Best of the Best

2 Austin favorites rank among America's 50 best new restaurants

Two of Austin's favorite new restaurants are in the national spotlight — again. On Tuesday, August 1, Bon Appetit released its list of the 50 best new restaurants in America for 2017, highlighting a SoCo hot spot and a quirky East Austin concept.

June's All Day, the charming neighborhood bistro named for sommelier June Rodil, and Kemuri Tatsu-ya, the Texas-style izakaya from the Ramen Tatsu-ya team, are the only Texas restaurants on the list, which is determined by editors Andrew Knowlton and Julia Kramer.

Go to June's "to find out what our ideal wine bar looks (colorful! neon!) and tastes like (a little bit healthy, a little bit indulgent)," writes the magazine. "We’ve spent the better half of a day here, drinking Pet Nat from Texas and nibbling on salt cod croquettes, pretending we were on vacation and shirking all responsibility. That’s a sign of a good hangout."

Of the ramen kings' new joint, the magazine says, "Chefs Tatsu Aikawa and Takuya Matsumoto first won us over with steaming bowls of noodles at the nearby Ramen Tatsu-ya, a Top 50 restaurant in 2013, but Kemuri stands out for trailblazing new flavor combos." So what should you order? The signature Texas ramen, and the "hot pocketz" — both involve brisket.

Earlier this year June's was named one of Food & Wine's best new restaurants; Kemuri Tatsu-ya earned the distinction from Eater in July.

Austin is no stranger to Bon Appetit's annual list of 50 finalists or the prestigious "Hot 10." Last year, Emmer and Rye was included on the list of 50 best; past Austin winners include Dai Due (No. 6 in 2015), Thai-Kun (No. 8 in 2014), and Jeffrey's and Josephine House (No. 8 in 2013).

The top 10 for 2017 will be announced August 15.

June's All Day is the kind of place where you can while away an afternoon.

Photo courtesy of June's All Day

June's All Day is the kind of place where you can while away an afternoon.

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Whoops

Michelin goofs on a few restaurants honored in first Texas guide

Kau Ba/Facebook

Houston's Kau Ba has been removed from the Michelin Guide.

Texans' reactions to the first Michelin Guide in the state have ranged from glowing to unimpressed, but a few notable mix-ups are more concrete than differences in taste. The November 11 ceremony honored more than 100 restaurants across the state, but at least two were in error. In Dallas the guide confused two restaurants with each other, and in Houston one of them had closed.

Starting in Dallas: The Guide's release announcing the list of restaurants who'd won awards included The Charles, an award-winning Italian restaurant in Dallas' Design District, as one of 57 restaurants that earned a "Recommended" rating.

The Charles is a surely deserving restaurant that opened in 2018, the first concept from acclaimed food & beverage group Duro Hospitality, which has since gone on to open other restaurants such as El Carlos Elegante, Sister, and Cafe Duro.

But the Guide got the wrong Charles: The real recipient was Mister Charles, a sibling Duro Hospitality restaurant that opened at 3219 Knox St. in early 2024.

The Charles specializes in Italian and Texas-inspired dishes.

Mister Charles features French and Italian-influenced dishes.

It wasn't just an incorrect name; it listed the accompanying (incorrect) address.

A spokesperson for Michelin Guide verified that Mister Charles was the winner and said that the listing of The Charles was a mistake.

“This was an internal error caused by our geolocation process. The problem will be corrected in the most expeditious manner,” the spokesperson said. The Guide website has since updated the list and replaced The Charles with Mister Charles.

Having a difference of opinion about a critic's choices is one thing — but having an error of this magnitude is something else entirely.

And blaming "geolocation" as the source of the error is a curious excuse. Geolocation refers to the ability to track the whereabouts of an electronic device using GPS, cell phone towers, WiFi access points or a combination of these.

The Houston mix-up was also disappointing, but only involved one restaurant: In a press release issued Thursday, November 14, the Guide announced that it had removed Montrose Vietnamese restaurant Kau Ba from the list of Bib Gourmand recipients.

The reason: "Upon further investigation, our team has discovered the restaurant has been permanently closed since our Inspection team's visits occurred," the statement reads.

As has been widely noted in local media, Kau Ba closed earlier this month. The restaurant’s Instagram account now belongs to Alora, which is described as “a fresh Peruvian-Vietnamese fusion concept inspired by travels to Saigon.” It is expected to open soon.

Open since 2018, Kau Ba served an innovative take on Vietnamese fare created by Nikki Tran. The restaurant built on the notoriety Tran had achieved after being featured in two Netflix series: Somebody Feed Phil and Ugly Delicious. It earned considerable acclaim, including a spot in the Houston Chronicle’s top 100 restaurants as recently as 2023 and a nomination for Best Neighborhood Restaurant in the 2021 CultureMap Tastemaker Awards.

The restaurant went through a number of iterations during its tenure. For three-and-a-half years, Tran partnered with Aya Sushi owners Minette Corpuz and Bruce Kish to oversee operations, but they parted ways in February 2023.

In an email sent to Houston Public Media, Tran expressed regret over Michelin's decision.

“But we understand and respect Michelin’s decision to remove Kau Ba from its selection,” Tran said to HPM. “Exercising an abundance of caution from a legal position, I am not able currently to share further details of our situation but I do hope to follow up soon with more information.”

“Until then, on behalf of the entire Kau Ba team, we want to thank the entire culinary community for the recognition and support,” Tran added. “Kau Ba is proud of the dishes we created and look forward to sharing very soon what’s next.”

Thankfully in Austin, things seem to be going okay. The capital city swept the competition with seven stars (one more than Houston now that the change has been made), and two green stars for sustainability — in fact, the only green stars in the state.

Austin also had four of the first-ever barbecue restaurants to be awarded stars. Houston also had one.

Austin's winning restaurants were Barley Swine, Craft Omakase, Hestia, Olamaie, InterStellar BBQ, John Bates, La Barbecue, Alison Clem, and LeRoy and Lewis Barbecue.

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