hot headlines

10 chilled sweets and drinks to cool down the blazing Austin summer, plus more top stories

Add these treats from around town to your list of cooling tactics.

Courtesy of Lick Honest Ice Creams

Editor’s note: It’s that time again — time to check in with our top stories. From escapist treats, to real travel tips, to the best of Austin-area real estate, here are five articles that captured our collective attention over the past seven days.

1. 10 chilled sweets and drinks to cool down the blazing Austin summer. There's some ice cream on the list, but there are plenty of other treats that offer delicious relief, like cream puffs and Thai tea.

2. Austin Public Library clears the runway for Passport Fair on July 3. Some people aren't eligible to get their passport business done online. APL's Passport Services division is here to help.

3. Hill Country residential community outside Austin breaks ground on development. More than half of the area will remain undeveloped to foster a closer relationship between residents and nature.

4. Breathtaking modern home with Tesla solar roof enters the Austin market at $8.1 million. There's also an underwater speaker in the pool. Is this what living in the future is like?

5. 3 Central Texas tours ranked among Tripadvisor's best experiences in the nation. Two of them are a wine-lover's dream. Tripadvisor made its selections based on traveler ratings.

This week's hot headlines

Wurstfest waltzes into this week's 5 hottest Austin headlines

Photo courtesy of Wurstfest

undefined

Editor's note: A lot happened this week, so here's your chance to get caught up. Read on for the week's most popular headlines. Looking for the best things to do this weekend? Find that list here.

1. New Braunfels sausage and beer extravaganza Wurstfest returns for 2024. German culture is on display in many subtle ways throughout Texas' historic towns; Wurstfest is not one of those ways. This oompah-driven, battered-and-fried, lederhosen-clad beer and sausage festival is coming back to New Braunfels for its annual festivities November 1-10.

2. Sixth Street icehouse branches out with posh, old-school sports club. There’s no shortage of spots to grab a drink in East Austin. But despite the area’s wide range of bar offerings — from cocktail lounges to dives — it comes up surprisingly short on sports bars. Enter Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (WTF) Sporting Club, which is taking over the giant East 7th space vacated earlier this year by Easy Tiger.

3. Austin's famous Katz's makes a comeback in the same location. There is good news this week for all Austinites pining for a simpler — and if you ask them, better — Austin of the past. The beloved West 6th Street eatery Katz's is making a comeback more than 10 years after it famously closed. Someone in the Katz family has re-purchased the original location and is hoping to bring back the good old days.

4. Popular Austin hospitality group stirs up sunny new daytime cafe. Since debuting in 2009, Jack Allen’s Kitchen’s weekend brunch has been a staple of Austin’s many best-of lists. Now, owners Jack Gilmore and Tom Kamm are upping the ante. The restaurateurs have founded a new concept, Day Maker Half Day Café, to bring that AM magic seven days a week.

5. Spectacular Austin Trail of Lights gets even more festive with weddings. Locals who feel sentimental about the 60-year-old Austin Trail of Lights now have a shimmering new way to make it part of their personal stories. Surely many have proposed to partners at the Christmas installation, but now they can get married there, too.