Bao'd Up is Open in Sunset Valley!

Pork belly guabao, one of my favorite items at Bao'd Up

BIG THANKS to Bao'd Up for 1) opening in South Austin 😊 and 2) having me out for lunch. This is a sponsored post, but all opinions are my own. I was not monetarily compensated for this post, nor was one requested from me. I am here to spread the good gospel of Bao'd Up!

Tables

I met my friend Rebecca of The Honest Foodist (check out her blog and especially her Instagram Stories!) for lunch at Bao'd Up on Friday, where we sampled a number of items on the menu.  They are located at 5207 Brodie Lane, right next door to Tarka and down from Petsmart.

When you walk in to Bao'd Up, there are four self-serve terminals on your right.  You do your own ordering, and it gives you options to customize like rice instead of noodles on the bowls. 

There are even options with the boba or bubble teas, from different flavors, to bases, to sweetness options. You can also place a to go order online. Once you pay, your receipt will have a bar code, or if ordering online, you'll receive a confirmation code. Don't throw your receipt out!

There are a couple screens inside the restaurant that show your name and order status. Once your order is ready, it is placed inside one of these lockers and it shows "completed" by your name on the screen. You either scan your receipt or enter your code on the keypad, and a locker door pops open.

Ta dah! There's your food! (And so if you're ordering online, you may never have to interact with staff at Bao'd but that doesn't mean you should forgo a tip.)

Yum yum! More explanation on what everything is, coming up!

Alex the manager admitted sometimes it's even hard for him to tell the pork bao apart! 😉 

Dang, I can't make this video larger. Here's Rebecca breaking bao (BBQ pork).

Brisket bao, a tasty Texas twist!

My favorite of the baos was the pork belly guabao (taco style) that's pictured at the very top of this post. The pork belly was so tender, it fell apart like pulled pork. And the flavors were phenomenal, though messy to eat!

This was my other favorite of everything we had, the spicy pork bowl with soft boiled egg and veggies. We got this with rice, but I will SO be getting this again with noodles! The pork had such a wonderful flavor and a nice medium spice level.  I am kind of drooling thinking about it right now! I loved this. 

I think this was Rebecca's favorite, the braised chicken bowl, which we got with gluten free glass noodles (I think they were Korean sweet potato noodles). The chicken must have cooked for ages because the meat fell off the bone and had a light Chinese five spice seasoning to it. She said it reminded her of her family's home style Vietnamese food.

Top left is the crispy fish guabao, where they use barramundi, a Pacific ocean fish, also known as Asian sea bass. It was nicely fried, meaty, and really good. Top right is the pork belly guabao, and at the bottom is chicken katsu (fried chicken cutlet). 

Not pictured is the egg cream bao, which I remember from their Mueller location, because it made me a fan of  them! And this one did not disappoint. Sunset Valley is now the third location for Bao'd Up, with Mueller as the original, and they opened on Rio Grande + 22nd Street earlier this summer. I am so thankful Bao'd Up has come to South Austin, as I honestly don't know a place down here that serves bao. A wonderful new spot for us Southies to enjoy! More Asian food, please!

Thanks again to Alex and the Bao'd Up team for having us for lunch!

Mural, part of the fun vibe at Bao'd Up. There's a similar one at the Mueller location too.

Cane Rosso + Cow Tipping Creamery

Updated October 2017

Pizza.
Soft serve ice cream.
It doesn't get much better than that for kids and adults alike.

The Elena, Honey Bastard, and Ella pizzas

The latest pizza player in Austin is a Dallas import. The well-regarded Cane Rosso Pizza which has several spots in the DFW area, was so impressed with the ice creams at Cow Tipping Creamery, that they bought the Austin-based food truck and have installed CTC storefronts. Conveniently for those of us in Austin, CR just opened in the old St. Philip in Sunset Valley with CTC going next door, in the old bake house spot.

These 900 degree ovens cook a pizza in about 90 seconds.

CR was packed on a Saturday evening at 5:30 pm, but fortunately our group of seven was able to snag a table fairly quickly. Five adults and two kids demolished four pies and a salad -- Margherita (pictured below), the Elena, Honey Bastard, and Ella above. The HB is an off-menu pizza, a white pie with soppressata, bacon jam, and habanero honey.

These are Neapolitan-style pizzas with a soft crust due to the use of Italian "00" flour, and they consider it to be a fork and knife experience, according to the waitress. My one critique is that the toppings are not evenly dispersed, particularly the bacon jam on the Honey Bastard.  And I 'd say the Elena doesn't have enough of local BBQ spot Valentina's Tex-Mex BBQ brisket on it to justify it's cost, but both are still delicious.

A Thursday lunch at 12:30 pm, it was only about half full. So if you can get there for lunch, it was a little more relaxed and a lot quieter. Three of us split the Honey Bastard (but note the uneven distribution of the bacon jam) along with a Capra salad; both times the salads were nice and fresh.

October 2017 update:
New chef Josh Healy has unveiled some new menu items. I was invited to a media tasting to check things out. Great happy hours, Monday through Friday, 5 - 7 pm, where several pizzas are only $5!

Crispy potatoes with a fabulous green sauce, which adds a lot of brightness.

Wood-fired St. Louis ribs; very tender, Asian flavors. I enjoyed them but our table was sort of split on these.

HUGE burrata! Super creamy and nice with balsamic drizzle and cherries. This thing was a monster, but we ate all of it! 

The Honey Bastard, still my favorite pizza there, with soppressata, bacon jam, and hot honey. 

The Metro Pizza, a three-foot long creation with your choice of toppings. Here we have Margherita, the Street Taco (with Valentina's Tex-Mex brisket and mole sauce), and arugula + prosciutto.  Great for a crowd!

The lovely and decadent truffle carbonara. Supple pappardelle pasta with loads of truffle flavor.
 By far the best of the pasta dishes we tried that night. 

Chef's special: butternut squash puree + goat cheese tortellini with beet puree and beet "dirt". Pan-toasted which gave them a great texture. Chef explained that he wanted the nightly specials to be plated differently so they stand out.

Cow Tipping specializes in soft serve and makes sundaes known as stackers. Fortunately, they have a kiddie size, which is still plenty of ice cream! I've also had the mint chocolate chip milkshake which was heavenly! Pictured below are the milkshake and a kiddie stacker.

Check out both Cane Rosso and Cow Tipping Creamery at 4715 S. Lamar Blvd, which is really the Hwy 290 eastbound frontage road, between Kohl's and the Toney Burger Center. While I don't see anything mentioning it online, on both visits to CR, I've seen people picking up to go orders, so it appears you can get your pizza to take home. Likewise, CTC has a freezer door with pints ready for take out. Make the kid in you happy with pizza and ice cream!

Royal India

I love Indian food, but apparently I am not having great luck with it in South Austin. Last fall I went to Asiana (see my post here) and was completely uninspired by the offerings (not to mention the decor), but have come to find out several foodie friends of mine like the place AND it made the Austin Chronicle's "First Plates" critic's picks list. Then last month, I tried Royal India, in the old Estancia Churrascaria location on the westbound Hwy. 290 access road, just before Brodie Lane in Sunset Valley. My friend and I met for an early Saturday evening dinner, and got there at 5:30 when they opened.

I ordered an iced chai tea which then took about 20 minutes to come. And when it did come, it was warm, and didn't have much flavor to it -- very little of the cardamom that I love about a hot or cold chai. So I told the waiter that. He said Indians don't drink it iced, only hot. And I understand his point completely (and no, there was not an iced option on the menu), but don't you think from the hospitality/customer service standpoint, that perhaps he should have said when I ordered it that it would essentially be a watered-down hot chai drink? Basically, we argued over the chai. He took it to the back and returned with more ice in it, but that didn't exactly help either. Fortunately, he did take it off the bill.

And on to the food. We shared an order of the vegetarian samosas, which I found to be bland. No cumin or coriander (or really any spice or salt) could be detected in the mashed potato interior.  Ironically, their online menu describes these as "well-seasoned."

My friend had the Aloo Gobi, a cauliflower and potato dish, which was fairly spicy; this was the best dish we ordered.

I had the lamb (kakori) kabobs from the Royal Tandoor portion of the menu. The ground meat was over-worked, and hence dried out. Tough meat is not very good meat in my book. I think the flavor was okay, though not memorable, but the execution was not.

I really wish I had better things to report. If you have been to Royal India and liked it, please tell me what you ate! I would love to have better things to write about.