put off by the garishly muu-muu’ed, incense-burning, turban-coiffed mystic promising to solve your love woes as you choke on perfumed smoke? Well, if you want career guidance from someone who not only talks…
Best Place to Buy Roses
Poet Dorothy Parker once scorned her lover’s gift of “one perfect rose.” Perhaps her boyfriend’s mistake was not going to Buchanan’s to buy his present. The beautiful Heights plant-and-flower shop offers so many different types of roses it would have been hard for him to stop at just one. The…
Best Lawyer
A severely mentally ill Andrea Yates had drowned her five young children. Her competency was the supposed issue, but it was hard to find much sanity anywhere in these weird proceedings. Into all that madness came attorney George Parnham. Along with defense co-counsel Wendell Odom Jr., Parnham brought a soothing…
Best Place for a Wedding
Humble Oil founder W.W. Fondren never imagined his 1923 home would become one of the finest little luxury hotels in the world. But hey, this is Houston; we could have torn it down. Luckily, Steve Zimmerman not only retained the mansion’s elegance but also added the 8,000-square-foot Grand Salon de…
Best Latin Restaurant
“Colorful” is perhaps the best word to describe the offerings served at Café Red Onion, a blend of foods from Mexico and Central America. The culinary melting pot begins with the one-of-a-kind pineapple salsa and plantain chips and ends (at least it should) with the chocolate empanada. Owner and chef…
Best Art Gallery
Inman Gallery is nothing if not hip, so hip it’s been included in New York’s Amory Show, that commercial mecca of über-cool contemporary art, for the past two years. Inman focuses on emerging artists with an emphasis on Texan talent, and their openings are attended by a roll call of…
Best Yee-Haw Fix
When we feel like takin’ in an eyeful of cowboys teachin’ livestock a lesson, when we got a hankerin’ fer the romance of lively country dancin’ in the open air, the fiesta rodeo jamboree comes through. Most Saturday nights, the big metal shed out on 288 roils with arena events,…
Best Gadfly
Shelley Sekula-Gibbs feels compelled to add her personal two cents to anything any citizen happens to say during the City Council public session. A dermatologist, Sekula-Gibbs has also appointed herself the resident expert on all matters medical. Like any gadfly, she means well but can drive colleagues up the wall…
Best Place to Pretend You’re Rich
This is where the rich people go. The place looks like a plantation. As soon as you drive up under the towering oaks, you expect someone to rush out and hand you a mint julep or a big straw hat and a cane. This is a place where the locker…
Best Club for Local Acts
It’s tough in Houston for new local acts to get gigs. It’s a catch-22: While everyone wants to see the next big thing, local audiences can be blasé about going out and seeing new bands. A band has to get a rep before people start coming out to see them,…
Best Show with a Gimmick
The gimmick behind Alan Ayckbourn’s House and Garden is irresistible. And no place in town was better suited to capitalize on this cleverness than the Alley Theatre. House and Garden is billed as two plays. Each focuses on a different set of characters, but all the characters from one show…
Mayberry LSD
The term “schema” is defined as “a pattern imposed on complex reality or experience to assist in explaining it, mediate perception or guide response.” In other words, we sort out the seeming chaos of a football game by knowing that the Texans are all the guys in red, white and…
Best Club for Local Acts
It’s tough in Houston for new local acts to get gigs. It’s a catch-22: While everyone wants to see the next big thing, local audiences can be blasé about going out and seeing new bands. A band has to get a rep before people start coming out to see them,…
Best Show with a Gimmick
The gimmick behind Alan Ayckbourn’s House and Garden is irresistible. And no place in town was better suited to capitalize on this cleverness than the Alley Theatre. House and Garden is billed as two plays. Each focuses on a different set of characters, but all the characters from one show…
Best Actress
Consummate actress Anne Quackenbush often gets the short end of the stick when it comes to casting. The sweet-faced woman is often cast as the goofball, the loser or the whiny plain Jane. What’s even harder, Quackenbush so deeply inhabits these quirky characters that it’s sometimes too easy to overlook…
Best Lecture Series
Behind every great man there’s a great woman, right? Well, forget the first part, and you’ve got the idea behind the fascinating lecture series that is Unique Lives & Experiences. This forum provides its audience with an intimate look at the personal tragedies and triumphs of its famous female speakers…
Best Church for Atheists
Why let a little thing like a lack of belief in God keep you from going to church? The Houston Church of Freethought has been hosting monthly services, minus the religion, since 2000. Sunday-school sermons can cover such topics as the inclusion of “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance…
Best Houston Info on the Web
If you want to see really funny pictures of your friends, and possibly yourself, making waves in Houston’s nightlife, this is the site to visit. There are pages and pages of pics from Houston’s clubs and their raucous partyers. From the Lotus Lounge to the Social, you can peruse photo…
Best T-Shirt Made in Houston
The best T-shirt we saw all summer was “Purple What?” Targeting the Willy Wonka-esque theme of rapper Big Moe’s “Purple Stuff” video, it featured a purple Oompa Loompa pouring a cup of lean, or drank, or whatever the hell you wanna call it on the floor. On the back was…
Best Local TV News
When it comes to local news in the Houston market, Channel 11 truly stands alone in terms of quality. That doesn’t mean it’s great: Local TV news around the country has been in a general decline for some time. KHOU is fighting that decline better than anyone else around here,…
Best Yee-Haw Fix
When we feel like takin’ in an eyeful of cowboys teachin’ livestock a lesson, when we got a hankerin’ fer the romance of lively country dancin’ in the open air, the fiesta rodeo jamboree comes through. Most Saturday nights, the big metal shed out on 288 roils with arena events,…
Best Local Boy Gone Bad
Andy Fastow was the creator of those infamous outside partnerships with the Star Wars names that diverted millions from the company to his family foundation and the bank accounts of fellow employees. After winning a conviction of accounting giant Arthur Andersen for illegally shredding Enron documents, government prosecutors have given…
Best Bread
The challah is braided and brown on the outside and golden with egg yolks in the middle — take some home and make French toast with it and your breakfast will take on a whole new dimension. If you’re thinking of making roast beef sandwiches, you’ll want to build them…
Best Coffee Beans
House of Coffee Beans has been Houston’s gourmet coffee roaster for almost 30 years. You can smell the roasting beans before you’re even through the door. The secret to their success is simple: They focus on doing one thing and being the best in their class. They purchase the best…
Best Downtown Parking Garage
If you’ve ever wanted to feel like Alice down the rabbit hole, take a few hours out of your life and go underground here. You can emerge at any number of downtown spots, from office buildings to the Wortham to the Angelika Film Center. If you’re smart, you’ll take note…
Best Resale Shop
It’s hard to figure out why the cars are crawling to a stop and little old ladies are fighting for parking along Dunlavy. With no obvious signs to flag you down, you could drive right by the Guild Shop without even noticing. Variety and good deals are the key to…
Best Bed-and-Breakfast
This amazing old structure, built in 1898, is lovingly restored and chock-full of Victorian charm. Yes, it’s a little foofy; don’t check in if your idea of luxury is the downtown Hyatt. This luxury is of a different, softer sort. Stroll over (yes, you can stroll in Houston) to one…
Best Retro Tex-Mex Restaurant
Neon beer signs glow brightly in the cool darkness. The taco and tostada are made of old-fashioned ground beef with a minimum of seasonings and a maximum of chopped iceberg. The tamale and rice and beans are served swimming in chili gravy. Larry’s seems indistinguishable from dozens of other vintage…
Best Barbecue
Look for the little red house in the crusty Third Ward neighborhood east of the George R. Brown Convention Center. You have to pass through a screened-in porch with a dilapidated sofa and a pile of broken chairs to reach the entrance proper. Inside, there’s a cozy little dining room…
Best Cuban Restaurant
A vertical arrangement of tropical fruit in a basket on the gleaming white bar looks like Carmen Miranda’s hat. The bartender borrows from the overflow of pineapples, bananas and assorted tropical fruits to make smoothies. Meanwhile, the barista cranks out tiny cups of Cuban coffee. Cuban food lovers from all…
Best Theme Restaurant
With its rattan furniture and mounted trophy fish, the bar at this “Floribbean” restaurant is one of the most colorful in the city. In fact, the Floridita restaurant on Kirby takes its name from the El Floridita bar in Havana, Cuba, where Ernest “Papa” Hemingway drank. Try a Papa Doble,…
Best Breakfast
Catfish and grits may sound odd to you, but it’s a popular breakfast dish in the Southeast, particularly in Georgia and the Carolinas. And while Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles in L.A. made that kooky combination famous, it was actually invented by jazz musicians in New York during the…
Best Cheap Seafood
Heading west on 610 from Reliant Stadium, you’ll see J&J’s “fresh seafood” sign poking up over the elevated section of the highway. Unfortunately, by the time you see the sign, it’s too late to get off at the Stella Link exit, where this classic “you buy it, we fry it”…
Best Place to Hike
It’s no easy task to get off the beaten path, when every trail in the Houston area has been beaten senselessly by the throngs. But the Big Thicket is waiting — and wild. It’s an hour or so drive from Houston, and worth every minute of it. Exit I-10 onto…
Best Place to Shoot Up
When you just have to shoot someone, this little forest hideaway is the safest way to go. Just inside Beltway 8, these woods are still secluded enough that crews have used them to film the wilderness scenes for Blind Fury and Born on the Fourth of July. It also happens…
Best Houstonian You Didn’t Know Was a Houstonian
You’re probably saying to yourself, “Who the hell is Jeff Martin?” Well, there’s a good chance the man, a highly successful television comedy writer, has made you laugh on more than one occasion. After all, this is a former Houstonian (and former AstroWorld employee) who started out writing for that…
Best Gumbo
Sam Segari’s gumbo is murky, mysterious and full of character — just like everything else in this crazy little joint. The soup is loaded with fresh shrimp, and the dark roux is just spicy enough to keep your lips warm. Sam prefers to serve the gumbo as an appetizer. The…
Best Bulgogi
If you only kind of feel like cooking — but definitely want to get out of the house — Seoul Garden is the place to go. The bulgogi is brought to your table. This fantastic Korean beef tastes as though it’s been marinating since JFK was alive and is sliced…
Best Attention to Detail
Little things mean a lot, especially when the family pet leaves big messes in your yard. With both parents working, it’s hard to keep up with the cooking and cleaning and lawn care, let alone enjoy home life. But Scoop le Poop makes having a dog that much easier. For…
Best Toy Store
Stepping into this little orange-and-brown shop in the Rice Village is like stepping back into 1954. Makes sense. That’s when G&G moved into its current location. The cozy, jam-packed store has an endearing, musty quality to it. But the selection is second to none. Anything you ever wanted in model…
Best Wine Store
Owner Scott Spencer renamed his store, formerly Wines of America, because the name no longer reflected his product offerings. This little gem of a wine shop carries selections from all over the world and reflects what you can do with your shelves when you have limited space but excellent taste…
Best School
Stepping into the large building of T.H. Rogers school a mile or so west of the Galleria is almost always an uplifting experience. First there’s the incredible mix of students: The school’s a magnet program, so every socioeconomic level is represented; it’s both an elementary and a middle school, so…
Best Hotel
Built in 1925, the Warwick is another of those rare Houston gems from time gone by. Old World elegance combined with a recent face-lift make for splendid accommodations: fabulous rooms, a great lobby and the most informed concierge in town, plus the elegant Hunt Room, with its marble fireplace and…
Best Radio Personality
At the stroke of midnight from Monday to Friday, KCOH jock Paris Eley spins part of an electrifying sermon from legendary Memphis Baptist preacher Jasper Williams. As his congregation shouts out words of agreement, the Reverend Williams dwells at length in stunning rhythmic cadence on the nature of midnight, saying…
Best Installation
What can you do with a flood-damaged bungalow? Mold remediation, schmold remediation. Turn some artists loose in it. Slumber House, organized by Poissant Gallery, transformed a decrepit, mildewed structure into an installation-art venue filled with work by ten artists. Jewel Baird Gleeson transformed the pink tile bathroom into the scene…
Best Traveling Show
Out of the mysterious variables of love came David Auburn’s Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning Proof, a play about familial love, genius and the terrible effects of madness on family. And for a brief two weeks Proof came to Houston, where it glowed at the Wortham Theater with a thousand…
Best Bureaucrat
Retiring Harris County elections supervisor Tony Sirvello, a veteran at the county for two decades and a favorite with media, oversaw the computerization of county election returns as well as the installation of a new computerized voting system to replace the much-maligned “hanging chad” punch ballots. He wanted to stay…
Best T-Shirt Made in Houston
The best T-shirt we saw all summer was “Purple What?” Targeting the Willy Wonka-esque theme of rapper Big Moe’s “Purple Stuff” video, it featured a purple Oompa Loompa pouring a cup of lean, or drank, or whatever the hell you wanna call it on the floor. On the back was…
Best Gay Bar
For all those tired of the scene, Meteor might well bring you back into the fold. This sleek joint off Fairview offers a fresh take on the neighborhood gay bar. It’s decked out in modern threads with neato ceiling fans and comfy oversize high-backed couches. The numerous TV sets around…
Best Calendar
Man, the battle for the title was a tough one. It came down to the wire between the Roxy calendar, which had its lucky den of calendar girls going full-monty this year, and the Barberdolls.com calendar, which had its ladies in exhibitionist Aguilera-esque outfits, coming up with new and inventive…
Hottest Foam in the Dome’s Home
It was a mixed crowd at Polly Esther’s Culture Club (6111 Richmond). Half were nattily dressed folks, dry as a martini, taking in the whole 1970s music-and-ambience thing. The other people were dressed in bikinis, T-shirts, shorts and other casual beach gear, occasionally covered head to toe in foam, walking…
Best Gay Bar
For all those tired of the scene, Meteor might well bring you back into the fold. This sleek joint off Fairview offers a fresh take on the neighborhood gay bar. It’s decked out in modern threads with neato ceiling fans and comfy oversize high-backed couches. The numerous TV sets around…
Best Calendar
Man, the battle for the title was a tough one. It came down to the wire between the Roxy calendar, which had its lucky den of calendar girls going full-monty this year, and the Barberdolls.com calendar, which had its ladies in exhibitionist Aguilera-esque outfits, coming up with new and inventive…
Best Effort to Inject Houston into Culture
Angie Day grew up in the Braeswood area of Houston and graduated in 1990 from St. Agnes Academy, the sister school to Strake Jesuit. She put her hometown to good use in her debut novel, The Way to Somewhere, published by Simon & Schuster this year. Day’s 18-year-old tomboy antagonist…
Best Belly Dancers
It’s Wednesday night and there’s nothing to do? We like to spend the midweek drinking a glass of wine or sipping a cup of coffee at Agora. It’s a dusky place with dark heavy furniture mixed with a few Greek artifacts here and there and hip magazines you won’t find…
Best Consumer Advocates
Some BBBs have standards that hardly go beyond mounting membership plaques correctly. And Houston has historically lagged behind more progressive areas in policing scam artists. But the current aggressive bureau has stepped in repeatedly to warn naive consumers about schemes and scams before they can be ripped off. The feat…
Best Bathroom for Bowser
Face it. Even the friskiest Fido eventually gets bored doing those leg lifts in the same old neighborhood spots. And the Great Dane becomes mundane when marking the same trees day in, day out. The leash, uh, least one can do is break the monotony with a pilgrimage to every…
Best Reason to Go Downtown
No, diversity isn’t the name of a bar or restaurant or nightclub or coffeehouse or loft or even theater or sports stadium. But it applies to them all and more. And that’s the ultimate attraction of a downtown that’s alive. With the central city’s growth (under those clouds of construction…
Best Flack
This former KTRH reporter left journalism and signed on to flack for legal giant Vinson & Elkins. He then took a sabbatical to help the Lee Brown mayoral campaign sweat out a narrow victory over Orlando Sanchez. Then he had the good sense to leave V&E just before the heat…
Best Traveling Show
Out of the mysterious variables of love came David Auburn’s Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning Proof, a play about familial love, genius and the terrible effects of madness on family. And for a brief two weeks Proof came to Houston, where it glowed at the Wortham Theater with a thousand…
Best Local Boy Made Good
After years of successfully defending local celebrity clients like QB Warren Moon (spousal abuse) and Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich (DWI), former Harris County prosecutor Rusty Hardin finally jumped to the major leagues with national coverage of his roles in the Anna Nicole Smith probate jamboree and the Arthur Andersen shredding…
Best Smoked Oysters
We’re willing to bet that Oysters Gilhooley are the best barbecued oysters on the entire Gulf Coast. The fresh-shucked oysters are topped with cheese and sauce and then smoked over a pecan-and-oak fire. The shells get partially blackened and the oysters pick up a strong smoky flavor while remaining juicy…
Best Cure for a Cold
Screw the NyQuil. When you’re sick, you need Jewish penicillin. We recommend Kenny & Ziggy’s Mish Mosh. Their matzo balls are light and fluffy. You can slice your spoon straight through these tasty dumplings. (That’s a sign they’re probably unhealthy; the only way to get really light and fluffy matzo…
Best Texas Stuff
Why buy your “How to Talk Texas” books, Houston skyline postcards and Lone Star flag barbecue aprons at some sterile mall when you can do so in the heart of the city, at the foot of the statue of Sam Houston himself? Those who say downtown is a vacuum for…
Best Shoe Store
It may be in the heart of River Oaks, but women from all over town know this is the place to buy those Sex in the City, midlife crisis, hot-date-tonight shoes. Divine Donald Pliners, gorgeous Goffredo Fantinis, majestic Mezlans and charming Charles Jordans, all to die for. Towering stilettos and…
Best Reason to Go to the Galleria
Nestled between Origins and Victoria’s Secret, Sephora is the Never-Never Land of beauty. Grab a basket for help-yourself makeup shopping. The first thing you encounter when you walk into the store is two walls of perfume, listed alphabetically. It’s daunting even to a product whore. The selection of makeup is…
Best Polish Restaurant
This cozy little restaurant a few blocks from Our Lady of Czestochowa, the Polish Catholic church, is the place to catch up on the doings of the Eastern European community over blintzes and tea. Be prepared for a long wait if you arrive during the post-church scene on Sunday afternoon…
Best Soul Food Restaurant
The brick floor, wood-paneled walls, fake hanging plants and stained-glass light fixtures hanging over every table make the dining room look like an expanded breakfast nook. Friends and neighbors gather here to linger over lunch and watch sports on the weekends. The easygoing atmosphere and friendly staff make Pearl’s our…
Best Cajun Restaurant
Real Cajun cooking comes from Cajun country. The southern populace of Louisiana refers to the north, including New Orleans, as Yankees. Don’t call this food Creole. Cajun and Creole are two different enigmas, sir, and we’re willing to come to blows over it. Creole has a tomato base. Cajun has…
Best Expense-Account Restaurant
There’s something magically peculiar about this space. It began as a church, then became the Dream Merchant, a freaky little clothing store. Now completely transformed into a restaurant, the former vestibule houses a dramatic, attractive wine cellar. The comfortably sedate furnishings flank a small glowing bar. But chef Mark Cox’s…
Best Brunch
Turtle soup, champagne and gospel music; it’s a heady combination on an early Sunday afternoon. You can’t help feeling like you’re in New Orleans when you walk in the front door, and Brennan’s plays the Crescent City card for all it’s worth. The Houston outpost of that legendary New Orleans…
Best Pre- or Post-Theater Restaurant
Legend has it that the word bistro comes from a Russian word for “quick,” or “hurry up!” How fitting that one of the best restaurants in the Theater District should be a bistro, since speedy service is exactly what theatergoers are looking for. The menu at Papillon features lots of…
Best Place to Bike
In a town as hot and biker-unfriendly as Houston, it seems almost pointless to purchase a two-wheeler. But once you check out this beautiful, highbrow Museum District neighborhood, you’ll be apt to change your mind. The wide-open, well-paved streets are practically covered with a roof of oak trees. Plus, if…
Best Place to Hike
It’s no easy task to get off the beaten path, when every trail in the Houston area has been beaten senselessly by the throngs. But the Big Thicket is waiting — and wild. It’s an hour or so drive from Houston, and worth every minute of it. Exit I-10 onto…
Best Shotgun Shack
4739 Buck RoadTucked at the end of Buck Road in the Fifth Ward is the oddest but coolest shotgun house in Texas. World-renowned Houston artist Bert Long, known to many for his massive public ice sculptures, lives there with his partner Joan Batson, a painter from Scotland. The house, rehabbed…
Best Olive Bar
Our favorite feature of the olive bar at Whole Foods is that samples are freely available, so it’s easy to try some new and exotic olives before you buy. Tucked away at the back of the store, near the cheese counter, the bar offers an excellent array of olives from…
Best Sangria
If you listen to KIKK FM, you’ve probably heard Jerry Jeff Walker’s “Sangria Wine” about 73 times. Sangria is most easily described as fruity trash-can punch. But it’s hard to find a place that puts real fruit in it, not to mention the difficulty in finding someone who doesn’t use…
Best Auto Mechanic
It’s mostly the employees of Fluor Enterprises who know about the affordable, honest wizardry of nearby Auto Tech, but it’s also open to the public at large. The original owner, Joe, and his knowledgeable staff could make even the most rickety engine purr like a kitten in no time. Before…
Best Jewelry
Call up this jewelry store and ask, “Where are you located?” and don’t be surprised if the person on the other end answers, “Houston, just between New Orleans and Austin.” Fly High Little Bunny is a goofy place, and not just because of its good-natured staff. There’s the bizarre but…
Best Cheese Selection
With a full-time cheese buyer who spends most of her time visiting local farms worldwide, a full-time department head, and a full-time cheesemonger who may spend 15 to 20 minutes with a customer helping him match up the perfect cheese-and-wine combination, it’s easy to see how Central Market manages to…
Best Place to Hang Out with High Schoolers
Directly across the street from Lamar High School is the place to find out what the kids are wearing, what they’re listening to and what’s cool. Rid your mind of all of the negative press about teenagers these days, and go hang out at 31 Flavors. You’ll meet friendly, open,…
Best Masseur
Bob Lemmon’s massage room is a magical mini-oasis. There are fountains, mystical music, candles, incense and Bob. Bob is the best part. This man’s hands will drain every ounce of stress out of any body. His regimen includes oils, hot rocks, soothing lavender lotion, even warm water poured over your…
Best Actress
Consummate actress Anne Quackenbush often gets the short end of the stick when it comes to casting. The sweet-faced woman is often cast as the goofball, the loser or the whiny plain Jane. What’s even harder, Quackenbush so deeply inhabits these quirky characters that it’s sometimes too easy to overlook…
Best Lecture Series
Behind every great man there’s a great woman, right? Well, forget the first part, and you’ve got the idea behind the fascinating lecture series that is Unique Lives & Experiences. This forum provides its audience with an intimate look at the personal tragedies and triumphs of its famous female speakers…
Best Show to Make You Think
The Alley Theatre’s November production of Yasmina Reza’s Art sparkled with smart ideas about art, modern lifestyles and our passion for everything “fashionable.” Reza’s flawless script gleefully deconstructs all the folly in our pathetically solipsistic world, including homeopathic medicine, psychotherapy and ridiculously high-priced paintings — the one in the Alley’s…
Best Champion of the Underdog
Brenda Flynn Flores, an Arkansas-born mother of ten, is the electronic bullhorn for a group of municipal workers who call themselves “The Silent Voice.” Since HOUSNITCH’s founding three years ago, hundreds of would-be whistle-blowers have found a forum to vent their grievances — and internal documents — for all to…
Best Reason to Go Downtown
No, diversity isn’t the name of a bar or restaurant or nightclub or coffeehouse or loft or even theater or sports stadium. But it applies to them all and more. And that’s the ultimate attraction of a downtown that’s alive. With the central city’s growth (under those clouds of construction…
Best Lesbian Tejano Bar
Didn’t know there’s a lesbian Tejano bar in town? Tight niche. Mela’s has been filling that niche free of competition since 1980, back when few folks were comfortable with the thought of lesbianism and fewer were familiar with the word Tejano. Owner Herlinda “Mela” Contreras, 55, was born and raised…
Best Ballet
Who will be the next artistic director of Houston Ballet? No one knows for sure, but choreographer Trey McIntyre certainly garnered a lot of ballet-world buzz with this year’s world premiere of his Peter Pan. Unlike most story ballets, in which mime-acting propels a thin plot between big dance numbers,…
Ann Savoy and Others
Fans of genuine Cajun music might have cringed to hear of this particular compilation. After all, it features singing — en français, mind you — by established pop and rock music industry insiders, all of whom are clearly outsiders to the distinctive culture of Acadiana. We’re talking a star-glazed roster…
Best Lesbian Tejano Bar
Didn’t know there’s a lesbian Tejano bar in town? Tight niche. Mela’s has been filling that niche free of competition since 1980, back when few folks were comfortable with the thought of lesbianism and fewer were familiar with the word Tejano. Owner Herlinda “Mela” Contreras, 55, was born and raised…
Best Ballet
Who will be the next artistic director of Houston Ballet? No one knows for sure, but choreographer Trey McIntyre certainly garnered a lot of ballet-world buzz with this year’s world premiere of his Peter Pan. Unlike most story ballets, in which mime-acting propels a thin plot between big dance numbers,…
Best DJ We’ll Miss
DJs come and go in this town. Sometimes they pack it in and move on to greener pastures. Or occasionally they just give up the life altogether. Just recently, Sista Stroke (or Oktober Davila, or whatever alias you might know her by) said farewell to Houston and fled to the…
Best Kids’ Theater Camp
Most every family’s got one wannabe star stomping through the house. A great place to put that special child who’s hogging all the attention is a drama class at Main Street Theater. There, your kid can learn everything from hip-hop to Shakespeare. The classes run year-round, but the summer camp…
Best Nonprofit Organization
At a time when most organizations are paring down, Big Brothers Big Sisters is pouring it on. Under the guidance of president Deborah Ortiz, Houston-based BBBS has expanded into an incredible 31 counties that stretch from the Gulf Coast upward into East Texas. The organization manages to be dead serious…
Best Secret
The legend is so old that some of the current students don’t even know the sordid past of their school’s basketball court. But we do. The High School for Performing and Visual Arts is located in the older section of the Montrose that used to be all houses. Legend has…
Best Place for a First Date
It took you three weeks, but you finally worked up the nerve to ask for his number, that sexy hunk at the gym. And you were thinking the hard part was over. But wait! You still have to woo him with your natty clothes, wow him with your classy ride…
Best Fried Chicken
They fry your chicken to order at Henderson’s Chicken Shack. It takes about 20 minutes. Henderson’s isn’t a franchise or a chain. It’s owned by a Creole woman named Ann Henderson, who was born in New Iberia, Louisiana. Cooking the chicken to order seems like a nuisance when you’re waiting,…
Best Show to Make You Think
The Alley Theatre’s November production of Yasmina Reza’s Art sparkled with smart ideas about art, modern lifestyles and our passion for everything “fashionable.” Reza’s flawless script gleefully deconstructs all the folly in our pathetically solipsistic world, including homeopathic medicine, psychotherapy and ridiculously high-priced paintings — the one in the Alley’s…
Best Polling Place
God bless that American tradition of elections — those august times when the populace flows into frayed schoolhouse hallways or churches or even humble homes or garages to exercise their voting rights. But the downtown crowd, at least the Republicans, got a better deal on this democratic notion in the…
Best Stuffed Mushrooms
And on the eighth day, God created Istanbul Grill’s stuffed mushrooms. Yes, they really are that good. The popular Turkish restaurant in the Rice Village is known for a lot of great dishes, but it’s the stuffed mushroom appetizer that is an absolute must-have. The dish comes with four medium-sized…
Best Comic Book Store
For a comic-book novice — and by that we mean someone who has a few books in their collection, as opposed to 20 to 30 boxes filled with intricately filed volumes — it must be a burden going to a comic-book store these days. Clerks and employees who work at…
Best DVD Selection
It took a while for the folks at this proudly independent music and video store to get a DVD rental section going, even after bigwig video chains Blockbuster and Hollywood beat ’em to the punch. But once they did, theirs turned out to be the definitive DVD section for die-hard…
Best Sole Revival
It’s a delicate business, salvaging footwear that costs as much as a used Honda, but Barry and Ellen Croft handle the art of shoe repair with an aw-shucks mirth that cuts through the pomp of Prada. Barry, who started Shoe Savers years ago, has become the official cobbler for Inner…
Best Galleria Alternative
If your goal is to experience the luxury and selection of the Galleria but to avoid the insane parking and crowds, then check out Highland Village. All of the staples are there: the Gap, Banana Republic, Victoria’s Secret and, of course, Starbucks. But the area also includes fine apparel stores…
Best Salvadoran Restaurant
Why would a Salvadoran restaurant choose a name like Super La Mexicana? Well, it didn’t really. This part-convenience store part-luncheonette already had that name when the current proprietors bought it. The new owners decided it was too expensive to change the signage, so they just changed the menu instead. Now…
Best Steak House
Palm on Westheimer (the cognoscenti don’t say “the”) has a lot of special memories for Houstonians. When it opened in 1977, it epitomized the “anything goes” spirit of the oil boom. And it’s still a boisterous joint with big steaks, big Bordeaux and few inhibitions. The Houston restaurant’s walls are…
Best Chinese Restaurant
Unlike so many outstanding Asian restaurants, which are dotted across the Bellaire archipelago, this one has been hiding right inside the Loop. It’s an upscale Hong Kong-style seafood restaurant where large groups of Asians sit at big round tables with lazy Susans in the middle. There are so many fascinating-looking…
Best Socioanthropological Study
Come for the cheap and excellent food, but come back for the bizarre mix of Heights yuppies, ethnic groups, gay couples and long-haul trucker types that populate this second location, the first one being the much smaller version on Irvington. With the Aztec mural on the wall, the Mexican soaps…
Best Burger Joint
The junk-store decor of this waterside burger bar draws an odd mix of bikers and moms with toddlers. Seabrook is a scenic drive down Highway 146, past the majestic bayside refineries whose smokestacks stand as straight and tall as palm trees. You forget all about alfalfa sprouts and textured tofu…
Best Place to Pig Out
This Brazilian meat eater’s paradise includes a 40-foot all-you-can-eat salad buffet with such exotic fare as quail eggs, crab salad and feijoada, a mixture of black beans and rice along with thinly sliced meats and collard greens. Choose only the salad bar for $17.99 or go for the complete buffet…
Best Place to Play Racquetball
Being locked in a cell with a bouncing blue projectile hurtling toward your head isn’t everyone’s idea of a good time. But we happen to love racquetball. And at Northwest Fitness and Sports Club, racquetball is the main attraction. The club offers ten courts, including the preferable windowless closed courts…
Best Place to Bike
In a town as hot and biker-unfriendly as Houston, it seems almost pointless to purchase a two-wheeler. But once you check out this beautiful, highbrow Museum District neighborhood, you’ll be apt to change your mind. The wide-open, well-paved streets are practically covered with a roof of oak trees. Plus, if…
Best Company to Work For
As the fall TV season approaches, the ultimate worth of Houston Medical remains under debate. But one thing is certain: The media has picked up on our Med Center excellence. Case in point: Fortune magazine, that bastion of biz lists, heralded St. Luke’s Episcopal Health System as one of the…
Best Smoked Fish
The counter men wear New York Fire Department gimme caps and talk with that unmistakable Big Apple accent. The menu hanging on the wall behind the counter includes a Yiddish glossary, just in case you’re wondering about authenticity. Yes, these guys are genuine meshuga New Yorkers, and the big doughy,…
Best Cabrito
When you walk in the front door of this place, the aroma of goat smacks you in the nose. Or is it mutton? Chivito asado al pastor (spit-roasted goat) and barbacoa de borrego estilo Hidalgo (Hidalgo-style lamb slow-cooked in maguey leaves) are two of the restaurant’s specialties; if it’s Friday…
Best Hardware Store
Many hardware stores are so enormous, they’re more of a hindrance than a help. Who wants to hike two miles to find a one-and-a-half-inch beveled polywasher for the kitchen sink, then another mile searching for one-eighth-inch mirror brackets? Then there’s the attitude. Unlike contractors, we usually don’t know what we’re…
Best Fish Market
Sure, it’s the largest retailer of crunchy stuff, but there’s more to Whole Foods than bulk granola and Gardenburgers. For example, it’s also the best place to snag a live lobster, a tuna steak or wild salmon. The tattooed guys behind the counter are friendly and knowledgeable. They know their…
Best Place to Buy an Engagement Ring
Eleanor Roosevelt’s solitaire came from Tiffany’s; Dennis Oppenheim created a sculpture in New York based on their engagement ring designs; George Peppard had a plastic ring from a box of Cracker Jack engraved by them in the classic Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Since 1837, these experts have been dealing in rings…
Best Trophy Room
Okay, it’s not really a room, per se, but the huge trophy case next to the front entrance of this old school holds bizarre and fascinating pieces of Houston memorabilia. Track-and-field trophies from the ’20s sit alongside photographs of generations of local junior-highers with funny haircuts who brought home the…
Best Bed-and-Breakfast
This amazing old structure, built in 1898, is lovingly restored and chock-full of Victorian charm. Yes, it’s a little foofy; don’t check in if your idea of luxury is the downtown Hyatt. This luxury is of a different, softer sort. Stroll over (yes, you can stroll in Houston) to one…
Best Effort to Inject Houston into Culture
Angie Day grew up in the Braeswood area of Houston and graduated in 1990 from St. Agnes Academy, the sister school to Strake Jesuit. She put her hometown to good use in her debut novel, The Way to Somewhere, published by Simon & Schuster this year. Day’s 18-year-old tomboy antagonist…
Best Belly Dancers
It’s Wednesday night and there’s nothing to do? We like to spend the midweek drinking a glass of wine or sipping a cup of coffee at Agora. It’s a dusky place with dark heavy furniture mixed with a few Greek artifacts here and there and hip magazines you won’t find…
Best Tea Time
When the artist Weihong attended openings for her gallery shows, she noticed that patrons seemed more interested in the philosophy behind her work than the actual art. So she put together an interactive show where people could sit down and discuss Chinese philosophy with her over tea. The gallery was…
Best Whistle-Blower
The beauty of Houston, in a perverted way, is the wealth of opportunities for individuals to rise up amid corruption and misconduct and take their moral stand, consequences be damned. Just in the last year, there was the implosion of Enron, the callous cunning of Arthur Andersen and the market…
Best Place for a First Date
It took you three weeks, but you finally worked up the nerve to ask for his number, that sexy hunk at the gym. And you were thinking the hard part was over. But wait! You still have to woo him with your natty clothes, wow him with your classy ride…
Best Jukebox
Not many jukes can take the pressure of having their own theme night, but Tom McLendon’s Big Easy box can. Every Monday, he turns off the coin slot and customers have free rein to play all the Lightnin’ Hopkins, Ray Charles, Neville Brothers and George (both Porter and Jones) they…
Best Dance Club
Among the many downtown clubs, one stands above the rest. From one night to the next, you’ll be mesmerized by the diverse vibes at Lotus Lounge. Tuesday nights bring “Soulphilia,” where your senses are tantalized by everything from live bands and DJs to performance artists, henna tattooing and massage therapy…
Dodd Michael Lede
When you get your first look at the cover art for Dodd Michael Lede’s Whatever Happened to You, electronica immediately comes to mind. What other genre of music would have a photograph of a man painted fluorescent, Linda Blair-puke green sitting in the middle of a city sidewalk? Surprise, surprise!…
Best Jukebox
Not many jukes can take the pressure of having their own theme night, but Tom McLendon’s Big Easy box can. Every Monday, he turns off the coin slot and customers have free rein to play all the Lightnin’ Hopkins, Ray Charles, Neville Brothers and George (both Porter and Jones) they…
Best Dance Club
Among the many downtown clubs, one stands above the rest. From one night to the next, you’ll be mesmerized by the diverse vibes at Lotus Lounge. Tuesday nights bring “Soulphilia,” where your senses are tantalized by everything from live bands and DJs to performance artists, henna tattooing and massage therapy…
Best Set
Swanky, cool and utterly gorgeous, Andrew Jackness’s set for the Alley Theatre’s fall production of Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning Art was an example of visual minimalism at its two-toned best. The large elegantly blank rooms of the set were framed with towering cream-colored walls topped with enormous curving crown moldings. Furnished…
Best Bureaucrat
Retiring Harris County elections supervisor Tony Sirvello, a veteran at the county for two decades and a favorite with media, oversaw the computerization of county election returns as well as the installation of a new computerized voting system to replace the much-maligned “hanging chad” punch ballots. He wanted to stay…
Best Local Girl Made Good
Although she’s technically not a whistle-blower, Enron executive Sherron Watkins’s memo to Ken Lay warning him of the coming catastrophe last fall made her the Cassandra of the biggest business scandal ever to hit the city. Watkins managed to stay on the Enron payroll while becoming a national hero through…
Best Hidden Neighborhood
While driving through the maddening traffic of West Gray from Waugh to Montrose, take a turn down Van Buren. What you will find is an enchanting little neighborhood, filled with duplexes, fourplexes, gingerbread houses and pink stucco homes that would fit in well in Bermuda. The residents are mostly young…
Best Place to Take Out-of-Towners
With its gleaming silver spindles, strips of barbed wire surrounding the front door and a big red “look over here” star affixed to its roof, the Art Car Museum is hardly the staid sort of building that pops into one’s mind at the mention of the word museum. But its…
Best Asian/Cajun Crawfish
Cajun Corner sells boiled Cajun-style crawfish all year round in its Vietnamese neighborhood. Gulf Coast Vietnamese-Americans are wild about Cajun-style boiled crawfish — the spicier the better. There’s a condiment bar where patrons stir up insanely hot dipping sauces made out of pure cayenne powder with a dash of ketchup…
Best Tea Time
When the artist Weihong attended openings for her gallery shows, she noticed that patrons seemed more interested in the philosophy behind her work than the actual art. So she put together an interactive show where people could sit down and discuss Chinese philosophy with her over tea. The gallery was…
Best Politician
East End native Carol Alvarado has been crusading for other people’s municipal campaigns ever since she could walk, and last fall she finally won her own place on Houston City Council. The former aide to Mayor Lee Brown weathered an acrimonious contest against two opponents to win the District I…
Best Place to Drink Guinness
With an outdoor walk-up bar, you don’t even have to go inside to quench your thirst at our new favorite pub in the Village. You can sit on a stool outside and have a pint and watch passersby. Even inside, the place has an outdoor feel — the place doesn’t…
Best Designer
Houstonian Chloé Dao spent eight years in New York City, including a stint at the Fashion Institute of Technology. Now she’s brought her talents home. She and sister Kim opened Lot 8 in the Rice Village at 6127 Kirby Drive two years ago, specializing in off-the-rack trendy clothes and local…
Best Anime Purveyors
Houston, Texas, a portal city for Japanese anime? Yes, thanks to forward-thinking ADV founders John Ledford and Matt Greenfield. For the uninitiated, anime is Japanese animation for adults, too, not just kids. It’s extremely popular in its home country and increasingly so all over the world. Recently spotted at the…
Best Laundromat
Maybe it’s the goofy messages posted on the sign (“We Make Good Scents,” for example). Or perhaps it’s the odd collection of celebrities painted on the front of the building (David Letterman, Tom Hanks, Jerry Seinfeld and Roseanne — you figure it out). Maybe it’s the cheesy rock stations permanently…
Best Chiropractor
The beautiful people stroll regularly through Kenneth Lester’s door, perhaps because of his reputation, perhaps because of his location, in the Page Parkes building in River Oaks. But while Lester is appropriately fabulous, there is substance to his style. For years the med student-turned-triathlete-turned-chiropractor has been breaking his back to…
Best Barbecue
Look for the little red house in the crusty Third Ward neighborhood east of the George R. Brown Convention Center. You have to pass through a screened-in porch with a dilapidated sofa and a pile of broken chairs to reach the entrance proper. Inside, there’s a cozy little dining room…
Best Sushi Bar
Chef Kubo (short for Hajime Kubokawa) made this the best sushi bar in Houston. But Kubo doesn’t work here anymore. Luckily, Hori (short for Manubu Horiuchi), the new head chef at Kubo’s and Kubokawa’s former second-in-command, is extremely talented in his own right. If you have any doubts, sit at…
Best Creole Restaurant
The fact that there are always people standing in line at Frenchy’s guarantees that every piece of chicken you get has just come out of the fryer. But Frenchy’s is more than a chicken shack. Since 1969, Percy Creuzot has turned out the tastiest greens, the most satisfying andouille-studded red…
Best Atmosphere
Whatever its name, The Fish (formerly known as Blowfish) is exceptionally titillating. It’s identified on the outside solely by the abstract image of a spiny puffer fish. And on the inside, the color scheme is repeated in everything from the waitstaff’s red ties and black shirts to the black napkins…
Best Cuban Restaurant
A vertical arrangement of tropical fruit in a basket on the gleaming white bar looks like Carmen Miranda’s hat. The bartender borrows from the overflow of pineapples, bananas and assorted tropical fruits to make smoothies. Meanwhile, the barista cranks out tiny cups of Cuban coffee. Cuban food lovers from all…
Best Theme Restaurant
With its rattan furniture and mounted trophy fish, the bar at this “Floribbean” restaurant is one of the most colorful in the city. In fact, the Floridita restaurant on Kirby takes its name from the El Floridita bar in Havana, Cuba, where Ernest “Papa” Hemingway drank. Try a Papa Doble,…
Best Rocket
Is it the hair? USA Today published an article that focused on Mooch’s braids. Nah, can’t be the hair. Moochie is a truly creative player. He slashes, he dashes, and most important, he gets in those just-in-the-nick-of-time shots. In his three years with the Rockets, the six-foot-one, 175-pound Norris has…
Best Place to Play Racquetball
Being locked in a cell with a bouncing blue projectile hurtling toward your head isn’t everyone’s idea of a good time. But we happen to love racquetball. And at Northwest Fitness and Sports Club, racquetball is the main attraction. The club offers ten courts, including the preferable windowless closed courts…
Best Place to People-Watch
Usually the animals aren’t up to much. Anybody ever seen one of those gators so much as blink? Some time back, it was even revealed that one of the snakes in the reptile house was made of rubber, and nobody cottoned on for more than a year. Far more fascinating…
Best Salsa
Is there smack in this salsa? No, of course not. But the addictive quality of El Pueblito’s version of the condiment will make you wonder. At this Guatemalan/Mexican restaurant, owned by Eduardo and Monica Lopez, the salsa is more than just something to dip the chips in while waiting for…
Best Cheeseburger
Watch out! The innocent-looking paper-wrapped package they hand you when you ask for a cheeseburger at Adrian’s is actually a delicious mess waiting to happen. The giant hand-formed meat patty is topped with a sloppy mountain of lettuce, tomatoes, onion and pickles. The burgers are fried to order, so they’re…
Best Car Wash
Your ride’s looking a little shabby. It wants to get spruced up and feel pretty. But you’re particular about what touches your car. You’re not keen on some automated gas station drive-thru scratching the gloss on your ClearCoat. And who knows where those frazzled brushes at the coin-operated self-wash places…
Best Farmers Market
Don’t let yourself be overly distracted by the incredibly good selection of produce, vinegars and bulk beans. The real bargains are way in the back, where the growers have the discount stuff fresh off the trucks. Get red peppers for a buck a pound, jalapeños for pennies, and some really…
Best Drag Queen
Drag. Some have attempted to explain the source of the word as Shakespearean. Bard Willie would often leave the costume directions “dressed as girl” in his scripts. Others say it’s a reference to cross-dressing actors’ long frocks dragging across the stage. The roots of the word (bleached, highlighted, tinted or…
Best Place for a Kid’s Birthday Party
As the song goes, “Ain’t nothin’ like the real thing.” If you’re doing a dino-party, you really can’t beat the ambience of celebrating amid actual dinosaurs. Consider the price regularly paid to set up moonwalks and hire magicians and hungover clowns. Then consider cleaning it all up off a suburban…
Best Reason to Go to the Galleria
Nestled between Origins and Victoria’s Secret, Sephora is the Never-Never Land of beauty. Grab a basket for help-yourself makeup shopping. The first thing you encounter when you walk into the store is two walls of perfume, listed alphabetically. It’s daunting even to a product whore. The selection of makeup is…
Best DJ We’ll Miss
DJs come and go in this town. Sometimes they pack it in and move on to greener pastures. Or occasionally they just give up the life altogether. Just recently, Sista Stroke (or Oktober Davila, or whatever alias you might know her by) said farewell to Houston and fled to the…
Best Kids’ Theater Camp
Most every family’s got one wannabe star stomping through the house. A great place to put that special child who’s hogging all the attention is a drama class at Main Street Theater. There, your kid can learn everything from hip-hop to Shakespeare. The classes run year-round, but the summer camp…
Best Jazz Club
Yes, we find it curious that they serve breakfast, but hey, why complain about a place that brings Houston live jazz in an upscale setting six nights a week? We’ve felt nothing but good vibes from the high beamed ceilings, comfortable bar and live music that spills out onto the…
Best Activist
Bob “Alwalee” Lee proclaims himself “Da Mayor of Fifth Ward.” This retired social worker is already a legend in his northeast Houston community for his person-to-person efforts to help the disabled and elderly. And he’s backed by a prime political connection. His brother is none other than Harris County Commissioner…
Best Place to Take Out-of-Towners
With its gleaming silver spindles, strips of barbed wire surrounding the front door and a big red “look over here” star affixed to its roof, the Art Car Museum is hardly the staid sort of building that pops into one’s mind at the mention of the word museum. But its…
Best Bar for Kids
Tack an extra digit onto your SAT scores. Valhalla is a grad student-run bar tucked into a corner of the old chemistry building on Rice’s abundantly treed campus (look for the red arched door). Even without the verdant surroundings, Valhalla’s ridiculously cheap 75-cent beer is a sufficient lure for anyone…
Best Open-Mike Comedy
Many nationally touring headliners agree: Houston’s comedy scene is prodigious. On Mondays, the Laff Stop is the place where local comedians gather to work on their craft. You’ll see the whole range, from nervous wannabes reading from notebooks to seasoned professionals trying out new material. They’re five minutes apiece, so…
Jaheim
Remember when R&B singers looked like R&B singers? They had the glitter jackets, the combination perm/Jheri Curl thing, and they did that shit with their hands to make it look like rain was pouring down in front of their faces. Yes, sir, R&B singers were smooth-ass bons vivants back in…
Best Bar for Kids
Tack an extra digit onto your SAT scores. Valhalla is a grad student-run bar tucked into a corner of the old chemistry building on Rice’s abundantly treed campus (look for the red arched door). Even without the verdant surroundings, Valhalla’s ridiculously cheap 75-cent beer is a sufficient lure for anyone…
Best Open-Mike Comedy
Many nationally touring headliners agree: Houston’s comedy scene is prodigious. On Mondays, the Laff Stop is the place where local comedians gather to work on their craft. You’ll see the whole range, from nervous wannabes reading from notebooks to seasoned professionals trying out new material. They’re five minutes apiece, so…
Best Vintage Sounds
When the dispiriting present is too much with you, set your Packard’s radio dial to Star 790, KBME. That’s AM, of course. KBME (“BME” stands for best music ever) exists in a time warp before FM ruled the airwaves, in the American past somewhere between the Great War and the…
Best Champion of the Underdog
Brenda Flynn Flores, an Arkansas-born mother of ten, is the electronic bullhorn for a group of municipal workers who call themselves “The Silent Voice.” Since HOUSNITCH’s founding three years ago, hundreds of would-be whistle-blowers have found a forum to vent their grievances — and internal documents — for all to…
Best Criminal Judge
Republican Lynn Hughes hardly blinked when he advanced from his state district court (a civil one, no less) to the federal bench some 12 years ago. That characteristic aplomb has yet to be erased by some of the most demanding cases at the federal courthouse. He’s coupled a healthy disdain…
Best Lost Landmark
It was a place for sipping fruity cocktails from the thatched-roof bar by the pool, partying with the band after a great downtown gig, spotting Bill Murray during the filming of Rushmore, watching the fireworks over the bayou on the Fourth of July, getting away from the usual Montrose haunts…
Best Bathroom Graffiti
“Do you remember when I was an elephant? The elephant is always here!” It’s a familiar set of phrases for any woman who has used the facilities on Rudyard’s first floor. (For the uninitiated, the elephant is the coat hook on the back of the bathroom door, with ears and…
Best Bagels
They’re large, always warm and have just the right balance of firmness, chewiness and doughiness. The bagels at Manhattan Bagels run golden-brown rings around the others. More than 20 different varieties are always available, including all of the standards, plus rye, whole wheat, egg, jalapeo, spinach, cinnamon and raisin, cranberry…
Best Jazz Club
Yes, we find it curious that they serve breakfast, but hey, why complain about a place that brings Houston live jazz in an upscale setting six nights a week? We’ve felt nothing but good vibes from the high beamed ceilings, comfortable bar and live music that spills out onto the…
Best Republican
Kyle Janek, a West U anesthesiologist, knocked off former GOP county chair Gary Polland by a decisive 66-34 percent margin in the spring primary for State Senate District 17, effectively putting to sleep Polland’s incipient political career. Janek also may have ended Polland’s reign as political payout king of the…
Best Use of Eggplant
The eggplant is a fine-looking fruit (yes, technically it’s a fruit). It’s big and round and dressed up in royal purple. But let’s admit it, most of us are at a loss as to what to do with it in the kitchen. So why not leave that task up to…
Best Tailor
With Ann’s help, you can buy off the rack and look like you’re wearing a designer original. You walk in, step behind the green velvet curtain, take off your clothes and try on the outfit you like. Then she measures and pins and makes it so that your horrible oversized…
Best Adult Videos
We’ve all seen those boring, windowless wooden shacks on the side of the freeway with such original names as Adult MegaPlexxx. And if it’s just porn you want, then those places are probably your best bet. But what if you’re itching to grab a copy of High Society magazine and,…
Best Accordion Teacher
Susan Jackson has one of those high-beam smiles that could blind you if it didn’t make you feel so good inside. That’s part of her power as a music teacher. There’s also something about her tiny attic studio that makes you feel really, well, arty. It’s filled with instruments, because…
Best Electrolysis Practioner
Those Aussies who make Nads are big dirty liars. No, Crocodile Dundee, we do not like putting Nads on our face, our hairy back, or anywhere. It hurts. Dear Lord, it hurts. That’s why we turn to electrolysis’s technologically advanced younger sister, laser hair removal, and to the bedside manner…
Best Soul Food Restaurant
The brick floor, wood-paneled walls, fake hanging plants and stained-glass light fixtures hanging over every table make the dining room look like an expanded breakfast nook. Friends and neighbors gather here to linger over lunch and watch sports on the weekends. The easygoing atmosphere and friendly staff make Pearl’s our…
Best Thai Restaurant
Recently reopened under new “old” management, Bangkok Place continues to churn out top notch Thai food. At $6.95, for both the lunch and dinner buffets, it’s one of the best values in town. Starters include two different soups (tom yam or sweet-and-sour), pad kee mao or clear noodle salad, fresh…
Best Deli
When the original owners of Nielsen’s first came to Houston from Denmark, they tried to sell the famous Danish open-faced sandwiches called smorrebrod. But customers didn’t know how to eat the messy sandwiches (Danes use a fork and knife) and the health department wouldn’t let them be displayed without some…
Best Place to See Bambi
Living in the sweltering silver city, there are few places where you can get in touch with your inner Daniel Boone. But just outside of town, before you get to the ocean, there’s a place where you can pretend you’re going over the river and through the woods to Grandmother’s…
Best Cajun Restaurant
Real Cajun cooking comes from Cajun country. The southern populace of Louisiana refers to the north, including New Orleans, as Yankees. Don’t call this food Creole. Cajun and Creole are two different enigmas, sir, and we’re willing to come to blows over it. Creole has a tomato base. Cajun has…
Best Expense-Account Restaurant
There’s something magically peculiar about this space. It began as a church, then became the Dream Merchant, a freaky little clothing store. Now completely transformed into a restaurant, the former vestibule houses a dramatic, attractive wine cellar. The comfortably sedate furnishings flank a small glowing bar. But chef Mark Cox’s…
Best Park
The great explorer Christopher Columbus stands at one end of the park, pointing to the Italian Cultural and Community Center. Nonetheless, this respite from the noise and traffic of the Museum District, this diminutive stretch of trees and grass, remains undiscovered (or at least unnoticed) by many Inner Loopers. Not…
Best Rocket
Is it the hair? USA Today published an article that focused on Mooch’s braids. Nah, can’t be the hair. Moochie is a truly creative player. He slashes, he dashes, and most important, he gets in those just-in-the-nick-of-time shots. In his three years with the Rockets, the six-foot-one, 175-pound Norris has…
Best Roadside Memorial
Hit the southern tip of the Piney Woods of East Texas and turn the car north through the town of Kountze. As the Sonic and the Dairy Queen dissolve in the rearview mirror, the highway takes on a rural tone. And just beyond the city limits, the humble shrine shows…
Best Salad
The lunch salad with scallops, listed on the menu as “pancetta-wrapped Maine diver scallops, warm salad of watercress, jicama and wild mushrooms,” tastes as big as its name. First you notice the scallops: three big fat ones, wrapped in pancetta, and the salty Italian bacon pairs beautifully with the sweet…
Best Chicken-Fried Steak
Smaller than a hubcap but bigger than your face, the chicken-fried steak at Rio Ranch is actually a thin-cut sirloin steak that has been dipped in buttermilk, hand-dredged in seasoned flour and fried until it’s crispier than Grandma’s chicken wings. It’s served atop a large pile of steaming mashed potatoes…
Best Place to Get a Car Wash, a Haircut and a Brisket
Imagine: An angry ex has poured garbage all over your new sports car. You haven’t slept for months, and your hair has become a bit unruly. What’s more, you’re hungry, dammit. Well, have we got the place for you. It goes by many names. Call it Pop’s Exquisite Bar-B-Q, where…
Best Camera Store
A visit to the Houston Camera Exchange is kind of like those commercials for Circuit City, where the technophile runs through the store in ecstasy. On a recent visit to the place, we intended to duck in quickly and check out the selection of books on black-and-white photography. But plans…
Best Local TV News Anchor
Gina Gaston tried for the big time, leaving Houston three years ago to take a job with MSNBC in New York, and ended up coming back last year. Given how few people tune in to MSNBC these days, she probably got out while the getting was good. At any rate,…
Best Kids’ Thrill
The Nutcracker ballet matinee performance just before Christmas is kid central. Any fidgeting, screaming, crying or other nontraditional theater behavior by your offspring will disturb only the other, already harried, parents. Afterward, take them backstage to meet the dancers. All are welcome. A six-year-old we know got her ballet shoes…
Best Galleria Alternative
If your goal is to experience the luxury and selection of the Galleria but to avoid the insane parking and crowds, then check out Highland Village. All of the staples are there: the Gap, Banana Republic, Victoria’s Secret and, of course, Starbucks. But the area also includes fine apparel stores…
Best Set
Swanky, cool and utterly gorgeous, Andrew Jackness’s set for the Alley Theatre’s fall production of Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning Art was an example of visual minimalism at its two-toned best. The large elegantly blank rooms of the set were framed with towering cream-colored walls topped with enormous curving crown moldings. Furnished…
Best Artist
Sad and Pissed, Rachel Hecker’s standout show at Texas Gallery, turned a relationship gone wrong into a powerful, poignant and witty body of work starring Hello Kitty spin-off characters. The show was punctuated by “explosion” paintings that riffed on Batman fight scene graphics, with “OOF!” and “POW!” replaced by succinct…
Best Graffiti
Graffito. Most people don’t recognize the word, the singular form of graffiti. Even fewer recognize the vernacular term, graf. However, many a Montrose pedestrian or driver recognizes the dour face of Chicken Boy, whether they know the name or not. Wooden cutouts of the cartoony yellow-faced guy with a red…
Best Fetishist
Most fixations require cross-dressing midgets, trailer-park love triangles or an element of Satan worship to be worthy of the tabloid TV circuit. But the odd obsession of this industrial filmmaker is a touchy-feely affair. Yaqi, who derives his name from Carlos Castaneda’s Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of…
Best Bathroom Graffiti
“Do you remember when I was an elephant? The elephant is always here!” It’s a familiar set of phrases for any woman who has used the facilities on Rudyard’s first floor. (For the uninitiated, the elephant is the coat hook on the back of the bathroom door, with ears and…
Best Bartender
Chris Wolfe has been at the original Berryhill Hot Tamales for the last four and a half years. New patrons hear his singsong “Hi, I’m Chris, what can I get you?” then are amazed as the sandy-haired, all-American boy rattles off instructions in Spanish to the kitchen staff while filling…
Best Underground Movie Theater
In the past, the Rice Cinema has flown under the public’s radar, yet has been responsible for lining up some of the most innovative selections around. In addition to many collaborations with the Museum of Fine Arts and other theaters on such projects as the Latin American Film Festival and…
