Cafe Piquet, a Cuban restaurant located at 5757 Bissonnet St., is one of 30 area restaurants participating in the Houston part of 2021 Latin Restaurants Week which runs from June 1 to June 14.
Courtesy Cafe Piquet
Alturas Mexican Cafe will serve coffees, chilaquiles, enchiladas and a Mexican hamburger.
Erik Navarro
The Mexican Cheddar Burger shown at Vida, 4224 San Felipe, Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2012, in Houston. ( Melissa Phillip / Houston Chronicle )
Melissa Phillip/Houston Chronicle
Houston’s food is one of the best things about this place, and we celebrate it every year during Houston Restaurant Weeks — which begin, appropriately, when the temperature is too high to do much else here.
I possess no bona fides to review food and drink except my voluminous waistline. But in my travels and travails, I have found myself returning to a few rules. Thus, these are my 101 rules for eating and drinking in the Magnolia City:
1. Never drink a margarita north of Bush Airport.
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2. Austin is technically north of Bush Airport, but pretend it isn’t.
3. Beware pricey dishes hearkening childhood nostalgia (e.g., caviar-topped tater tots).
Housemade Caviar Tater Tots at Riel.
Annie Mulligan/Contributor
4. Order the steak rarer than you want it.
5. Tunnels downtown have beautifully diverse food post-Harvey.
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6. When asked, order flour tortillas. If the corn tortillas are good enough, they won’t ask you.
7. Acquaintances are made breaking bread. Friends, by sharing appetizers.
8. Even the airports have spectacular food now, if you pay for it.
9. Airplanes do not, even in first class.
10. Annually frequent a conveyer belt sushi joint, a Chili’s and a Red Lobster.
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11. But not an Applebee’s, TGI Friday’s or Olive Garden.
12. Always order creamed corn as a side.
13. Two appetizers are an entrée.
14. Veggie burgers are just as good most of the time.
15. Vietnamese crawfish is incredible. Vietnamese shrimp is even better.
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16. When eating crawfish, wash your hands before going to the bathroom.
Crawfish from Saigon House.
Saigon House
17. Avoid ordering any fish you have to debone.
18. The spiciest Chinese food is exponentially spicier than the spiciest Indian food.
19. Chilled red wine is a joy.
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20. English pubs have great curry.
21. Live within walking distance of your favorite bar.
22. But make sure it’s a journey to one of your favorite restaurants.
23. Catfish is exceedingly difficult to do right, but it can be done very right.
24. Buy scotch nice enough you feel guilty drinking it without occasion.
25. Find the ethnic food on the diner menu.
26. Corona tastes good at Irish bars, and Guinness tastes good at cantinas.
27. Cold plates are half the secret of a great salad.
29. Bartenders recommend good holes in the wall. Waiters, good dive bars.
30. Japan makes food other than sushi, and it is incredible.
31. Filling up on bread is bad. Avoiding it altogether is worse.
32. Have beer at the ballgame, unless it’s a sellout, whereupon have liquor.
33. Jewish brisket makes Jewish Texans sad.
34. Go to a bar for brunch and order coffee.
35. Better beers than Corona and Pacífico exist but are not ubiquitous.
36. Frequent a restaurant serving cuisine of a country whose flag you don’t know. (Assuming that you do not know all the flags.)
37. Dessert wine pairs far better with dessert than does coffee.
38. Light green salsa in ketchup bottles is never not great.
39. Hotels have far better bars than restaurants.
40. Cod is overfished and underappreciated.
41. Eat in a party or two or four, sometimes six.
42. Georgia, Turkey and Lebanon all make great wines — red and white.
43. Fries at the bottom of the bag are fair game for anyone.
44. Life is too short to eat pork barbecue.
Pork ribs, rice dressing and baked beans at Dooley’s BBQ, Beaumont
J.C. Reid/Contributor
45. Espresso martinis are often made for professional drinkers. Caveat emptor.
46. Indian restaurants have great lagers.
47. Coffee tastes better on Sunday.
48. Cajun and Creole foods are related, but different, and both great.
49. Drink a Manhattan when out of town — for business or pleasure.
50. Don’t fight the som’s recommendation.
51. Full English breakfasts look awful and taste great.
52. “Liquor before beer” is actually decent advice.
53. Delicatessen sandwiches can change your life.
54. Bottled beer, or at least in a glass. Never in a can.
55. Everywhere gets at least two strikes; nowhere gets more than three.
56. Imbibe Japanese beer at an unfancy sushi joint.
57. Doing as the Romans do does not necessarily mean eating Roman food.
58. Italian restaurants serving crab claws are proud of them for good reason.
59. Beer is not an apéritif for a meal with a tablecloth.
60. Even Eastern European cuisine has some diamonds in the rough.
61. Guac nights and queso nights, but never “both” nights.
62. Car wash taquerías can hit or miss like Mantle and Mendoza, respectively.
63. If they have a messed-up white wine (i.e., a grape that is usually red), order it.
64. Know thy exceptions to the rule.
65. Load up French fries with every sauce you fancy. You’ll be dead soon enough.
66. Lobster is best eaten inside a hot dog bun.
67. Both Connecticut and Maine lobster rolls have their places.
68. Mojitos are better homemade, or in the pool.
69. Pay cash at a liquor store.
70. Milanese is better than chicken fried steak.
71. Make intense eye contact when toasting with people you love.
72. Potatoes are not worth it as a side at a nice place. Unless they are.
73. Mexican restaurants can make incredible hamburgers.
The iconic Lankford Grocery & Market in Montrose, known for its burgers and Tex-Mex specials, is opening a second location at 5298 Bissonnet in Bellaire.
Greg Morago/Houston Chronicle
74. The octopus you eat isn’t the smart kind. (Is that really true? Don’t worry about it.)
75. Mimosas made college a blast. Leave them there.
76. Nostalgia improves the food and margaritas at the Tex-Mex family staple.
77. Margaritas involving fruits other than limes are always a must.
78. Proper martinis are made from gin.
80. Roe is at least half as good as caviar but, like, a twentieth the price.
81. Purchase bottles of wine that cost about as many dollars as your age.
82. Sauce is not the most important thing, but it makes or breaks the dish.
83. Remember that manna from Heaven tasted like crud.
The Salmon en Croûte is photographed at The Green Room restaurant in Houston on Wednesday, July 22, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
84. Salmon is easy to make good and incredibly hard to make great.
85. Rainbow trout is half the price of many fish and twice as tasty.
86. Seeing and being seen does not a good restaurant make.
87. Nevertheless, it is sometimes necessary.
88. There are no clocks and no order in airports and casinos. Eat and drink accordingly.
89. Slurp some oysters; dunk others in the sauce.
90. Sit on the same side of the booth as your spouse.
91. Tasting menus are almost always worth it. Wine pairings are hit or miss.
92. Stab the cherry in the Old Fashioned or Manhattan with the toothpick. Eat it.
93. Sophisticated locals give better recommendations than Michelin.
94. Seldom is making your own margaritas worth it.
95. $300 sushi is not ten times better than $30 sushi.
96. It is still worth it, sparingly.
97. You can add a little cream to your coffee on vacation.
The sake tray with glasses on display at Kira on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Houston.
Karen Warren/Staff photographer
98. Toast nice sake at a nice place.
99. Tis bad luck to pour your own sake.
100. Whitefish salad is severely underrated.
101. Tomato juice — with or without vodka — at 30,000 feet.
Noah M. Horwitz is a Houston lawyer and writer.
