Seafood/Fish: Not much available locally. Scallops and shrimp at Chinese Reastaurant is closest to seafood in Zapata. Steak House has a limited selection and fairly good shrimp there. Catfish available locally at several places including Godkins, Steakhouse and Holiday.

Culinary Observations 10/13/02 - It is not often that I reach a point where I am compelled to commit to writing my indignation at what passes in some Zapata eateries for "food service". After last night's experience, this morning is one of those times.

It all started out innocent enough. I opened the store Saturday morning at 5:30 am as I usually do when a fishing tournament is in town. It was Saturday and remembering that this was the day that my usual favorite breakfast place had a relief cook who was well known for ruining Saturdays by burning potatoes, serving leaking eggs and other feats normally performed by only the fine chefs of Europe, I went for "Did Somebody Say McDonalds"?

I do not know why it is that relief cooks always cook on Saturday, but that seems to be the case in Zapata. Anyway, after a hard day, which included a drive to the State Park for the Wildcat Bass Club's weigh-in, several hours spent updating and posting tournament results and fishing reports, it was 7:30 pm and time to grab some dinner. We headed out and, being in no mood to wait thirty minutes for our meal, I made a pass through town and identified the restaurant with the least number of cars (which shall be nameless) and pulled in.

My wife ordered a hamburger and I went for the small chicken fry. She made the mistake of dipping one of the cold chips in the super-sized-for-hot salsa and it was sometime before she could quit crying and coughing. Our meal came out quickly enough since it was the only order in the kitchen, but my chicken fry looked bad, make that horrible. It was burnt brown on one end and the breading was gone from some of the edges and one side. It looked like the last piece of meat that had been laying in a smorgasbord pan for six hours at the local truck stop. I called the waitress and inquired as to whether this was typical of all their chicken fry's or if this was a new cook. You just are not going to believe her response. She said, and I quote," The cook tonight normally is the dish washer, but tonight he is the cook". Well, I tried a small piece while she stood there observing my reaction. It absolutely tasted as bad as it looked so I requested she take it back and bring me a hamburger. I had requested the chicken fry with extra salad and no rice or beans because I am so tired of getting rice and beans, regardless of what you order. I honestly think I will dump it on the floor next time I see it on my plate. I thought about eating just the salad, but my wife kept reminding me how good her burger was so I caved in and went for what seemed to be a sure thing.

One of these days there will be a restaurant in Zapata that will be so successful no other place will have any customers. When you go in for lunch, they will have a vegetable or two as an option for the rice and beans that they now force on us with every virtually meal. (To their credit, the Holiday does serve vegetables and if you are lucky enough to hit Tina's when they have grilled vegetables, well that is special). One of the vegetable choices might even be steamed and on special days they might even have Brussels sprouts. Seems like no eatery in South Texas even knows what they are. They will of course also have homemade bread or rolls and they will serve it with margarine that does not have to be dug out of small packets. Best of all, you won't have to beg for it. They just serve it to everyone like water and salt and pepper, no big deal.

On Friday for a special, or any day you choose to order it and wait a little longer, they will have a country pan-fried chicken with mashed potatoes, veggie, hot rolls (in a basket) and iced tea. Oh yeah, and a cobbler for dessert. When you go in for breakfast, one of your choices at this phantom eatery will always be a ham & eggs special featuring a big slice of bone-in sugar-cured ham. Served with eggs, hash brown a couple slices of tomato, some homemade bread and a good blackberry jam. You might even find a homemade croissant or cinnamon roll on the menu. They might even have a strawberry jam to flavor the croissant.

Lunch will only come with chips and salsa when you order a Mexican plate and the chips will be like they serve in old Mexico, not the Doritos knock-offs that are served nearly every place in Zapata. They are a blight on civilization. Salsa might even be offered in mild and hot varieties instead of just the gastro burn-out formula that you now find in most of the Zapata eateries. Holiday does have hands down the best salsa in town and I recommend it highly as well as their ham breakfasts even if it isn't on par with sugar-cured bone-in ham. In most of the other places in town expect to receive a laser-sliced ham that is reminiscent of the cheapest lunch meat, in the cheapest store, in the smallest town in Mexico.

Dinner you ask? Well here you go again. The best two or three steaks, ribeye, filet mignon and New York steak 1 1/2 inches or more thick is absent from Zapata Steak Houses. I will say that the hamburger steak at the Holiday is about as good as you will find in the free world and just about that big. Their ribeyes and Filets are acceptable, but not quite as thick as one might like. A properly cooked medium-rare steak of any kind in Zapata is rare, no pun intended. It really does not matter what you order, it usually comes out overcooked or so raw you have to send it back and it is then returned overcooked. One way or the other, figure on ending up with a steak that fails to meet your exact specifications. One place has ribeye on the menu, but instead they serve you a rib steak. Forget trying to expalin the difference, you might as well be ordering Brussels Sprouts. And how about recalibrating the scales so a 16 Oz steak weighs at least somewhere in the vicinity of a pound?

I still have enough Yankee in me to believe that appetizers need to be appetizing. They should include things like rumaki, stuffed mushrooms and maybe even some crab-stuffed shrimp, not just panchos, nachos and chips. Don't get me wrong, I like panchos, but not every day, at every restaurant and with no other options. You can only tolerate so much of a good thing after which it becomes about as appealing as a greasy spoon chicken fry.

One last complaint that applies to every place I have eaten in Zapata and that is regarding waitress training, which seems to be as scarce as 10lb bass in Falcon. Waitresses should be trained to control aberrant behavior like rug rats screaming and running amuck with less than zero parental supervision. These groups need to be relegated to a backroom or be required to discipline their kids, chain them to a table leg or remove them from civilization completely. Waitresses also need to be trained to have anyone conversing on a cell phone for more than long enough to say, "Sorry I am eating, I'll call you when I finish", to take it outside and talk there. I have no interest in having my meal disrupted by an inconsiderate cell phone dependent low life unless they are providing vital information involving insider trading or stock manipulations on which I can make some serious money.

I doubt we will ever see any of the above changes in Zapata, but if we ever get over the hump on the Falcon Lake Improvement Program, I just might kick off a culinary deprivation protest. In my opinion, the Holiday comes the closest to achieving the quality, quantity and level of service of the hypothetical proposed facility in this article and the owner has a great attitude and tries very hard.