At the James Beard Awards ceremony Monday night, chef Adrian Torres of West University Place modern Mexican restaurant Maximo won the national Emerging Chef award. Evelyn Garcia and Henry Lu of Heights restaurant Jun took home Best Chef Texas.
The awards are often regarded as the Oscars as the food world.
In his acceptance speech, Torres, a DACA recipient who immigrated to the U.S. from San Luis Potosi, Mexico, as a child, talked about a conversation his mom once had with him.
A fish taco is shown at Maximo in West University Place, Friday, June 20, 2025. (Melissa Phillip/Houston Chronicle)
“She said, ‘Never tell anyone about your legal status. Never talk about our immigration journey.’ For a long time, fear was our story,” Torres said.
“But tonight,” he continued, “I refuse to let fear be the headline. Tonight the headline is that a brown kid from the Northside, raised by parents who sacrificed everything for a chance at a better life, is standing on this stage accepting one of the highest honors in this industry.”
He thanked his parents in Spanish for leaving their home to give the family a new opportunity. And he concluded with a shout-out to Houston: “I am excited to bring this award back to the city,” he said. “Desde el norte de Houston para el mundo.”
At Maximo, Torres offers one of the city’s most affordable tasting menus, at $45. The restaurant opened in 2024 and re-opened after a revamp in early 2025. It stars dishes like masa cornbread with caviar and bluefin tuna tostadas. Torres took home the first prize of the evening, helping set the tone for a night full of praise for the immigrants’ contributions and condemnation of anti-immigrant hate.
At Jun, Garcia and Lu combine flavors from Asia and the Americas into dishes such as red fish with guajillo and pickled melon; five spice sweet soy pork shoulder; and heirloom grits with carne seca gravy. They opened their restaurant three years ago and earned James Beard semifinalist nods in both 2024 and 2025.
Chef Henry Lu and Chef Evelyn Garcia at Jun. They won Best Chef Texas. (Annie Mulligan/Contributor)
“Houston, I love you so, so much. Our amazing city is made from creatives, from first generations like we are. It is a city of dreams and hopes,” Garcia said at the ceremony. “And what has taught me anything with Jun is that there’s room for everyone. That there is space to tell our story. That it is meant to be heard. And that there is a reason we are here.”
Ope Amosu, of the Montrose West African restaurant ChopnBlok, had also been nominated for Best Chef Texas. June Rodil – a finalist for Outstanding Professional in Beverage Service in recognition of her work at Montrose fine-dining destination March – and Agnes and Sherman, which had been nominated for Best New Restaurant, did not win either. Nor did Tracy Vaught and Hugo Ortega of H Town Restaurant Group; the couple, who run the restaurants Hugo’s, Zaranda, Caracol, Xochi and Urbe, were finalists for Outstanding Restaurateur.
The Houston-based Southern Smoke Foundation, which offers emergency relief and mental health care to food and beverage workers, was briefly recognized at the ceremony as a 2026 Impact Award honoree.
WHAT TO KNOW: James Beard Awards are tonight. Here are the Houston nominees that could win.
The city’s six finalists were:
Emerging Chef: Adrian Torres of Maximo
Outstanding Professional in Beverage Service: June Rodil of March
Best Chef Texas: Ope Amosu of ChopnBlok; Evelyn Garcia and Henry Lu of Jun
Best New Restaurant: Agnes and Sherman
Outstanding Restaurateur: Hugo Ortega and Tracy Vaught of H Town Restaurant Group
Taiwanese dip sandwich at Agnes and Sherman (Annie Mulligan/Contributor)
The James Beard Foundation launched in 1986 to honor the late James Beard, who had been a cookbook author, cooking show star and cooking school founder. The organization presented its first awards in 1991, and they have since grown into among the most prestigious recognitions in the American culinary world.
Houston only earned its first national James Beard Award in 2022, when Julep took home the Outstanding Bar Program prize. But the city has seen at least six chefs win the Best Chef Southwest and Best Chef Texas categories. (Texas competed in the Southwest region until 2020.) Most recently, Benchawan Jabthong Painter at Street to Kitchen won the 2022 Best Chef Texas prize, and Thomas Bille at Belly of the Best repeated the feat last year.
Two other restaurants, Irma’s Restaurant and Gaido’s in Galveston, have earned America’s Classics designations, an award that honors enduring, locally-owned spots with long-standing community appeal and regional importance.
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This article originally published at James Beard Awards: Adrian Torres of Maximo, Evelyn Garcia and Henry Lu of Jun take home medals.