Wop Salad
"Wop salad" is an "Italian Salad" that became popular with Sicilian immigrants to New Orleans (also famous for the muffuletta sandwich) by at least 1930. The salad can contain…
Concrete or Blizzard (frozen dessert)
Entry in progress. Penniless lexicogapher taking a break, attending to pregnant wife -- B.P. Wikipedia: Ted DrewesTed Drewes is a frozen custard shop well-known in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. The…
Counterfeit Triangle (Canal Street area)
The "Counterfeit Triangle" area of Manhattan that sells counterfeit merchandise is bounded by Canal, Walker, Baxter and Centre Streets. The name "Counterfeit Alley" had been…
Chicken Fried Shrimp
Chicken fried shrimp is another attempt to imitate the Texas success of
Mexican Food Shit (Mexican Shits; Taco Shits; Screamers)
Mexican food has resulted in some scatalogical language, such as "Mexican food shit" or "Mexican shits," "Mexican food poop," "Mexican food poo," "taco…
“Come on ice cream!” (post-jalapeño-eating saying)
Mexican (or Tex-Mex) food can be hot. After eating several jalapeños, it's not unusual to follow that up with ice cream for dessert. An old joke/saying goes that, the following day while…
Southwestern Crab Cakes (Southwest Crab Cakes)
Southwestern Crab Cakes (or Southwest Crab Cakes) is a seemingly Gulf Coast dish, but it appears perhaps most frequently on restaurant menus in Austin, Texas. "Southwestern crab cakes" is…
Tex-Mex Mile or Mexican Food Mile or Taco Row (South First Street, Austin)
Austin's South First Street has about a dozen Mexican food establishments (restaurants/bakeries), all independently owned. South First has been called "Taco Row" (first cited in…
Painted Desert Soup (black bean soup + corn chile chowder)
"Painted Desert Soup" is a specialty of the Blue Mesa Grill (various locations, originally in the Dallas area in the 1990s). The soup actually combines two popular Southwestern soups --…
“Gal reminds me of the highway between Fort Worth and Dallas. No curves.” (Foghorn Leghorn)
"Gal reminds me of the highway between Fort Worth and Dallas. No curves" is a saying by the cartoon rooster Foghorn J. Leghorn in the 1953 cartoon Of Rice and Hen. Foghorn Leghorn spoke…
Taco Short of a Combination Plate (“not all there”)
"Taco short of a combination plate" is another way of saying that a person is "not all there" or "not playing with a full deck" (called "full deckisms"). The…
Vietnamese Fajitas (Bo Nuong Xa)
Vietnamese fajitas (Bo Nuong Xa) are strips of beef with lemongrass, rolled in rice-paper wrappers (rather than tortillas). Tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, sprouts, mint, basil, carrots, jalapeños…
LoCo (Lower Congress Avenue, Austin)
LoCo (Lower Congress Avenue in Austin) is just below SoCo (South Congress Avenue). "Loco" is a Spanish word meaning "crazy," and the unofficial neighborhood nickname has…
Sunset Capital of Texas (Oasis restaurant on Lake Travis, Austin)
Texas has many "capitals" that are designated by the state legislature. All of the "capitals" are cities. The Oasis restaurant on Lake Travis in Austin has such spectacular…
Margarita Chicken (Chicken Margarita)
"Margarita Chicken" or "Chicken Margarita" is another name for "Tequila Chicken" or "Chicken Tequila." Like a Margarita cocktail after which it was named,…
Tequila Chicken or Tequila Lime Chicken (Chicken Tequila)
Tequila (usually paired with lime juice) began to be added to chicken recipes by at least the 1970s, but the recipes became much more frequent in the 1990s. A 1977 recipe for "Chicken Tequila…
Veggie Confetti or Vegetable Confetti (Veggie Confetti Taco; Veggie Confetti Chili)
"Vegetable confetti" (or "veggie confetti") is a combination of vegetables that are cooked together. Recipes for "vegetable confetti" date to at least 1930.…
“The blackest land and the whitest people” (Greenville, Hunt County, TX)
"Welcome to Greenville. The Blackest Land, The Whitest People" was a sign that existed in Greenville (Hunt County) from 1921 until it was removed in the 1960s. The saying was from…
Tosc-Mex or Tusc-Mex (Tuscany, Italy + Tex-Mex cuisine)
What would a restaurant serving Italian + Tex-Mex cuisine be like? The restaurant Matilda opened in New York City in late 2007, offering a mix of Tuscany (Toscana) and Mexico that it called…
“None of the hits, all of the time” (91.7 KVXR-FM, student radio at UT-Austin)
The motto for 91.7 KVXR-FM, the student-run radio station of the University of Texas at Austin, is "None of the hits, all of the time." Austin is known as the "Live Music Capital of…