MON., AUG. 21, 2006
If for some inexplicable reason you moved to Austin and you don’t like Mexican food, leave. Seriously. Go back to whatever culturally impoverished, Applebee’s patronizing, Wonder Bread loving suburb you rolled down from and stop fucking up the office lunch run with your whining about acid reflux. Everyone is tired of you dipping the corner tip of your tortilla chip in the hot sauce, biting down, waving your hand in front of your mouth and declaring, “oooh that’s sooo spicy!” Not even a well-tipped waitress will fake sympathy for that weak shit. Oh yeah, and just because the restaurant is named “Chili’s” doesn’t mean the food is hot … not any more than a fish symbol on a business sign means they won’t fuck you in ways the devil himself never imagined. So, if you don’t like Mexican food, there are at least two northbound lanes on I-35. Ta Ta. Austin didn’t work out for you. Go back whence you came to the place where they spice their chili with cinnamon and nutmeg. Go back to the place where they eat flapjacks and Krispy Kremes for hangovers and pronounce jalapeño with a hard “J.” Don’t hate, emigrate. Leave us crazy Austicans to indulge in our sick, masochistic fetish for capsaicinoids. Leave us to sit sweating over our serranos, anchos, chipotles, piquins, and habaneros – both on the way in and the way out. Mexican food is why we live here. It’s why we came here. It’s why we can never leave. You think you can get a decent plate of migas in Maine? Unlikely. And we won’t be producing any world-class maple surple either, but we do make some mighty fine hot sauce. If you’re not convinced, you should check out this weekend’s Austin Chronicle Hot Sauce Festival, one of the world’s hottest events featuring a sampling of more than 300 hot sauce recipes and four Austin bands: NewBoy, White Ghost Shivers, Guy Forsyth, and the Texas Sapphires, all for a paltry donation of two nonperishable food items. If you don’t like Mexican food, this isn’t the event for you, but that’s OK, you should be busy packing anyway.