Hole in one

New bagel and coffee truck slams into South Austin from beloved wine bar

Wham Bam features house made schmears on Rosen's bagels.

First he conquered home design with Aviary Decor and Lounge, then he set his sites on wine with Aviary Wine & Kitchen, now owner Marco Fiorilo is getting into the mobile munchies game. His new food truck Wham Bam will park in on the corner of Stassney Lane and Manchaca Road beginning this fall.

According to a release, Fiorilo worked with business partner David Mireles in opening the new concept, which specializes in bagels and coffee. Though bagels were ubiquitous in his former home of New York City, Fiorilo found that satisfying his carb cravings in Austin wasn’t quite as easy.

“I’m excited to bring a ray of bagel sunshine to a city flooded with never ending breakfast taco options,” Fiorilo beams in the release. “We’ll also have super fast service, so you won’t spend hours waiting in line for your bagel and coffee fix.”

The curated lunch menu features five sandwiches, all made on bagels from Rosen’s. Classics include lox with capers, shaved shallots, and tomatoes; roast beef with horseradish cream cheese and arugula; and pastrami smoked by Loro.

Lighter offerings such as jalapeño marinated chicken with grilled onions and peppers and a veggie sandwich with seared shiitake mushrooms and basil and lime aioli round out the offerings.

In the morning hours, Wham Bam will serve a customizable breakfast bagel with a choice of bacon, sausage, and ham and eggs made your way. Schmears like house-made berry and bacon jam will also be available for customers on the go.

Keeping with Aviary’s bold aesthetic, Wham Bam is housed in a rare Ultra Van RV. The poppy pink exterior, fuchsia lettering, and gold stripes will surely be as eye-opening as the Third Coast Coffee.

Once open, Wham Bam will keep regular hours daily 7 am-3 pm. Mobile catering will also be available.

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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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