Written by the Seasons by Kathy Tran for the Advocate
The Eater blog is well known for keeping a finger on the pulse of the dining scene in cities and small towns across the land. Dallas editor Courtney E. Smith earlier this week published the Eater Awards winners for our dear burg, and, no surprise, it includes several mentions of Oak Cliff restaurants.
They gave Restaurant of the Year title to Restaurant Beatrice. Located at 1111 Beckley, the Creole and Cajun eatery, under executive chef Michelle Carpenter, “elevates foods made from Black and Indigenous traditions, and Acadian peasant-style meals, into fine dining,” as Smith puts it.
The new restaurant, which replaced Jonathan’s, is named after Carpenter’s “mammaw,” Beatrice.
Best New Restaurant went to Written by the Seasons, located in the heart of the Bishop Arts District at 308 Melba.
Written by the Seasons by Kathy Tran for the Advocate
Written by the Seasons, according to Eater, “has quietly built up a cult following in the year that it has been open. It’s easy to see why upon stepping inside.”
But the way it’s set up, you need not even step inside to see the beauty of this restaurant — wide floor- to-ceiling windows allow shoppers cruising Bishop to gaze enviously at the diners inside.
If you’ve seen Lark on the Park at Klyde Warren Park, it’s like that.
And guess why? The owners, husband-wife duo, Melody Bishop and Dennis Kelley, used to own Lark in the Park. (It closed shortly after their departure.)
“It’s a very approachable restaurant menu,” Bishop told the Advocate last summer. “If you’re vegan, you don’t have to be concerned here.”
Steak, pork, fish and chicken dishes are on the menu. But even items that aren’t listed as vegan can be modified, she says. The chefs are very accommodating to dietary restrictions and don’t mind special requests.
“We don’t sit down and say, ‘OK, we need to make a dairy-free dish,’” she says. “We just think of a way to make a dish that would taste good, and organically our menu tends to have a lot of options for a lot of people.”
Bar of the Year, according to Eater, is Bar Eden. It is a gorgeous, interesting and exotic sibling to Paradiso on Bishop. (Just located an old press release in which owners Exxir Hospitality call it “Paradiso’s mysterious older brother”.) According to Eater it far exceeds its initial role as a holding area for Paradiso patrons awaiting their table.
According to Smith for Eater, “Sitting in its lush greenery and gilded touches, in a high-backed booth for two, is delightfully intimate, as is the limited cocktail menu. It does the work of evoking a garden of paradise and then some.” Nicely put.
Also in the Paradiso family, for the rest of this month, is the Tipsy Elf, which is a Paradiso-Bar Eden-adjacent bar in the middle of an unorganized yet well-stocked pop-up Christmas decoration warehouse with nightly performances by Miss Gay Texas.
