Austin Restaurant Experts Share Their Hopes and Dreams for 2025

As is the tradition when the end of 2024 is coming up, Eater asked a trusted group of friends, industry types, and local bloggers for their takes on the past culinary year in Austin. All answers will be revealed before the year ends — cut, pasted, (mostly) unedited, and in no particular order. Last but not least, question number 11:

What is your biggest hope for the restaurant industry in 2025?

​​Nadia Chaudhury, outgoing editor of Eater Austin and forthcoming editor at Eater Northeast

Okay, so this is my final Year in Eater answer of my Eater Austin tenure of the past 10+ years. Here are my hopes and dreams for the Austin culinary scene:

• I wish that Austin restaurant owners/cooks/chefs/etc. will treat their staffers with respect, fairness, kindness, and equitable pay.
• I hope dining out returns to more affordable levels so that going to restaurants can go back to being an everyday fun thing to do for people.
• I hope Austin diners also support independent restaurants, food trucks, and bars, because that’s how we keep them around.
• I wish restaurant rents and operational costs become more manageable and not outrageous. Likewise, I wish Austin restaurants wouldn’t get priced out of their leases or fucked over by out-of-their-hands construction that impacts their businesses and ultimately get replaced by boring chains. City of Austin, a little help, please?
• I want Austin’s diners to be more adventurous — y’all can handle spice.
• I hope that Austin continues to be a place where the food and drink community supports each other — it’s one of the loveliest things I’ve learned about the city.
• And for Austin diners, the city is full of great dining experiences if you just go out and look for it. It’s not about the Instagram-ready soulless restaurants, it’s about the chefs who pour their hearts into making creative, fun, and genuine food.

Keep in touch, Austin <3

Nicolai McCrary, Austin staff writer at The Infatuation

As more and more coastal and international restaurant transplants continue taking over downtown, I just want to make sure we keep supporting local businesses as much as we can. I love a good Nando’s, but I hope that homegrown businesses continue to thrive in this city.

Taylor Tobin, restaurant critic at Austin Chronicle and Eater contributing writer

I want to see more ambitious and exciting restaurants opening in far south Austin! LeRoy & Lewis’s success proves that Austin diners will definitely venture south of Ben White Boulevard if the food is good enough. Let’s keep that momentum going!

Erin Russell, former associate editor of Eater Austin, Eater contributing writer, and freelance writer

I hope paying restaurant employees a living wage and providing health care continues to become more commonplace. I hope food trucks stop being broken into. And I hope more talented chefs feel empowered to share their specific point of view because I think there is always an appetite for creativity (see: Joseph Gomez of Con Todo and Stacy Kiley of The Interrupted Baker).

H. Drew Blackburn, former interim associate editor of Eater Austin and columnist of The Barbed Wire

I can repeat my platitudes about what the culture in Austin is turning into, but my true hope is that the employees are paired fairly and treated with the utmost respect. If Instagram culture helps these folks get health insurance, then it’s fine by me. Well, fine-ish by me.

Madeline Hollern, editor-in-chief of Austin Monthly

I hope it can become more affordable. I also want more types of cuisine — we have enough taco spots, barbecue joints, and omakase pop-ups already.

Ali Khan, content creator of @alikhaneats

Affordability can somehow coexist with a more equitable system for hospitality workers. What unites diners and hospitality is that we are both diners and the experience of going out is becoming more and more a luxury. P.S. I have no answers, just dreaming over here.

Darcie Duttweiler, freelance writer and Eater contributing writer

Gosh, I just really hope prices can level off somewhat. I feel like a cranky old person, but dining out is so freakin’ expensive. I know, with the skyrocketing cost of rent, food, and labor, it’s literally insane to run a restaurant these days, but Austin is starting to look a little bit like L.A. with its menu prices. So, I hope that there’s some relief for everyone next year.

Cat Cardenas, freelance writer and photographer, contributing Eater Austin photographer, and writer-at-large of The Barbed Wire

I would love to see the return of the dive bar. I love a nice cocktail lounge, or a well-executed retro concept, but I would love to see more affordable places where you can find cheap food, cheap drinks, and good music. Some of my favorite places are Black Sheep Lodge, Nickel City, Donn’s Depot, and Workhorse Bar. I want those places to keep thriving, and I also want this to be a city where more businesses like them have the chance to pop up.

Jane Ko, blogger of A Taste of Koko

Austin is getting more expensive to operate restaurants in and there’s a lot of out-of-state investors — but let’s continue to support our locally owned mom and pop restaurants.