We're consistently baffled at the pitiable coverage national websites offer when it comes time to vector in on Austin's food scene.

For example: We received a twitter alert this morning that Serious Eats, the laughable national website had penned a "College Tours: Where to Eat Near the University of Texas at Austin" claiming that "Several subpar taco joints are the only thing distinguishing the food around UT-Austin."

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There has been a breakthrough.

We're coming up on our 3 year anniversary at Scrumptious Chef and are pleased to note that in the past month our readership has finally exploded. There were sad days and lonely nights in the past, when we considered abandoning the project, but we vowed to keep on writing, blogging and riding around town developing stories til we found our audience. Thanks for the support y'all.

Now on to the weekly Top 5 Scrumptious Chef articles.

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Austin, Texas is chock-a-block with agua fresca shops with quality ranging from abysmal to sublime. This post concerns itself with the sublime.

La Fruta Feliz began its life as a juice shop but quickly transformed into the best brick and mortar Mexican restaurant in East Austin. Thankfully, they did not forget their roots. You haven't lived til you've had a sandia agua fresca from this tiny taqueria.

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Another big week as we shattered our 7 day page views and unique visits records. Thanks y'all. Sometimes the job is a grind but we're dedicated to pushing through the hard work and getting the Austin Texas food news out there-daily.

On to the hottest Austin Texas food stories we reported on this week, gleaned from the twenty four articles we penned over the past 7 days.

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The fall of the once mighty Times-Picayune, the daily newspaper of New Orleans, has been well documented, but when you're five hundred miles from the Big Easy, it's still the best way to stay abreast of the day to day news of the city.

Like how Texas chef Jack Gilmore of Jack Allen's kitchen fared in the Great American Seafood Competition Saturday afternoon at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. It's hard to fathom Gilmore doing anything but winning but there it is in black and white. Gilmore finished 3rd.

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Busy week at Scrumptious Chef. We hosted our second pop up restaurant in Austin at Three Little Pigs and it damn near killed us. Of course that doesn't mean that we're not doing another one. Watch this space for info on pop up number three, this time we're tackling Tex Mex. Now let's take a look at the hottest Austin food stories of the week.

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I remember when Zagat was relevant.

Back in the Paleolithic era of searching for good food, the narrow, oblong Zagat guides were pure gold. You could walk into a B. Dalton's, buy a Zagat guide and Michael Stern's latest Roadfood book, and set out for your destination knowing you'd have your bases covered.

The three hundred mile journey from Alabama to New Orleans would go by in a flash as your co-pilot reconnoitered through the guides, put little stars on the paper maps and the conversation flowed like sweet tea as you prepared to eat your way through the finest dining city on earth.

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We're late getting this weekly feature up due to the mammoth work load we shouldered to put on the Scrumptious Chef Pop Up restaurant event at Three Little Pigs this weekend. It was a blast but we're all feeling the effect today.

We did manage to post 22 articles though. Without further ado, our weekly top 5:

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all the details on our Sat Jan 12 2013 Wild Foods Of Texas Pop Up Restaurant At Tamale House East http://www.scrumptiouschef.com/food/index.cfm/2013/1/3/

We were blown away at the multitude of eaters that came out to our corner of East Austin to listen to Guitar Watson, eat collards and hot guts and while away a nice chunk of a gorgeous Summer afternoon.

Thanks y'all. We really appreciate it.

As a testament to your voracity we prepared thirty pounds of collards, fifteen pounds of country style pork ribs, thirty pounds of smothered chicken, fifteen pounds of pork belly sausage, 6 quarts of grits, twelve quarts of hoppin john, 1 quart of porridge and a host of accoutrement.

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Brand new pop up this Sunday October 21st 2012 http://www.scrumptiouschef.com/food/index.cfm/2012/10/1

It's unbelievable how much work goes into throwing a pop up restaurant.

Grocery stores visited:

Central Market

Fiesta Mart

Wheatsville

HEB

La Michoacana

To source the finest groceries in Austin, there is no one-stop market where you can lay your hands on everything at one time.

I've got 3 kettles rolling right now. A smoked turkey wing stock for the wilted greens, a chicken stock for the chicken gravy and a pork stock for the hoppin john/black eyed peas. If you want your food to be the best you have to make your stock from scratch. Period.

We knocked out fifteen pounds of pork belly, roasted hatch chile sausage last night. It was batch number 7 of our Central Texas Hot Guts project and it's dynamite. We dropped over fifty pounds of chicken and pork ribs in an icy brine yesterday. There are naysayers to the brining method but we've always utilized the technique to good effect.

Tomorrow night will be an all-nighter as we cook the greens, bake the cornbread, make the banana pudding and simmer the black eyes all night long. Sunday morning it'll be fire up the smoker to roast the meats-time. Hopefully the timing will be right and we'll wrestle the kettle of grits off the range right as we go to service.

Pictured is the team that made the first Scrumptious Chef Pop Up such a success. Robyn's an Austin restaurant veteran who just started her career in graphic design. Harrington worked in the best kitchens in New Orleans, Paris, New York, Vermont and San Francisco before finally attaining a 3rd Michelin star at Meadowood, one of the greatest kitchens in the USA.

The party could not happen without their labor.

I spent the last week poring over my Edna Lewis and Sylvia Wood's cookbooks to make sure the Adrian Miller {soul food scholar} menu would be honored properly.

Details on the party:

Place: 3 Little Pigs and East End Wines

Date: Sunday August 5th 2012

Time: Noon

Event: Scrumptious Chef Pop Up Restaurant

1209 Rosewood Avenue Austin Texas 78702

cash

follow this party on Twitter with the hashtag #soulfoodpopup

https://twitter.com/RLReevesJr

previous http://www.scrumptiouschef.com/food/index.cfm/2012/8/1/

While there are plenty non-profit food trucks in Austin, they haven't reached that status voluntarily. They're trying as hard as they can to be for-profit, they're just not making any money.

One of our most "popular" ones shuttered at the beginning of summer to move away from Texas. The owner told me the decision was easy. He worked 12 hours a day, 6 days a week and never netted more than 20k in his 3 years of work.

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