Southern Road Trip: Best of the Rest (Pt. 1)

As much ground as the previous couple of weeks of Southern road trip blog posts covered, not every place we visited made it in. However, that by no stretch of the imagination means that they aren't worthy of a mention. These next couple of posts touch on an eatery from each of the major cities we encountered during this road trip that we found to be worth the consideration at the very least.

I know I can't personally start the day without a good cup of coffee, but the following two places add much more to the equation other than that caffeinated elixir.

Dallas - Cuban Dulceria International Bakery & Cafe

A longstanding Dallas-area tradition, the Vasquez family has been serving their Cuban specialties to Dallas-area residents since 1979. They may have remained pretty much only on the radar of the locals, but a couple of unrelated pushes from as different spheres of fame as you can imagine (President Barack Obama efforts to normalizing Cuban relations and a Khloe Kardashian reference to cortaditos) has bumped into modest eatery much higher onto the culinary radar. In fact, the demand created has encouraged the owners to open up a second location in the area.

Brews Cruising (Pt. 1): A Seventh Son Sighting in Big D

“A Seventh Son Brewing T-Shirt? In Dallas?”

Little did I know it at the time, the t-shirt, sporting the logo of one of the most well-regarded Columbus-area craft breweries, belonged to a well-traveled beer aficionado.

Similarly unbeknownst to me at that time, it was something of a symbol of a parallel growth in craft beer in two rather different cities, as well as a sign that I would be doing some fairly substantial beer traveling in the next few days.