Why not count Austin, Texas as part of the South? If nothing else, the Southern cuisine in Austin is certainly representative of what you might find in many places in Texas. Many might say it's not like the rest of the South because it's liberal, enlightened, and artsy -- but it is most certainly not the only place in the South, nor the only place in Texas, like it. Nearly every large city in the South, just like large cities in the North, votes liberal and has a thriving arts community.
That said, Austin *is* unique in Texas in the way that it is possibly unique in the whole country in its awesomeness (disclaimer, my parents retired there because of that, even though it was one of few places in Texas my father never lived) -- on my last trip I finally bought a "Keep Austin Weird" shirt -- but still, the fact that it's awesome doesn't make it not a product of, nor totally unrepresentative of, anything in the South. In fact it represents many Texan values for which Texas had always stood proud until corrupt oil barons, generally originally from the northeast, bought their way into political power and began to change things. [/huff]
Anyway, my Texan relatives have eaten at Firefly and pronounced it an absolutely wonderful representative of Southern cuisine, so you are quite right to call it that! I gotta get up there at some point...
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Date: 2008-01-09 05:48 pm (UTC)That said, Austin *is* unique in Texas in the way that it is possibly unique in the whole country in its awesomeness (disclaimer, my parents retired there because of that, even though it was one of few places in Texas my father never lived) -- on my last trip I finally bought a "Keep Austin Weird" shirt -- but still, the fact that it's awesome doesn't make it not a product of, nor totally unrepresentative of, anything in the South. In fact it represents many Texan values for which Texas had always stood proud until corrupt oil barons, generally originally from the northeast, bought their way into political power and began to change things. [/huff]
Anyway, my Texan relatives have eaten at Firefly and pronounced it an absolutely wonderful representative of Southern cuisine, so you are quite right to call it that! I gotta get up there at some point...