Lunch: The last of the Salisbury steak I made last week with white rice topped with beef gravy and collard greens sauteed with ham.

Dinner: I pan fried a salmon fillet with salt, pepper, and lime zest infused simple syrup and served it with lemon penne (tossed with extra virgin olive oil) and locally grown green beans sauteed with garlic.

Lunch: Tina and I stopped in at Swad Indian Vegetarian Restaurant (9515 N Lamar Blvd # 156, Austin, TX‎ - (512) 997-7923‎) for lunch and it was delicious!

I ordered samosa chaat which came with two tasty samosas smothered in chickpeas and served with chutneys.

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What I Ate: July 12, 2009 (Swad Indian Vegetarian Restaurant)

Lunch: We stopped in at the Manna From Heaven Tex-Mex restaurant (602 W Center St, Kyle, TX‎ - (512) 268-6900‎) for some chalupas for lunch. The last time we had lunch here we really liked the food, but something was wrong today. The salsa tasted watered down and so did the limeade. The special was the chalupa platter, so we thought we were lucky - but this time there was no meat which severely diminished the flavor.

In the middle of the day, I passed a 7-Eleven and decided to stop to get a free Slurpee. When I came out with my 7.11 ounce Slurpee, Tina thought it looked ridiculous, so she took a picture.

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What I Ate: July 11, 2009 (Manna From Heaven Tex-Mex, Hao Hao Restaurant)

Dinner: Tina and I were joined by Gary and Mary at the Backstage Steakhouse & Garden Bar (21814 State Highway 71 W, Spicewood, TX‎ - (512) 264-2223‎) about 7 miles west of Bee Caves, Texas. Backstage supposedly serves the best steak in the Austin area. So, I ordered the 20 oz. Bone-in Cowboy Ribeye ($39.99) cooked rare with a baked potato (with bacon bits) and onion rings.

The steak was excellent - tender, juicy, and cooked a little blue. I had it heated up a little bit and worried about them over doing it, but it came back medium-rare - just a little past the sweet spot that I personally look for. Still, the steak was of good quality and was pretty close to flawless both when blue and when medium-rare. They know how to cook a steak and not over do it here.

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What I Ate: July 10, 2009 (The Backstage Steakhouse)

Lunch: I ate left over Salisbury steak with rice, spinach, and an avocado half.

Dinner: Tina braised a whole trout in a soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, and black bean chili sauce (there's more stuff in there, but I'm too lazy to list it all).

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What I Ate: July 9, 2009

Dinner: Tina made soy sauce braised pork (hong sao rou) and served it over white rice along with fresh spinach and an egg & tomato soup.

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What I Ate: July 8, 2009

Dinner: Technically, I didn't eat at Coyote Creek Farm, but my dinner was heavily indebted to it. This dinner tale begins at 6:00am when I got up to drive out to Elgin, Texas to visit Jeremiah Cunningham at his farm: Coyote Creek Farm. My persistent readers will remember that I've been raving about the eggs from Coyote Creek (see the last paragraph of this post), so we had to see for ourselves. After corresponding with Jeremiah via email, we arranged for Tina and me to arrive at the farm at 8:00am.

It turns out Jeremiah is doing a lot more than producing incredible eggs. He's trying to encourage sustainable and organic farming in Central Texas in whatever way he can. His main business now isn't the pastured eggs or the grass fed beef - it's organic feed. This service has a greater impact than one initially might think. Jeremiah operates one of the only organic feed mills in this area of Texas (Coyote Creek was the first such mill in the entire state of Texas). The existence of his mill provides a market place for organic corn, flax seed, oats, alfalfa, and other grains enabling and encouraging local farms to use non-pesticide, environmentally friendly and sustainable techniques.

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What I Ate: July 7, 2009 (Coyote Creek Farm)

Lunch: Zong zi with leftovers - kale and bean curd.

Dinner: I coated some chicken parts (drumstick, thigh, drumette, and wingette) in bread crumbs (made from old olive bread) with paprika, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and coriander seed. Tina made a stir-fry from chicken breast, onions, and red bell pepper as well as a napa cabbage and bean thread dish.

Lunch: Tina had never been to a California Pizza Kitchen, so we went to the one in The Domain (2901 S Capital of Texas Hwy, Austin, TX‎ - (512) 327-6905). We ordered Avocado Club Eggrolls as an appetizer. The mix of ingredients - avocado, bacon, chicken, tomatoes, and Monterey Jack cheese in a crispy fried wrapper - is a good idea, but the execution included way too much cheese.

We then had a pizza made that was half The Works (sweet Italian sausage, pepperoni, Canadian bacon, Capicola ham, julienne salami, Mozzarella cheese, and tomato sauce) and half Italian Tomato & Basil (Imported Italian tomatoes [canned of course], Mozzarella cheese, and tomato sauce topped with fresh basil and Parmesan cheese). The crust (which we can only assume is their normal crust) was much too sweet, soft and spongy. It was like eating a really thick, untoasted, sweet pita bread with toppings. We love all sorts of pizzas, but this crust was not to our liking. Also, the toppings were so-so, and not nearly good enough to redeem the pizza crust.

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What I Ate: July 5, 2009 (California Pizza Kitchen)

Lunch: We headed to Luling's City Market (633 E Davis St, Luling, TX‎ - (830) 875-9019‎) which is supposed to be one of the best barbecues in Texas.

We ordered 1/2 pound brisket, 2 pounds spare ribs, and 1 sausage ring for Tina, myself, and Tina's parents.

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What I Ate: July 4, 2009 (City Market)