News
 
Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

For more Bum Steers coverage, read about Elon Musk, Ken Paxton, John Whitmire, and our Bum Steer of the Year, Jerry Jones. For some of this year’s more uplifting moments, check out the Best Things in Texas. The Passenger Who Thought Flying Didn’t Stink Enough AlreadyBefore departure, a taxiing American Airlines plane headed from Phoenix to Austin returned to the gate so that a disgruntled passenger could be removed from the plane after, among other actions, he yelled, “You thought that was rude? Well how about this smell?” and then loudly farted.Senior Worst OfficerA Southwest Airlines pilot approaching an Oklahoma City airport flew so low that at least one nearby resident was terrified, thinking that the aircraft, which was a mere five hundred feet off…

The post The Seven People You Meet . . . on the Flight From Hell! appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

For more Bum Steers coverage, read about commercial airlines, Elon Musk, Ken Paxton, and our Bum Steer of the Year, Jerry Jones. For some of this year’s more uplifting moments, check out the Best Things in Texas. When Democratic state Senator John Whitmire was elected Houston’s sixty-third mayor, in December 2023, the 75-year-old attorney had been serving for half a century in the Texas Legislature, where he worked five months every other year while enjoying Austin’s nightlife. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he had trouble adjusting to a job with actual responsibilities. At first Whitmire tried blaming Houston’s problems on his predecessor, Sylvester Turner. But his impulsive, half-baked solutions to the city’s ills seemed only to make things worse. Whether he was tearing out concrete medians that were intended…

The post Houston Mayor John Whitmire’s (Fake) Secret Diary appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

eclipse illustrationFor more Best Things in Texas coverage, read about the Texas Olympians who dominated at the Paris Games, the issue that brought Republicans and Democrats together, the horny toad’s likely comeback, and the Man of the Year, Brisket Powell. For less dignified behavior, read the 2025 Bum Steer Awards. It was the greatest show above Earth—and Texas was in the spotlight. The total solar eclipse that took place on April 8 had towns in the path of totality, which stretched from the southern Hill Country to the northeast corner of the state, preparing for months for the celestial event, which attracted scores of visitors and their dollars to spend on gas, food, lodging, and special viewing glasses.After all, it hadn’t happened here for 124 years…

The post Totaling Up the Totality: 2024’s Solar Eclipse by the Numbers appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

For more Best Things in Texas coverage, read about the Texas Olympians who dominated at the Paris Games, the greatest show over Earth, the issue that brought Republicans and Democrats together, and the Man of the Year, Brisket Powell. For less dignified behavior, read the 2025 Bum Steer Awards. The Texas horned lizard, affectionately called the horny toad, may be iconic, but Texas hasn’t always treated it with due respect. The population of the state’s official reptile has dwindled over the past sixty years, to the consternation of Texans who grew up seeing the spiky, four-inch-long critters everywhere. Driven largely by urban sprawl as well as invasive fire ants and pesticides, the decrease in numbers has left parts of the state, including most of East…

The post Texas Horny Toads Could Be Making a Comeback appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

For more Best Things in Texas coverage, read about the Texas Olympians who dominated at the Paris Games, the greatest show over Earth, the issue that brought Republicans and Democrats together, and the horny toad’s likely comeback. For less dignified behavior, read the 2025 Bum Steer Awards. He’s been on the scene for what seems like forever (okay, since 2023), but it wasn’t until 2024 that the world finally saw this charming scamp ascend to bona fide A-list Hollywood hunkdom. Brisket Powell, who was born in California but got to Texas as soon as he could, was the internet’s summer crush, dazzling fans during a press tour that helped turn Twisters—a film starring his “father,” Glen Powell—into a box office hit. With soulful brown eyes…

The post Brisket Powell Is 2024’s Man of the Year appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

Texas lawmakers meet with Robert Roberson at a prison in Livingston, Texas, on Friday, Sept. 27, 2024.For more Best Things in Texas coverage, read about the Texas Olympians who dominated at the Paris Games, the greatest show over Earth, the horny toad’s likely comeback, and the Man of the Year, Brisket Powell. For less dignified behavior, read the 2025 Bum Steer Awards. Robert Roberson likely would have died this past fall if not for the actions of a few Republican and Democratic lawmakers. On October 16, a day before the now 58-year-old death row inmate was set to be executed, the legislators subpoenaed him to travel to Austin from the Allan B. Polunsky Unit, in Livingston. In a state that has executed 591 felons since 1982 (more than four times as many as any other state), the move was a legal…

The post Texas Legislators Kept Robert Roberson—and Bipartisanship—Alive (for Now) appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

For more Best Things in Texas coverage, read about the greatest show over Earth, the issue that brought Republicans and Democrats together, the horny toad’s likely comeback, and the Man of the Year, Brisket Powell. For less dignified behavior, read the 2025 Bum Steer Awards. Of the 1,039 gold, silver, and bronze medals awarded at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, Team USA received 126 of them—35 more than any other national team. Chants of “U-S-A! U-S-A!” were certainly appropriate, but Texas deserved some of that adulation. The Lone Star State contingent, by some counts 38 athletes with ties to Texas, competed in a dozen events and earned 53 medals, contributing mightily to the nation’s total. Team Texas included high-profile Olympians such as Houston-born basketball great…

The post Simone Biles Wasn’t the Only Texas Olympian Who Made Us Proud in 2024 appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

landman episode 6 stillFind our ongoing coverage of the first season of Landman here. We’re taking a three-hundred-mile field trip from Midland to Fort Worth during this episode, folks, so pack a snack.The action opens in one of the tonier western suburbs of Cowtown, where we finally see Demi Moore, as Cami Miller, wife of oil baron Monty, doing something other than swimming leisurely laps in the pool of her palatial mansion. She welcomes Tommy, who has driven from Midland to brief Monty on sundry new threats to his business. She fetches Tommy a cup of coffee. (Just pause here for a moment and imagine Demi Moore fetching you a cup of coffee.) As Tommy waits, we get the lay of the land. The Miller mansion has everything: ugly, oversized…

The post ‘Landman’ Episode Six Recap: Do Not Let Billy Bob Thornton Near You With a Wrench appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

David Cook and Dustin BurrowsFormer Speakers of the Texas House are starting to pile up like the wives of Henry VIII. Last week, Beaumont’s own Dade Phelan dropped his bid to reclaim the gavel—which means that when the lower chamber convenes in January, members will be under the authority of their fourth Speaker in six sessions, the fifth Speaker since the era of the permanent Republican majority began. If you’re trying to remember them all, it goes something like this: Beheaded, collapsed in scandal, retired, beheaded . . .The turmoil matters. Polls regularly report that Texans know much less about the Speaker of the House than about the governor or lieutenant governor, which makes sense. The latter figures are directly elected by voters and frequently pose bravely on local TV news broadcasts.…

The post Taking Stock of the Farcical Battle for the Worst Job in Texas Government appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!

Gravatar

Get in-depth coverage of news, reviews and conversations about Texas barbecue. It's basically Christmas every day for barbecue-lovers.

In August, Michael Flores stopped doing his irregularly scheduled pop-ups under the banner of Friends’ Barbecue to join his family’s business, Jiménez Tortilleria y Taqueria. You may have read about the Lubbock restaurant’s amazing tacos de guisado from our taco editor, José Ralat, last year. Now that Flores is on board full-time, the family has tweaked the name to Jiménez y Friends Barbecue y Taqueria, and it offers a full barbecue menu every Saturday and Sunday.I first met Flores at the 2023 Texas Monthly BBQ Fest, in Lockhart. He was serving tacos with his mother, Maria Flores, and his half brother, Mark Jiménez. He handed me a smoked barbacoa taco and a link of sausage split lengthwise, showing off bits of jalapeño and cubes of…

The post The Lubbock Barbecue Scene Just Got a Lot Brighter, Thanks to This Tight-Knit Clan appeared first on Texas Monthly.

Thank you for reading!