Phaedra Cook is eating her way through Houston and counting down her 100 favorite dishes of 2015. It's a collection of personal favorites that is also indicative of Houston dining. It's a scene where a vast range of dishes coexist: highbrow and lowbrow; local and international; cheap and expensive; modern cuisine and beloved tenets — and everything in between.
One of the many things that Hugo’s does a great job with is accommodating vegetarian diners. The restaurant even has a dedicated vegetarian menu. However, almost anyone will love the plato de vegetales, or vegetarian plate.
It’s a $15 smorgasbord of flavors and textures. There’s soft, creamy corn pudding, hearty quinoa strewn through with cubed zucchini, a stuffed ancho pepper, asparagus spears, pureed sweet potatoes and roasted mushrooms with peppers in soft blue corn tortillas. There's often a seasonal vegetable as well, and on our visit, halved, seared Brussels sprouts served in that role.
There's also a neat, circular pile of nopales, or the cooked leaves of the nopal cactus plant. They have an okra-like stickiness that people either love or hate, but the lightly tart flavor is the payoff.
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