Tavel Bristol-Joseph of San Antonio’s Nicosi talks about his restaurant after being awarded and Michelin Star at the Wrtham Center in Houston on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025.
Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle
Nerves and excitement bubbled like the sparkling wine that toasted honorees at the Michelin Texas awards ceremony at the Wortham Center in Houston on Tuesday night.
About 500 hospitality industry professionals attended the second annual gala, which was marked by far fewer awards than the French-based guide’s inaugural event in Houston last year.
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No new Austin restaurants earned a Michelin star
Members of the Emmer and Rye Hospitality group pose for a photo after the Texas Michelin Award Ceremony at the Wortham Center in Houston on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025.
Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle
No Austin restaurants took home any of the three new Michelin stars handed out to Texas restaurants, though all seven restaurants that received a star in 2024 retained their honors, as did last year’s 15 area Bib Gourmand restaurants. The Bib Gourmand designation recognizes restaurants which serve excellent meals at a reasonable price,
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It wasn’t all status quo, however. Austin-based restaurant group Emmer & Rye Hospitality had the biggest night, taking home two single stars and a Green Star for two of its San Antonio restaurants. Austin’s Nixta Taqueria took home a Green Star, an award that recognizes sustainable practices; an Austin wine professional earned a special commendation; and two new businesses received the only Bib Gourmand honors bestowed.
Emmer & Rye’s Isidore — the Texas ranch-inspired restaurant located at the Pullman Market in San Antonio’s Pearl District — earned one of the three Michelin stars and a Green Star honoring its local sourcing and support of the state’s farm and ranch community. The group’s Nicosi — a cinematic and experimental restaurant where sweet and savory dishes intersect for a celebration of acidic, sweet, umami and bitter flavors — also earned a Michelin star.
Members of Isidore pose for a photo with Bibendum after being awarded with a star during the Michelin Guide Ceremony at the Wortham Center in Houston on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025.
Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle
Those stars join the Emmer & Rye collection that includes a star retained for Austin fine dining restaurant Hestia and a Green Star received in 2024 for Emmer & Rye.
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Emmer & Rye partner chef Tavel Bristol-Joseph — whose wins drew big hugs and even bigger cheers from the audience of industry peers — had imagined Nicosi since he came to the United States as a teenager from Guyana.
“I think that Nicosi is more special to me because it’s a concept I’ve been thinking about since I was 17 years old,” he told the American-Statesman. He was inspired by the restaurant Room for Dessert in New York. When he walked into that space, he thought, “Wow, pastry chefs are on stage; pastry chefs are the focus,” he said. “And I was truly taken by that. And it has evolved into what Nicosi is today.”
Austin chefs receive special honors at Michelin Texas ceremony
Chuck Charnichart from Barbs BQ in Lockhart, Texas comforted by emcee Java Ingram as she is overcome with emotion after winning the Young Chef Award at the 2025 Texas Michelin Awards at the Wortham Center in Houston on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025.
Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle
East Austin’s Nixta Taqueria, from chef Edgar Rico and partner Sara Mardanbigi, joined Isidore (and 2024 winners Dai Due and Emmer & Rye) among the ranks of Green Star winners thanks in part to the restaurant’s on-site garden and sourcing of Texas and Mexican corn.
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The couple who operate one of Austin’s best Mexican restaurants were in Oaxaca working when they learned that their tiny restaurant — which serves an exceptional tasting menu dinner indoors a few nights a week — had won. Sara Aguilar and Natalya Velasco of Nixta accepted the award on the owners’ behalf.
Rico and Mardanbigi weren’t the only Austinites not on hand to accept an honor. Este and Suerte director of operations and partner Celia Pellegrini was back in Austin when her name was called as the sole winner of the Michelin Sommelier Award.
Looking surprised, Suerte and Este executive chef Fermin Nunez and owner Sam Hellman-Mass took the stage to accept on her behalf. “She’s an amazing sommelier, person, leader, manager. We owe a lot to her,” Hellman-Mass said of Pellegrini,
Barbs B Q owner and chef Chuck Charnichart — who disrupted the Lockhart barbecue world with her weekend-only business that sits in the shadow of the Caldwell County Courthouse — was at the ceremony to receive the Young Chef Award.
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Charnichart, whose barbecue spot retained its Bib Gourmand from 2024, told the American-Statesman after the ceremony that it was a surprise and a validation for the hard work that usually demands all of her bandwidth.
Parish Barbecue and Mercado sin Nombre earn Bib Gourmand
A jamon display at the reception for the 2025 Texas Michelin Awards Ceremony at the Wortham Center in Houston on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025.
Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle
While the event felt like old hat for some of the chefs and owners in attendance, Austinites Holden Fulco and Julian Maltby were wrapping their heads around the fact that they had even been invited to the ceremony and reception, where caviar bumps and espresso martinis were passed around, and a string duo played pop hits by the likes of Taylor Swift.
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Parish Barbecue pitmaster and owner Holden Fulco was still getting used to the idea that he was in such august company so soon after opening his first barbecue trailer.
The young pitmaster and former general manager of Michelin-starred Interstellar BBQ opened his trailer behind Batch Craft Beer and Kolaches in March. In September, he received an email invitation to the ceremony, which he attended with his wife, Taylor.
“It was the last thing I was ever expecting. I didn’t go to culinary school,” Fulco said. “It’s a blessing just to be here.”
Fulco — usually seen sweating in a T-shirt at his East Austin food truck — was dressed in a suit jacket, a look he doesn’t usually sport. The Louisiana native, who briefly entertained the idea of working in real estate in Houston, said he had not worn it in years.
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“We finally put it to some good use,” Taylor Fulco joked.
Fulco’s former boss John Bates, of Interstellar BBQ — which retained its Michelin star Tuesday night — said he was surprised but proud of his former employee’s quick ascent. The American-Statesman named Parish BBQ the best new barbecue spot in Austin earlier this year.
Fulco joined KG BBQ owner Kareem El-Ghayesh, dressed in his trademark cowboy hat, as yet another former Interstellar employee to have his own Bib Gourmand plaque. Bates said the award reinforced and highlighted a family tree of cooks and employees that he hopes will continue to grow.
Julian Maltby’s recognition might have been one of the night’s biggest surprises — though not to anyone who has enjoyed coffee or food from his walk-up window in East Austin. When he first opened his coffee shop, which serves great burritos and sublime pastries while spotlighting Mexican coffee makers and corn farmers, it would have been hard to imagine the Bib Gourmand honor for the hospitality newcomer.
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“I thought it was a joke,” Maltby said of the email he received this summer inviting him to the event. “I thought I was waiting on a payment for my tires.”
Maltby — who attended the Michelin ceremony with business partner Melissa Alvear — said he thought the distinction for his cafe, where no item costs more than $10, was a validation for their mission.
“Having a lot of care can take you far, and when you’re in our space you feel that care,” Maltby said. “Maybe us being here gives people hope they can do it.”