Chef Anastacia Quiñones-Pittman Creates Modern Mexican Magic in Dallas – Texas Monthly
The free-standing building made of white and roughly hewn brown bricks feels just as at home in Dallas’s Lovers Lane on the edge of the affluent enclave of Bluffview as in a clayey district of a Mexican city. José Restaurant, a modern Mexican eatery locally known as José on Lovers, is rustic but chic. The interior is stylish with leather seats, semicircular yellow niches, dark wood, and ceramic tile walls. They are painted in quick, rough lines with street and food scenes representative of Mexico. The mural extends to the outdoor seating area in front of the restaurant. In the middle of this courtyard is an agave heart fountain. Much of the decor comes from the studio of the ceramic master José Noé Suro in Guadalajara. (The name of the restaurant honors the artist.) It’s a peaceful place with an exceptional agave liquor list and a staff that anticipates guests’ needs. The kitchen is led by Executive Chef Anastacia Quiñones-Pittman (known as AQ), a native Texas woman and a leading figure in contemporary Mexican cuisine in the state.
It is a position that she has fought for in the course of her career as a professional chef. Ten years ago she was one of the first upscale Dallas chefs to nixtamalize corn in-house at the ephemeral Alma restaurant on Henderson Avenue. The area diners weren’t ready, and the restaurant closed after eight months. More recently, when she helped open Cedars Social as the head chef, diners seemed prepared for the modern day Mexican. But Quiñones-Pittman left the restaurant after a disagreement with her partners over the direction of the menu. With José, she has found an inviting space in which her talent and vision can be fully exploited.
Quiñones-Pittman holds its place at the top thanks in part to their chef’s specialty, tacos de tacha. (Tacha is her childhood nickname.) The dish changes every few days and is often inspired by existing ingredients or the cook’s introspection. Thoughtfulness led to the creation of a new taco de tacha, a piece of cute lobster tail draped with aromatic and herbaceous mole tree. The fat mole, ripened for almost a thousand days, with a surprising but not unwelcome spice tip, is sprinkled with pepitas (pumpkin seeds) and sesame seeds. The taco is served on a tortilla made from pink Bolita Belatove heirloom corn. Its coarse texture and color, which changes from mottled pink to an even brown, are reminiscent of a damp sandy beach. But it is more than a beach dream on your plate.
The cook tells me the taco came about when she thought about the fact that mole is still limited to family recipes and inherited history. “It’s always about your grandmother’s mole or your mother’s mole. It doesn’t have to be, ”she says. Chicken smothered in chocolate brown mole poblano doesn’t have to be the default. The lobster taco is a rejection of it in honor of her daughter. “My cooking is often about showing that it’s perfectly okay to honor your mother, while showing your daughters that it’s okay to be different.” Tradition can be bent without being broken and aside to be swept.
Lobster tacos at José on Lovers. Photo by José R. Ralat
Examples of the refreshing versatility of eating Quiñones-Pittman can be found in other tacos de tacha, including the Maitake mushrooms fried in tempura with burrata and pickled peppers on a red bell tortilla; seared pork belly with blackberry mole and peaches on a blue corn tortilla; and fried pumpkin blossoms filled with quesillo with rocket on a chili de arbol tortilla. Two of my favorite early tacos de tacha are the taco de flautitas, chopped fried flautas embedded in a blue corn tortilla, and the s’mores taco. The latter begins with a chocolate-enriched Abuelita brand corn tortilla topped with a caramelized homemade Mexican vanilla marshmallow. Most corn tortillas are enriched with other elements such as peppers, chocolate or chillies with a tangy tingling sensation.
Tacos aren’t the only dishes in Quiñones-Pittman’s culinary arsenal. Aguachiles are another of their specialties. The seafood dish in a chilli-infused liquid is essentially a citrus-like, fruity playground for raw seafood. The aguachiles rotate according to the chef’s mood, as does the ceviche. Recently, however, the offering was coconut ceviche, a Texas redfish, diced avocado, and mango mixed with pepitas, slices of serrano chilli bantam, coriander, and lime juice, served in an open coconut surrounded by tostadas.
Carnitas de olla, a tender and sweet pork preparation dipped in a tomatillo salsa, is also popular. Then there are the tetelas, thick, triangularly folded masa filled with a net of quesillo and mushrooms. The dish is a celebration of the rainy season when Mexico’s abundance of mushrooms is used in myriad preparations, including the beautiful tetelas in José. They are plated next to a pond of aged moles with an island of crema in the center. In combination it means bite of chewy masa; salty, milky cheese; forest awakening mushrooms; and alternating sweet, spicy and spicy flavors from the mixed sauces.
In a way, Quiñones-Pittman should find a home with José, a home that she gave free rein to share her vision of Mexican food. Owner Brady Wood offered her the job before the restaurant on Cinco de Mayo opened in 2017. She immediately declined the offer because she didn’t think she was the right person for the job. Wood continued to reach out to her to join the team, even if it was an advisory role. Quiñones-Pittman refused repeatedly until her departure from Cedars Social had a dramatic effect. She decided to take a break from professional cooking to focus on taco pop-ups. When Wood approached her again in late 2018, Quiñones-Pittman agreed, as long as she had a free hand. “It turned out to be magical,” says Wood. “She is one of the most extraordinary people I have ever met.”
The result is magical, but the start was bumpy. One day after Quiñones-Pittman had been on duty for less than two weeks, most of the kitchen workers left in protest. “They didn’t like taking rules from a woman,” she says. Her husband, head chef Daniel Pittman, left his busy restaurant to do the dishes for José. This disastrous ministry, which resulted in Quiñones-Pittman hiring a slew of new kitchen workers, has resulted in people being invested in the community at all levels. The tortillera declares that she is happy because she loves what she does. Quiñones-Pittman encourages their chefs and cooks to experiment in the kitchen, learn new skills, and work on various kitchen stations. You might even get the chance to create a taco de tacha using Masienda’s in-house nixtamalized heirloom corn masa.
Quiñones-Pittman, General Manager Victor Enrique Rojas and Beverage Director Carlos Marquez make most of the restaurant decisions in the trio. In the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, they served hot meals to the frontline medical staff, set up roadside operations, and worked together to adapt to newly discovered variables. The pandemic also gave the team an opportunity to streamline operations, customer experience and staffing. Since March 2020, the trio has created a team bond by handpicked staff who they believed had the same approach to hospitality and Mexican cuisine. Rojas calls these employees “a superior group to work with every day”. I see the high standards every time I eat at José’s. The bar or the courtyard are the best places to experience the excellence of the restaurant. Every waiter is ready to help, the bartenders are as knowledgeable as the waiters and kitchen staff, the agave heart fountain soothes and the tacos are always a happy surprise.
Joseph
4931 W. Lovers Lane, Dallas
Phone: 214-891-5673
Hours: Sunday 11 am-9 pm, Tuesday 11 am-9 pm, Wednesday and Thursday 11 am-10 pm, Friday and Saturday 11 am-11 pm
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