Roll On Sushi Diner, a concept restaurant that serves fusion items like the Cholesta Roll (chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes instead of rice, deep fried and served with cream gravy) alongside more traditional offerings like a spicy tuna roll, served in a diner-setting, is opening this Thursday, August 18 at 5350 Burnet Road in the AMLI building.

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Tyson Cole is a smart chef. To encourage pre-orders of his new Uchi: the Cookbook, Cole is throwing a VIP book signing on March 1 at Uchiko...with complimentary passed dishes straight from the pages of the new tome. If you're interested, head to uchicookbook.com for more information. The new book retails for $39.95 and was co-authored by Texas Monthly and Fodor's contributor Jessica Dupuy. more ›

Uchi may be Austin's most beloved restaurant: it placed first in The Fearless Critic's most recent edition, scoring a 9.8 out of 10. The rub: it also came in at an average cost of $80 - not unfair given the restaurant's sterling rep, but also not designed for everyday consumption. In a fun twist, Uchi has decided to do a limited "bargain" of sorts by offering a 14-seat community table once a month for just $45. The next event takes place on Monday, 10/25, and as of this writing, a few seats are still available. more ›

• Our prayers have been answered: there’s now fried beer at the State Fair of Texas!
• We’re shocked! A BP exec is "astonished" at a mistake in the failsafe device for the oil well that caused that oil spill in the Gulf. Next, will they reveal that they were expecting unicorns to come in and clean up the mess?
• If you aren’t ready to pile in the car and go to this Houston sushi joint immediately after reading this review, you might be suffering from a defective sense of yummy.

• Austin volunteers spent Father’s Day fixing up Flo’s Comfort House, an unofficial community day care center serving kids in the Montopolis neighborhood. (Picture number three in the related photo set shows how dirty these volunteers were after spending a day cleaning and repairing the place!)
• The Cactus Cafe isn’t closing, but supporters wonder if it’s really “saved.”
• Actress Meggan Anderson was arrested at a PETA protest in Dallas, "for trying to incite a crowd." The Dallas Observer reported that the event involved 20 protesters, and at least eight cops arresting the topless girl. As one commenter asked, “how many DPD officers does it take to arrest a naked chick?

There seems to be some confusion about the why and wherefore of Tacodeli. So, to offer a clarification: Tacodeli is not a hybrid eatery where you can get black beans with a side of pastrami. Tacodeli is, however, an exclusively Tex-Mex breakfast-thru-lunch taco bar with three locations in Austin. The third location quietly opened this month on North Lamar, right across the street from Central Market. more ›

Uchi's take on ceviche consists of of salmon, striped bass, vine-ripened tomatoes, yellow bell peppers, garlic and cilantro drizzled in a light vinegar mixture. more ›

Crave's vegan and vegetarian-friendly menu features a large variety of Japanese cuisine (sushi, tempura, miso soup), Thai favorites (pad thai, curries), and pan-Asian stir-fries at reasonable prices. more ›

Shilla offers delicious beef and pork bulgogi, tabletop barbecuing for marinated ribs and the like, and whole broiled mackerel. Shilla also offers sushi that, while not exactly top-tier, is fresh and better than we expected. more ›

Prefuse 73 - Preparations Electronic musician Guillermo Scott Herren, a.k.a. Prefuse 73, has spent years building some of the most elaborate and abstract hip-hop productions on the market today; thing is, they’re aren’t really on the market. Rather than auctioning his wares to the highest bidder, Herren weaves his tracks together into loose instrumental albums, bringing in a guest MC if he feels like it. Preparations, his latest, features plenty of vocals, but barely any... more ›

Fall is here, the weather is cooling, and the prospect of an outdoor food and wine tasting has mentally moved from "it's too hot!" to "that sounds perfect." One of the marquee wine events of the fall, Tour De Vin pairs eleven chefs and over 100 wines in a "sip and stroll" format tasting on Thursday, October 4th. This is the fifth anniversary of the event, and the wine lineup looks to be the... more ›

Austin is full of small, out of the way places that we have grown to love. These aren't the big name restaurants that everyone already knows about or the restaurants in the warehouse district or downtown locations. In fact, two of them are in nondescript strip malls, and one is surrounded by giant safety cones. These places offer up good (and in the case of Tomo, great) food in locations away from the city center.... more ›

Maru (Japanese) Location: 4636 Burnet Rd [map] Phone: (512) 458-6200 Cost: Starters $5-8, Maki Rolls $6-13 Atmosphere: Not much to speak of, as it's on a nondescript part of Burnet Road in some modest and anonymous white-walled digs. Food: There are three reasons to visit Maru, and they are simply the freshness of the fish, the affordability of high-quality sushi, and the modest $5 corkage charge. Maru's decor is as plain as can be,... more ›

MONDAY [11] film • Patton Oswalt live with "Ratatouille" sneak preview at Alamo Downtown film • Music Monday: "Harry Nilsson's Birthday Party" at Alamo Downtown food • Central Market Cooking School Class: Sushi 101 with Chef Timothy Thomas at Central Market Cooking School, 4001 N Lamar ($70, 6:30-9:30pm) music • Maserati, My Education, Lazar Wolf at Emo's music • Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, Cheer Accident, Oh, Beast at Emo's music • Manu Chao at Stubb's... more ›

MONDAY [9] books • Jillian Robinson presents Change Your Life Through Travel at BookPeople (7:00pm) comedy • 22nd Annual Funniest Person in Austin Contest, hosted by John Ramsey at Cap City Comedy Club dance • Spank Dance's "4Red Lines" at Secret Location, Check Austinist's Clues (5:30pm) film • "Harold and Kumar" with All-You-Can-Eat Mini-Burgers at Alamo Downtown film • Music Mondays: "Times Square" at Alamo Downtown film • Jim Jarmusch Film Series: "Dead Man"... more ›

Sixty restaurants, thirty wineries, and you. This is perhaps the simplest way to describe the indulgence that is the Stars Across Texas tasting at the Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival. A veritable "who's who" of Texas restaurants each prepare small portions of signature dishes for guests to sample, making the most difficult choice simply what to eat before you run out of room. Last year, we had sushi tarts from Roy's, Shiner-braised... more ›

Coldtowne Conservatory's Tami Nelson and Chris Trew are Hurricane Katrina transplants who also happen to be pretty damn funny improv artists with a sold out FronteraFest 2007 show - one a.m. Austinist got up close and personal with these two cut-ups, and this is what we found out: Tell me about the background and history of Coldtowne Conservatory. Tami Nelson: So, Tami Nelson and Chris Trew are in Coldtowne and one a.m. is the... more ›

Is anyone else tired of Christmas music yet, or is it just us? While eating Sushi one night last week we were forced to listen to Feliz Navidad. Give us a break. Some Bing Crosby or Sinatra music on Christmas Eve is fine, but when Sisqo has a holiday album out it's time to stop the madness. The point of this diatribe is to point out that it can be very hard to make... more ›

There are plenty of fish in the sea...or not. Some kinds of seafood are soon going to be extinct from restaurant menus. We're worried about the status of sushi. How will we go on? Talk about a Military Crisis. This isn't Short Circuit (1,2 or 3). When Samsung gets going here in Austin, we want to make sure they leave their robots at home, and these, too. Good news: premature ejaculation is a common... more ›

We didn't realize there were that many sushi joints in Central Texas, until we surfed on over to the newly relaunched AustinSushi.com, a website-slash-blog for slightly obsessive fans of Japanese cuisine that sports its own themed flickr stream. The site sports witty post titles like "Badass Bim Bab Not In Bubbaland" and "More Turnover, Less Filling," and an extensive repository of knowledge of all-things-sushi ... like, how you might enlist a professional chef to cater your next sex orgy or, for those more adventurous types, where you can find macrobiotic vegetarian sushi. They've also implemented an insane (and pretty) Flash-based interactive map of every sushi bar from Manchaca to Round Rock. more ›

The Austin Asian Film Festival kicks off tomorrow at the Drafthouse Downtown. The annual showcase runs through Sunday, and features over thirty full-length films, documentaries, and shorts. Countries represented in their schedule include Bhutan, China, North and South Korea, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, and more. A full-access pass to the festival costs $25 for AFS members, and $35 for the general public - those of you on a budget can still enjoy many of their programs, as well over a dozen screenings on the UT campus are free. more ›

M O N D AY [ 31 ] music/party · The White Ghost Shivers' Halloween Ball at American Legion Hall! Burlesque, Independence Brew, apple bobbing with the TX Roller Girls, Tarot card readings, a kissing booth and more. The White Ghost Shivers will also be performing a live soundtrack to accompany Buster Keaton's "Cops." ($25, 9pm) music · Galactic, Mofro and New Monsoon at Stubb's music · Halloween Show at Emo's with Flametrick Subs, Satans... more ›

There's just too much stuff happening tonight to keep track of, so we're reposting the IST list for your convenience. See you out there. ( F I R S T ) T H U R S D A Y art · In House Gallery presents “Barnyard”, with paintings by Ethan Azarian, Felice House, Rachel Koper & Rainey Navaro. 5-10pm. Thanks, Austinist newbie Craig! [map] music · Hurts to Purr, Maneja Beto, and La La Land... more ›

Austin's latest downtown loft+office+retail haven is the master-planned 2nd Street District, which houses the new city hall site along with several mammoth mixed-use buildings just north of Town Lake. While we're convinced that it's merely the next step in mega-developer AMLI's nefarious plot to enslave our city's simple yuppie folk, we're nevertheless drawn to the district's distinctive architecture, swanky shops, and quasi-art installations. All of which remind us, shockingly, of every other higher-end development sprouting up across the country. (Here's where we'd usually insert some snide comment about how our neighbors covet commoditized luxury goods, but we're too busy trolling the Design Within Reach website.) more ›

Sometimes the Austinist gets a little somewhat mind-numbingly lazy, especially during the hot hot heat of the summer months. We've been known to lock ourselves into our apartment, crank up the A/C, close the blinds, order in, and watch back-to-back episodes of The West Wing on DVD. And while we luuurve The West Wing, it’s not really the most productive way to spend our days. We know this. Thus, we have to find stuff to occupy our time, and (gasp!) maybe we should learn a little something, too. more ›