Crystal Wise
The James Beard Foundation previously nominated Don Artemio as a best new restaurant in 2023.
One year removed from Fort Worth going nomination-less at the 2024 James Beard Awards, and only a few months after the city went star-less at Texas’ first Michelin Guide Awards, Cowtown has received yet another punch to its culinary gut: Fort Worth is again shut out of the annual James Beard Awards — the “Oscars of the food world.”
Early Wednesday, the James Beard Foundation announced the restaurants, bars, and chefs that made its list of semifinalists in 25 different categories. On the Texas front, Houston establishments received 10 nods, Austin and San Antonio received seven each, Dallas received five, and El Paso three. El Paso also received the state’s only Outstanding Restaurant nomination, which went to ELEMI.
In the category of Best Chef: Texas, two mid-city chefs sneaked in as semifinalists, including Fasicka Hicks and Patrick Hicks of Smoke’N Ash BBQ in Arlington and Anais Paniagua and Iris Rojas of Doña Maria in Irving.
This year, Fort Worth has the distinction of being the second most populous city to receive zero nominations from the James Beard Foundation, with the most populous being Jacksonville, Florida. And San Jose was the only other city with at least 600,000 residents to not have a single semifinalist.
Despite this year's exclusion, Fort Worth is no stranger to the James Beard Foundation; in 2023, Don Artemio, the upscale and innovative Mexican restaurant on West 7th, was a semifinalist in the category of Best New Restaurant.
Though he ultimately didn’t take home any hardware, Don Artemio’s co-owner was nonetheless honored to be recognized as a semifinalist. “It’s an incredible honor just to be nominated,” Burciaga told Malcolm Mayhew in June 2023. “Hundreds of new restaurants open every year. To be singled out for what we’re doing here; it’s just unthinkable.”
While Fort Worth has received James Beard nominations in the past, the city has yet to produce an actual winner. Of course, such exclusions can leave the local food scene in a state of anger, discouragement, or disbelief, or, hopefully, the scene can use it as a catalyst for improvement. And it’s not so much the nominations given to Houston, Austin, or dare we say, Dallas that’s troubling. Rather, it’s when one sees the likes of Oklahoma City, Tulsa, and Albuquerque on the list multiple times that the snub starts to stick in one’s craw.
But, with a slew of noteworthy restaurants set to open in 2025, and the Michelin Guide returning to Cowtown for seconds, the culinary scene’s trajectory is trending upward.
