Puff daddy

Mike Keolanui, owner of Texas Mexican Restaurant (1114 Eighth Street) is opening the new Tex-Mex Bar and Grill (2326 J Street) any day now. I asked him about the menu.

“The term ‘Tex-Mex’ was coined years ago from a railway line, where they used the ingredients available to them in Texas. Tex-Mex cuisine is known for the big plates of rice and beans and chiles rellenos.

“The new place will be lightened up a little and more Texas-influenced rather than Mexican-influenced. We’re going to have a beautiful wood grill, which infuses the smoke flavor that is a staple of Texas cooking.

“We’re going to have things like puffy tacos. No one’s ever done a puffy taco in Sacramento! We’ll have a selection of different salads, like mesquite chicken salad. And we’re going to be rolling into fajita land again—doing buffalo and flat-iron steak and rib-eye fajitas.”