Cream of the Crop
Austin restaurant collabs with Michelin-recognized peers from across Texas
Tatemó is kicking off this summer's collaborative dinners at Hestia.
A returning dinner series is bringing together Michelin-recognized restaurants from across Texas in a unique sustained effort. Hestia, the most formal of Emmer & Rye Hospitality Group's Austin restaurants, will host three collaborative dinners in its Lone Star Dinner Series this summer: one each with restaurants from Austin, Houston, and newly, Dallas.
This is the second year for the series, which started with all-Austin collaborations, sold out, and later extended to work with March, a restaurant from Houston. Although it is not new for the Michelin-praised crowd to work together, this summer's efforts expand the series into something much harder to find, an ongoing project to connect the growing class of fine dining honorees across the state.
The three dinners on deck are:
- June 16: Hestia and Tatemó from Houston
- July 21: Hestia and Mamani from Dallas
- August 25: Hestia and InterStellar BBQ from Austin
“The Lonestar Series allows us to tighten our relationship with other Michelin-starred restaurants in Texas,” said Hestia chef de cuisine Paul Wensel in a press release. “It is great to share experiences and different techniques across other incredible restaurants. Additionally, it's just fun to bring other chefs into our space for one night and do a different style of service; our team loves it, and it makes the summertime more interesting.”
Menus are not yet available for any of the dinners, but it is easy to guess that Tatemó's will heavily feature masa, the cornerstone ingredient that led to the restaurant's formation and still informs nearly everything it does. It's even in Tatemós mission statement: "Our mission is to restore the cultural value of maíz, and its nutritional value in Houston, Texas by showcasing the diversity of heirloom corn, from different landscapes and purveyors of Mexico via masa products like tortillas."
“The passion behind why they do so much with masa and trying to teach people the importance of it all is something that I really look forward to learning more about,” said Wensel.
The next two dinners with Mamani and InterStellar will focus on French cuisine and barbecue, respectively.
Mamani, led by Parisian chef Christophe De Lellis, combines the culinary influences of Paris and the French and Italian Rivieras. Its Michelin Star was awarded just 60 days after it opened in 2025 (and it won Restaurant of the Year at the CultureMap Dallas Tastemaker Awards this spring).
Most Austinites who follow barbecue at all know InterStellar, which is known for mostly traditional barbecue with some unexpected culinary twists like peach tea glazed pork belly, lamb tacos, and brown butter mac and cheese. That makes it well-suited to the collaborative format, where it can once again run with ideas that hardly cross paths with barbecue.
"They do a lot of cool interpretations of classic BBQ dishes," said Wensel. "It's going to be really interesting to see what they create in a tasting menu format."
Appropriately for this diverse set of culinary perspectives, Hestia is more attached to a technique — live-fire cooking — than to any one place or ingredient. Executive chef Kevin Fink and partner Tavel Bristol-Joseph have developed a tasting menu that responds to the seasons and utilizes Texas ingredients above all.
Reservations for each dinner are available on OpenTable, with seatings ranging from 5:30-10 pm. Each menu costs $225 per person, with optional wine pairings for $125 per person. Hestia is located at 607 W. 3rd St.
Ernesto Torrealba and Iliana de la Vega working in Mexico.Photo courtesy of El Naranjo
De la Vega and Torrealba after decades in the restaurant business.Photo courtesy of El Naranjo
El Naranjo presents Mexican fine dining without Americanization.Photo courtesy of El Naranjo