Mussolini may have been famous for making the Italian trains run on time, but he never lived long enough to work with or for Amtrak. And despite a truly weird invasion of Ethiopia, he never tried anything quite as outlandish as staging a food festival in what has to be the single most remote area of Texas. That job was left to a young fellow named Stewart Ramser, who already had one Viva Big Bend Music Festival under his belt before attempting to enjoy the same success with food.
There was no shortage of surprises during the festival this past weekend, yet one of them probably wasn’t that the Amtrak train organized from Houston to Alpine arrived several hours behind schedule - courtesy of a freight train that happened to be blocking the track west of San Antonio. Still, by the time the Foodie Train (a rail car commandeered by Abbey Branch, originally of Alpine but now of The Woodlands) pulled into the depot, people were happy to set foot on terra firma for all kinds of excellent reasons.
The Foodie Train had one major draw beyond a non-driving trip to and from the Viva Big Bend Food Festival: Houston celeb-chef Monica Pope of Sparrow Bar + Cook Shop, who served food on the overnight train heading west, taught several hands-on cooking class once arrived, and even staged a pop-up dinner in an iconic Alpine hardware store. With a band keeping the depot lively, Pope here receives the key to the city from the mayor of Alpine - a longtime chemistry professor and then movie-theater operator known around town as “Dr. Rangra.”
While there were events attached to the festival - and live music every time you turned around - most of the eating took the form of restaurant opportunities in the four towns of Alpine, Marfa, Fort Davis and Marathon. It was possible, only months after Century Grill opened for dinner at Alpine’s historic Holland Hotel, to also enjoy the new lunch. Pictured above is the Kinky Friedman Reuben sandwich, a kind of “Texas Jewish” thing featuring smoked brisket where the deli corned beef would typically be.
There was also a presence of one of America’s newest craft beer operations, Big Bend Brewing Co. in Alpine. Though the business is barely a few months old, its head brewer started out making beer at home (as have so many in the craft beer movement) and then spent more than two decades making it professionally in Austin. Big Bend beers are now available only by the keg in bars but soon will be making the jump to cans, with an eye on Texas-wide distribution.
Althought the event title mentions only food, there were plenty of things to drink - mostly in conjunction with live music in any venue imaginable and a few that maybe weren’t. Tito’s Handmade Vodka of Austin was on hand, being deftly stirred into cocktails by mixology consultant David Alan, whose new book Tipsy Texan is due out in June. Who knew just how “Texan” vodka could be?
For many, a highlight of the entire festival was a trip by van out to the Marfa Maid goat farm and dairy, where Malinda Beeman and Allan McLane have joined forces to produce several variations of first-class goat cheese. The Marfa Maid line is sold at several local retailers, plus by Malinda herself at each Saturday’s Farm Stand Marfa.
It isn’t often in life that you get to pet the goats, see the milking operation and finally hear all about how that milk becomes cheese. Talk about getting back to nature - and of course, very Marfa, through and through.
Every bit as quirky, come to think of it, was David Beebe’s fanciful Airstream Land built around his own taco food trailer called Boyz 2 Men. As you can see amid the Houston native’s growing collection of vintage Airstreams, this stark corner facing Highway 90 can also proclaim itself the Smallest Drive-In Movie in Texas. There were several events held here during the festival, including one no-doubt beer-besotted movie night.
Just down the street from the Holland and its Century Grill, there’s a class-act bar that also serves excellent food called the Saddle Club. Western hipster from head to toe, the chefs behind the place are so committed to drinking that they serve only foods that make you drink. And that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Consider, for instance, the Saddle Club’s “Stephen’s Scrimp” with roasted garlic beurre blanc and roasted red pepper aioli, or these beer-battered “Epic Fries” topped with smoked brisket, queso, bacon and a squirt-bottle swirl of sauces tending toward the hot. And as though just in time to celebrate the first Viva Big Bend Food Festival, the place finally got its own neon sign. Like so many things about the weekend, it was art that lit up the night.
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