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Featured Replies

We're picking up stakes and leaving the prolapsed anus of Texas that is otherwise known as College Station in about a month or so.

I have a pretty full travel itenerary for once we're on the East coast, but I'm curious. If you were on the verge of moving away, what purely "Texas" things would you want to do one last time before leaving?

Where are you moving?

Purely Texas? Big Bend, tube/swim one of the hill country rivers (might help wash some of that aggy stink off you), visit some top bbq joints.

From someone that lived out of state for 5 years, I’d eat at the best Tex-Mex place and the best brisket place that I knew of. 

You aren’t likely to find anything close where you are going. 

I also might take a bottle of wine and said brisket to watch the sun go down at the Devil’s Backbone on 32. Or Enchanted Rock. Either would give me fond memories to look back on. 

swim the Blue Hole, a Cowboys game, dancing at Gruene Hall, the Davis Mountains/Big Bend, a drive through Palo Pinto region, Enchanted Rock, some Tex Mex in San Antonio, fish Baffin Bay, a 150+ class deer in Webb county, a duck hunt in Anahuac, seafood in Galveston, a big, greasy hamburger in East Texas after a hike through the Big Thicket, a high school football game, eat a peach from Fredericksburg and some pecans from San Saba, a visit to the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame in Waco, pay homage to the Battle of San Jacinto outside LaPorte.

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Two chicks at the same time.

Eat at the Original Whataburger on Shoreline Blvd in Corpus, then buy some fresh gulf shrimp across the street take it to your rental on the beach and eat up, drive back thru New Braunfels and Tube the Comal, drive the Devil's backbone thru Wimberley to Fredericksburg, drink some wine, climb Enchanted Rock and end it with a hotel in downtown Austin and or a dip in Barton Springs with some Juan in a Million for breakfast.   

9 hours ago, Walden Ponderer said:

We're picking up stakes and leaving the prolapsed anus of Texas that is otherwise known as College Station in about a month or so.

I have a pretty full travel itenerary for once we're on the East coast, but I'm curious. If you were on the verge of moving away, what purely "Texas" things would you want to do one last time before leaving?

Things I missed the most when I left:

Chicken Fried Steak

Proper Tex Mex

Beautiful Texan women...although you are in College Station.

West Texas sunsets

people with manners/ friendly "Howdy" or at least a nod when you're walking by.

Beer being drank from an ice cold schooner

Go see the Sam statue at Huntsville one more time and eat at Farmhouse in town.  hell...might as well hit Bucees on the way home, even if it is the long way.

Edited by slorch

Tex-Mex and Brisket, damn near impossible find a decent version of either outside of Texas

  • Author
49 minutes ago, RollLeft said:

Eat at the Original Whataburger on Shoreline Blvd in Corpus, then buy some fresh gulf shrimp across the street take it to your rental on the beach and eat up, drive back thru New Braunfels and Tube the Comal, drive the Devil's backbone thru Wimberley to Fredericksburg, drink some wine, climb Enchanted Rock and end it with a hotel in downtown Austin and or a dip in Barton Springs with some Juan in a Million for breakfast.   

I grew up in Kingsville, so yeah, I've been to that Whataburger a time or eight. Used to commute from Blanco to Austin, too, so I've seen the Devil's Backbone pretty often, as well. May need to do New Braunfels one more time, though.

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1 minute ago, Patricio Swayze said:

Where are you moving?

Research Triangle in North Carolina.

Research Triangle in North Carolina.

Ah ok. Too bad you are married, I know this one chick up there. Very morally flexible. You might have heard of her.

2 hours ago, Kyrie Eleison said:

swim the Blue Hole, a Cowboys game, dancing at Gruene Hall, the Davis Mountains/Big Bend, a drive through Palo Pinto region, Enchanted Rock, some Tex Mex in San Antonio, fish Baffin Bay, a 150+ class deer in Webb county, a duck hunt in Anahuac, seafood in Galveston, a big, greasy hamburger in East Texas after a hike through the Big Thicket, a high school football game, eat a peach from Fredericksburg and some pecans from San Saba, a visit to the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame in Waco, pay homage to the Battle of San Jacinto outside LaPorte.

is that a josh abbott song?

Stock up on as much HEB(if they’re open) stuff as humanly possible, ain’t no other like it outside Texas. 

Lots of good suggestions.  Let me give you a counterintuitive one.  Go spend about 12 hours sitting right in the middle of the aggy campus and watch the people go by.  Given you are moving to the Research Triangle you are going to feel a hell of a lot better about your move when you juxtapose who you are surrounded with by what you were surrounded with and maybe you won't miss it as much.  

 

And yea take the brisket with you when you perform said retard watching.  

Buy some Texas souvenirs.  You'll want everyone to know where you're from.  The more random, the better.  Lone Star flag oven mitts, Texas-shaped clock like in King of the Hill, Remember the Alamo codpiece, etc.

Get a Texas bottle opener, it makes me happy. Most my Texas stuff is from the family, and the large Texas flag is from the girlfriend's cousin. I miss Texas.

19 hours ago, Walden Ponderer said:

Research Triangle in North Carolina.

You and Tim Brewster might be the only people to make the move there from College Station in the past year. Needless to say, that’s a massive upgrade. 

How long are you going to be in North Carolina?

And bless your soul because they are going to insist what they call BBQ is the best.  And here's a hint, it has nothing to do with a cow.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbecue_in_North_Carolina

I hope you can at least find a brisket or something resembling a brisket in whatever the major grocer is or meat market.  You'll probably pay a hefty price for it too.  Same for Fajitas.

lived there while in grad school...you're going to love RDCH, esp. Carrboro and the surrounding area.

49 minutes ago, Nueces River Rat said:

How long are you going to be in North Carolina?

And bless your soul because they are going to insist what they call BBQ is the best.  And here's a hint, it has nothing to do with a cow.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbecue_in_North_Carolina

I hope you can at least find a brisket or something resembling a brisket in whatever the major grocer is or meat market.  You'll probably pay a hefty price for it too.  Same for Fajitas.

Pork BBQ is edible as long as you decline whatever sauce is offered ... unless you think vinegar has a use other than as a douche. 

Your last Whataburger on the way there is in the Birmingham suburb of Pelham, AL.  For planning purposes...

1 hour ago, Nueces River Rat said:

And bless your soul because they are going to insist what they call BBQ is the best.

Well legitimate place is going to be a mouth breathing idiot and spell barbecue BBQ for starters, and secondly barbecue is a pig roasted and pulled. Full stop. Everything else is just cooked meat.

1 hour ago, Nueces River Rat said:

How long are you going to be in North Carolina?

And bless your soul because they are going to insist what they call BBQ is the best.  And here's a hint, it has nothing to do with a cow.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbecue_in_North_Carolina

I hope you can at least find a brisket or something resembling a brisket in whatever the major grocer is or meat market.  You'll probably pay a hefty price for it too.  Same for Fajitas.

This is totally true, but the good news is that Charleston is only a 4.5 hour drive where you can get BBQ from the best Texas Pitmaster to have ever gone to open shop in the Southeast.

https://lewisbarbecue.com/story/

 

Lewis-40.0.jpg

 

Well legitimate place is going to be a mouth breathing idiot and spell barbecue BBQ for starters, and secondly barbecue is a pig roasted and pulled. Full stop. Everything else is just cooked meat.

Wait, what?
This is totally true, but the good news is that Charleston is only a 4.5 hour drive where you can get BBQ from the best Texas Pitmaster to have ever gone to open shop in the Southeast.
https://lewisbarbecue.com/story/
 
Lewis-40.0.jpg
 
Been there, it's good but no big red. Used have decent prices in pvw no idea how it is now

Get baptized in the Guadalupe.

There doesn't have to be any religion involved either.

Just liquor.

As someone who's been longing to return to Texas for over 30 years, I would recommend that the last thing you do before leaving Texas is quit your job and get a new job that allows you to stay in Texas.  Seriously, you'll be trying to find way to return for the rest of your life...or as long as it takes you to return.  But yes, by all means, GTF outta College Station.

You can obtain passable BBQ outside of Texas.  The brisket doesn't measure up, but passable bbq is available.  Tex-Mex, on the other hand, is almost universally awful outside of Texas.

The closest anyone came to the real answer was the codpiece.

 

Take a swing through San Antonio and visit the Alamo....   At night.    Go down to the Plaza as late as you can.  Take a seat near the Chapel and enjoy the view.   It's a special treat when there are hardly any other visitors around.   You don't need to be there during the day fighting the crowds to tour the grounds.  

Big Bend National Park is far and away the correct answer. Kind of hot for that by now though.

Knowing you're going to NC, good Tex Mex and BBQ are both musts. Maybe float the river. Otherwise, I'd think most of what can be had in College Station Texas can be had in NC. THe bar ain't that high there.

I left Texas last year and will reiterate emphatically the Tex-Mex/BBQ line. Southern cooking in general - I spent a week in NOLA.

Outdoors stuff, not so much. You are moving to a beautiful area of the country and are going to wonder how you spent so much of your life in sweltering prairie land.

I lived in RDU for a year and a half about 10 years ago. 100% agree on all who note the absence of Tex-Mex and BBQ. Sadly, I once went to Chili's for proper nachos when I lived there. 

Also, eat breakfast tacos and kolaches as much as possible before you leave. Every work breakfast will be bagels and smears. Biscuitville and Bojangles have their place but in no way can compete with breakfast tacos or kolaches.

Other than food, I'd recommend walking around the UT campus one final time. For me, leaving was leaving Austin (thankfully I'm back now) but walking the 40 Acres was a good trip down memory lane. 

 

 

Good tex mex is not that hard to cook.  Maybe have some Texas friends ship you the raw tortillas every couple months.  But other ingredients should be easy.

I assume you can buy briskets out there too.

Good tex mex is not that hard to cook.  Maybe have some Texas friends ship you the raw tortillas every couple months.  But other ingredients should be easy.
I assume you can buy briskets out there too.

Raw tortillas? Hahaha come on man. Just make them yourself. That is what I did when I lived in Brazil. It’s just flower, lard, salt and water.
  • Author
9 minutes ago, Johnny Sack said:

Good tex mex is not that hard to cook.  Maybe have some Texas friends ship you the raw tortillas every couple months.  But other ingredients should be easy.

I assume you can buy briskets out there too.

Yes on both counts, actually. We're moving right down the road from our son's godparents, and Godfather is from Hatch. Gets green chiles by mail all the time. And they run cattle, too, as luck would have it, so local beef is not going to be a problem. Granted, they don't know what the hell to do with it, but even though I'm no Franklin, I can get by with smoking my own passable brisket.

There's even a Chuy's about 20 minutes from our new place, too, so I don't think I'll get too homesick. But good chicken fried steak may be kind of hard to find.

Mostly, though, the lack of aggy is going to make an impression that all the non-Texan cuisine in the world could not ruin.

Yes on both counts, actually. We're moving right down the road from our son's godparents, and Godfather is from Hatch. Gets green chiles by mail all the time. And they run cattle, too, as luck would have it, so local beef is not going to be a problem. Granted, they don't know what the hell to do with it, but even though I'm no Franklin, I can get by with smoking my own passable brisket.
There's even a Chuy's about 20 minutes from our new place, too, so I don't think I'll get too homesick. But good chicken fried steak may be kind of hard to find.
Mostly, though, the lack of aggy is going to make an impression that all the non-Texan cuisine in the world could not ruin.

There is a good chance you will love it, but you most definitely get homesick. It is just the way it is. From the small things on up.

Chuy's is bad here. I can't imagine what it's like in North Carolina. 

Oh, and don't forget to visit the basement of the Alamo before you leave. 

Tortillas do get more difficult to make the further you get from the Texas/Mexico border. Notice the aggressive stance I had to take at approximately 4,750 miles. In the Carolinas it should be a little easier.

1Kqt3yUg_o.jpeg

29 minutes ago, Deej said:

Chuy's is bad here. I can't imagine what it's like in North Carolina. 

Oh, and don't forget to visit the basement of the Alamo before you leave. 

The Denton Chuy's is just bad, I don't get the love it gets.

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