San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Three neweateries add to S.A. foodscape
They bring ants, grasshoppers, woodfire flavor
Note: The Express-News is suspending traditional restaurant reviews until restaurant dining rooms fully reopen.
It’s hard enough to keep a restaurant going under the best of circumstances. But for three successful operators in San Antonio, mere survival wasn’t nearly enough.
And so the teams behind the Piatti family of Italian restaurants, the Spanish paella powerhouse Toro Kitchen + Bar and the modernist Mexican madhouse called Mixtli launched new restaurants high into midpandemic orbit.
Only a few weeks old, those brave new concepts — Camp Outpost Co., Cuishe Cocina Mexicana and Kumo — each bring something special to the San Antonio table.
Camp Outpost Co.
Imagine if REI switched from selling camping gear to burgers and beer. That’s Camp Outpost Co., from the group that brought the Piatti chain of elegant Italian restaurants to San Antonio and beyond. This outdoorsy bar and grill serves cheffy takes on food you’d cook over a campfire.
It’s a breezy spot in the Lone Star district just south of downtown, its broad patio with picnic tables and an Airstream bar trailer shaded by canopy sails. The inside’s all high ceilings and exposed ductwork, with long steel tables and distressed wood. The smell of the wood-fired grill surrounds you like a memory and snaps you into the present with food that draws power from the smoke.
The Camp All-Natural Meat Plate ($19.95) flexes that campfire power the strongest, with rubyhearted slices of seared tri-tip steak, a juicy chicken leg quarter with lush rotisserie flavor and a snap-cased smoked sausage with charro beans on the side, served in an enameled tin cup like a lakeside cookout. The Camp Burger comes on almost as strong with a thick, grass-fed beef patty and a tumble of lettuce, tomato and onion on a mahogany brioche bun ($11.95 plus $1 for cheese).
But what gives Camp Outpost its true picnic flair is the constellation of small plates, salads and sides that conjure images of a table set by campers who know how to cook. Roasted beets teem with sliced orange, radishes,
pumpkin seeds and blue cheese ($4.95). Black bean and corn salad conveys earthy-sweet comfort ($3.95), and a Market Salad bowl is an all-in-one trip down the produce aisle with apples, mixed greens, beets and green beans accented with blue cheese and candied pecans ($11.95).
Camping out means glamping out with a tap wall that pours 10 craft beers and a half-dozen prebatched cocktails on draft, including a respectable Smoky Negroni with bracing Campari bitterness ($8.95) and a sweet Camp Hard Tea with vodka, lemon, pomegranate and iced tea in a hurricane glass ($8.95).
1811 S. Alamo St., 210-942-4690, eatatcamp.com. Open 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday to Thursday; 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Dine-in and curbside available. Third-party delivery coming by month’s end.
Cuishe Cocina Mexicana
How do you follow the breakout success of the stylish tapas and paella of San Antonio’s two locations of Toro Kitchen + Bar? If you’re restaurateur Gerardo De Anda and chef Juan Carlos Bazan, you put two upscale Mexican restaurants next to them.
And so Cuishe Cocina Mexicana was born, the first in Stone Oak last month and the second in St. Paul Square this month. Named for an agave plant used to make mezcal, Cuishe in Stone Oak is a labyrinth of themed spaces: an agave room, a barrel room, a cigar terrace and main bar with more than 150 agave spirits, from sotol to mezcal to tequila and a few you’ve never tried, but should.
In the kitchen, Bazan explores Central Mexico with food from the streets and posh haciendas
alike, starting with simple tacos of fried parsley seasoned with toasted grasshoppers ($12). The result is crunchy, earthy, nutty and unexpected, an aesthetic that carries over to Bichos ($12), a collection of scorpions, worms and grasshoppers served with guacamole.
Street food also gets a nod at Cuishe with Tacos de Canasta ($10), six minitacos served in a basket, shrouded in tissue paper to preserve their soft, steamy texture and flavors propelled by grilled onions, chicharrones, beans and potatoes. Chicharrón de Queso ($12) brings an edible bowl of fried Gouda cheese to break apart like chips with a vibrant green salsa.
Cuishe navigates into hightone territory with a trio of roasted beef marrow bones with garlic butter and nuggets of sirloin fried like a chicharrón for texture ($26). Tender roasted octopus channels the twangy achiote flavor of al pastor, amplified by pineapple chutney ($28).
At the bar, Cuishe treats mezcal with simple respect, served neat in clay jars on a board with toasted worms, oranges and chili salt. But mezcal proves its value as a mixer in lively cocktails like the San Miguel de Allende with deep red hibiscus ($11) and the after-dinner Puerto Escondido with Grand Marnier, Ancho Reyes chili liqueur and chocolate bitters ($14).
115 N. Loop 1604 E., Suite 1118, in Stone Oak, 210-960-8935, cuishemx.com. Open noon to 11 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, noon to 2 a.m. Friday and Saturday, noon to 9 p.m. Sunday. Dinein and takeout available. Opening Friday In St. Paul Square at 119 Heiman St., 210-960-8935.
Kumo
Like Mixtli that came before it, Kumo presents a challenge right out of the gate: Persuade skeptical San Antonians that their beloved Mexican food is worth the same compound-adjective attention to detail — and pricing
— as the high-end cuisines of the world.
Mixtli, set in a converted railroad car at The Yard in Olmos Park, rose to that challenge by becoming the best restaurant in San Antonio two years’ running in the Express-News “Top 100 Dining & Drinks” guide. Chefs Rico Torres and Diego Galicia closed Mixtli this fall to prepare for the move to a bigger space in Southtown early next year.
In Mixtli’s old space, they opened Kumo this month, channeling the Japanese concept of omakase, wherein chefs choose your dinner for you, guiding you through multiple courses — much the same way Mixtli operated. Factoring the automatic 20 percent service charge and tax, the ticket price comes to $109 a person at Kumo — also much the same as Mixtli’s price point.
And while the eight or nine courses of guacamole, tostadas, tacos and other small bites might stretch the value proposition, watching two of the country’s most innovative chefs in action makes the experience a must-see event for adventurous San Antonians.
The menu will change regularly, but opening night began with guacamole flavored with Oaxacan ants called chicatanas, roasted grasshoppers, cilantro, purslane, nasturtium flowers and a side of blue corn tostadas. Creamy, nutty, crunchy, floral — that’s a lot to pack into half an avocado shell.
Dinner progressed through lush slices of cold-smoked swordfish with a sauce of coconut aminos, rice wine vinegar, serrano chilies, orange peel and toasted sesame seeds, followed by a blue corn tortilla with oaksmoked carrots and Mexican ricotta cheese. Then came a sope-style blue corn memela with a riot of white beans, nopales, purslane, boiled egg and pico de gallo, followed by the night’s most compelling bite: a blue corn tostada with chorizo and scallops spiced like an al pastor street taco.
The night finished with a rich duck enmolada and a taco made with compressed beef suadero and chili mole that gave substance to the flash, followed by delicate chocolate truffles with fuses lit like little flavor bombs. It’s BYOB, so raise a toast to your curious nature and the enduring spirit of San Antonio’s dining scene.
5251McCullough Ave. at The Yard in Olmos Park, 210-338-0746, restaurantmixtli.com/kumo. Seating by ticketed reservation only, 5 to 9:15 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Dine-in only.