Leo Davila’s Apple Watch buzzed with a textual content message at 9:09 a.m.
Seated at Alamo Metropolis Barber School for his weekly buzz reduce, Davila glanced down at a screenshot of names from the James Beard Basis.
The checklist appeared under a headline in daring sort, “Finest Chef: Texas.”
The messenger, a fellow chef in Houston, wrote: “You made it!!!!” For a break up second, Davila’s imaginative and prescient blurred. Goosebumps rose on his tattooed arms. Then he made a fist, gave a slight muscle flex, and wrote again, “Wow, I can’t consider it!”
Lower than 4 years after opening Stixs & Stone, a Mexican-Asian fusion restaurant with solely eight tables, Davila was named a James Beard Award semifinalist.
His thoughts raced within the barber chair, recollections swirling. There he was in 2018, promoting tacos at a farmers market bustling with clients, however he had solely two: his mom and grandmother.
There he was at a taco truck throwdown, the one competitor serving out of a tent.
There he was, right down to his previous couple of hundred {dollars}, considering he may need to enter one other enterprise.
And there he was, telling his teacher at culinary college that he was going to drop out as a result of he wasn’t ok.
However now? Now his watch and cellphone have been blowing up with congratulatory messages.
Now he couldn’t wait to inform his employees. Leaning again with clippers buzzing up his neck, Davila settled right into a dream, seated on high of the San Antonio culinary world.
He’s one among 26 Texas cooks named as James Beard semifinalists for greatest chef within the state.
Different listed locals are Jennifer Hwa Dobbertin of Finest High quality Daughter, Gray Hwang of Shiro Japanese Bistro, Emil Oliva of Leche de Tigre, John Ramos and Jonathan Reyes of Chika and Alex Sarmiento and Brenda Sarmiento of El Pastor Es Mi Señor.
Finalists can be introduced on April 2, winners on June 16.
The James Beard Basis launched its checklist on Jan. 24.
The following day, a protracted line fashioned outdoors Stixs & Stone, a hole-in-the-wall on Wurzbach Highway in Leon Valley. Squeezed inside a protracted row of small institutions, the restaurant is straightforward to overlook. Informed the wait can be a couple of hour, clients didn’t flip away.
Maybe nobody was happier than Davila’s sister, Michelle McCall, the restaurant’s common supervisor. “I used to be past thrilled,” she stated. “We’re a hotspot for folks from all around the state.”
McCall remembers the lean occasions. The lengthy hours. The scraps of enterprise.
“I labored for ideas,” she stated. “It was battle, battle, battle. Push onerous. Push onerous. Push onerous. It was positively humbling.”
Davila adopted an unconventional path to success.
A 40-year-old San Antonio native, he didn’t start cooking till his mid-20s. He bought meals poisoning after sampling one among his early dishes. The son of a Hispanic father and Chinese language mom, Davila tried to mix the flavors of two cultures within the kitchen, however struggled in culinary college. After an teacher persuaded him not to surrender, he pressed on, incomes a level in culinary administration from the Artwork Institute of San Antonio.
He went to work for a meals producer. Along with his sister’s assist, he served as a weekend vendor on the Pearl Farmers Market. In 2018, he turned a culinary chef on the college he practically give up and opened his personal enterprise, a pop-up known as, “Catch The Wave.” Davila, it appeared, couldn’t catch a monetary break.
Inside a yr, he thought-about closing.
In 2019, with out telling his sister, he determined to spend his remaining $400 to enter Taco Fest, a neighborhood competitors. To his shock, he gained. Then he gained two extra cooking competitions.
Davila completed 2019 with a surge of optimism just for enterprise to get slammed by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. He pivoted to yard catering to outlive.
The next yr, he opened his first brick and mortar, Stixs & Stone. His signature dish, the Massive Purple and barbacoa taco flight, turned an immediate hit.
Corn tortillas infused with, sure, Massive Purple soda. Tasty barbacoa drizzled with strawberry jam and topped with salsa, queso fresco, pecan pesto and a pickled watermelon rind. Texas Month-to-month liked it. And a restaurant that provides a hen and Hong Kong waffle dish landed on the journal’s checklist as a high taqueria in Texas.
Enterprise boomed. It boomed much more in 2024 when Texas Month-to-month named Massive Purple & Barbacoa the eighth greatest taco in Texas. “The cellphone has not stopped ringing,” Davila stated.
Flush with enterprise and awards, phrase unfold that James Beard recognition was on its approach. Davila waited on edge final yr. Anticipation grew. Hope soared. Then got here a intestine punch: Stixs & Stone didn’t make the reduce.
Davila mirrored, asking himself a tough query: “Did I’m going from the love of cooking to chasing an accolade?” He resolved to pursue his past love — making good meals — and returned to the fundamentals. “I by no means need to go down this path once more,” he informed himself.
In the meantime, all 35 seats at Stixs & Stone crammed up. Guests drove in from all around the state to strive the No. 8 taco in Texas. Folks flew in from Australia and France. Prospects savored the Mexican-style avenue corn and Korean fried cauliflower. They raved in regards to the pan-seared duck breast with hibiscus mole.
Davila didn’t like mole rising up. As a chef, he needed to know why. “Was it the chocolate notes?” he requested himself. “Was it the sesame notes?“ He eradicated elements he disliked, changing them with these he liked. The method yielded appropriate moles for his palate: hibiscus, pumpkin and pecan.
Davila is a UNESCO chef ambassador who likes to discover and experiment. Stixs & Stone, he explains, is just not a mix of Mexican and Chinese language dishes. It’s not carne guisada in an egg roll. It’s a fusion of Hispanic and Asian elements and strategies, a melding of two cultures served as a single presentation.
Davila and his employees served Hispanic-Asian fare at a pageant in China final yr. Whereas there, Go to San Antonio invited the staff to prepare dinner at a Platform by James Beard Basis occasion at Pier 57 in New York. Davila’s staff served a three-course meal that included hibiscus and pecan mole with duck.
The suggestions from the James Beard employees floored him. “They stated, ‘Oh wow, I’ve by no means had something like that earlier than,’” Davila recalled. “One of many cooks adopted me on Instagram and despatched me a congratulations notice.”
Unbeknownst to Davila, inspectors from the James Beard Basis visited Stixs & Stone over the subsequent few months. Psychological notes have been taken. Observations made quietly.
Davila awoke on Jan. 24, understanding the annual checklist of semifinalists can be launched. When his Apple Watch buzzed within the barber chair, he had no concept how life would change.
“It was mind-blowing,” stated Stixs & Stone chef Hunter McCall, Michelle’s husband.
Davila doesn’t know what to anticipate on April 2. Possibly he’ll be a finalist. Possibly he gained’t. All he is aware of for certain is all of the sweat and toil has been price it.
As soon as he was serving Frito pie in a farmer’s market pop-up. Now he’s in rivalry for the highest culinary award in America.
