Eat Local

Sustainable Food Center celebrates the spring harvest with Chef Series dinner at La Condesa

Twice a year, the Sustainable Food Center gathers friends, supporters and foodies to celebrate locally-grown food with its Chef Series dinners.

On April 14, the 6th biannual event, appropriately titled “Spring Bounty,” will take place at La Condesa. Celebrating the coming of spring — and local harvests — the dinner will feature an exquisite multi-course tasting menu featuring fresh meats and produce from the Austin Farmers’ Market, as well as local area farms and suppliers, all accompanied with drink pairings.

La Condesa owner Jesse Herman is proud to play host to the organization’s special dinner. “We strive to offer our patrons the best farm fresh and local foods, much of which is purchased from vendors who sell at Austin Farmers' Market. We strongly support SFC's work in the community and are thrilled to help them promote the benefits of buying from local growers and ranchers and of supporting small businesses in the community.”

Participating chefs in the Spring Bounty dinner include:

Rick Lopez, Chef de Cuisine at La Condesa
Todd Duplechan, executive chef at Lenoir
Tim Byres, Executive chef & owner at SMOKE & Chicken Scratch
Alexis Chong, chef de cuisine at Sway
Shawn Cirkiel, Executive chef & owner at Parkside/Olive and June
Erica Waksmunsk, pastry chef at Congress;
Rene Ortiz, executive chef of Sway/La Condesa
Laura Sawicki, executive pastry chef of La Condesa/Sway

Tickets to the event are $125 per person, with all proceeds benefiting the Sustainable Food Center and its mission to creates opportunities for individuals to make healthy food choices and to participate in a vibrant local food system.

“By attending this fundraiser for SFC's programs, guests are supporting those in our community without access to healthy, local food," says SFC Executive Director Ronda Rutledge.

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For more information on the La Condesa dinner, visit the Chef Series website.

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Peak Plates

7 Austin restaurants make OpenTable's top 100 for 2024

Jeffrey's Restaurant/Instagram

Jeffrey's Restaurant is a great example of the type of fancy, well-established restaurant that made the list.

Restaurant reservation website OpenTable has issued its new list of the top 100 restaurants in America for 2024, and seven Austin restaurants have made the list. That's already impressive at a glance — 7 percent of the entire national list in just one city — but compared to other Texas cities, it's huge. Austin is the only Texas city to have more than one restaurant on the list.

The "2024's Top 100 Restaurants" list is a compilation of the most sought-after and top-ranked restaurants in the U.S. based on 14 million verified reviews on OpenTable from October 1, 2023, to September 30, 2024. Restaurants are not ranked, but arranged in alphabetical order by state.

Austin's seven restaurants (including several repeats from OpenTable's 2023 list) are:

Aba: Known for its laid-back, yet fancy patio and being a popular spot for visiting celebrities
J Carver's: Known for a commitment to the classic steakhouse experience and legitimately fancy dining
Jeffrey's Restaurant: Known for fine dining, a connection to Austin before its boom, and a fantastic wine program
Red Ash Italia: Known for approachable, yet high-quality Italian food with rustic touches
Sammie's Italian: Known for its romantic take on the archetype of an East Coast Italian joint
Uchi: Known for bringing Austin into the national sushi conversation and defining the scene
Uchiko: Known for a cool atmosphere and getting creative with sushi and other small plates

Austinites will probably not be surprised by this list, which names some very well-established restaurants that are all upscale. These qualities tend to appeal to similar lists, regardless of who's curating them.

It is interesting, given that the list was democratically based on user ratings, that there were not more beloved food trailers or casual spots. However, other factors that led to high rankings included alerts set and reservations made ahead — things that don't really apply to even the most awesome taco truck.

Mediterranean food was a trend among the Austin picks. Red Ash Italia and Sammie's Italian are, as the names would imply, completely dedicated to Italian food, while Aba covers a wider swath of the Mediterranean. There were also two steakhouses: J Carver's and Jeffrey's Restaurant.

As list-perusers may have guessed, Uchi and Uchiko are in the same family of restaurants, with Uchi being the more formal and Uchiko being a bit more accessible for drop-in meals and cocktails. But are two more incognito duos of sibling restaurants on the list: J Carver's and Red Ash, and Jeffrey's Restaurant and Sammie's Italian.

That could be a coincidence. It could also be a reflection of the utility of money and experience in opening a good restaurant, or a lesson about the effects of good (and expensive) marketing. Whatever it is, it doesn't sound like hospitality groups had any direct sway on how OpenTable made its choices.

This list was different from the inaugural list of OpenTable Icons, which launched in 2024. The "Icons" list chose restaurants that are getting a lot of buzz, which ended up being more subjective. It also seemed to let in — as a side effect of the process, rather than a hard eligibility rule — more new and Mexican restaurants. Two restaurants are on both lists: Red Ash and Jeffrey's.

Restaurants outside of Austin that made the Top 100 list, organized alphabetically, are:

Hudson House — Dallas
Steak 48 — Houston
Signature — San Antonio

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