A few weeks ago, I told my editor at Newsweek that I planned to do my monthly Food and Drink column on Fearing’s, Dean Fearing’s new restaurant in the Dallas Ritz-Carlton. Her first question, not surprisingly, was “why?” I love my editor but she is from Ohio and is now a full-fledged New Yorker. I’m pretty sure she’s never been to Dallas and I know she had never heard of Dean Fearing, who won accolades during his long tenure at the Mansion on Turtle Creek, because she told me so. She asked me if he was changing the culinary landscape, what trends he was at the forefront of. All I could tell her — lamely — was that his food is really, really good and eating in his restaurant was the most fun I have had in ages.

It’s a good thing that she let me put him in anyway. Two days later, the New York Times’ Frank Bruni named Fearing’s as one of the top ten best restaurants in the country (outside of Manhattan), along with Cochon, which is one of my very favorite places to eat in New Orleans. While Fearing’s is grander, both spots are completely unpretentious, have yummy food (Cochon’s is a sophisticated take on traditional Cajun fare, while Fearing tweaks Southwestern sensibilities with some Deep South and even Far Eastern elements thrown in), and open kitchens (Fearing’s has three other dining rooms besides the “kitchen” room). And while it is possible to spend a lot of money in Fearing’s, especially on Sunday nights (the wine list is full of irresistible offerings), you can also order fried chicken with all the trimmings for $28.

Mainly though, as I told my editor, Fearing’s is huge fun. Now, I eat at Cochon about three times a week (their oven roasted oysters are too sublime not to eat them at least that frequently) so the chef always talks to me. But you have never seen somebody work a room like Dean Fearing. He is so happy to have his own place that it is almost ridiculously infectious, and he is damn glad to see everyone. He pumps the hands of cowboy- boot-wearing hedge-fund managers, and makes bejeweled Dallas matrons giggle; he is delighted to share the secret of his amazing mashed potatoes with anyone who asks (a little grated fresh cheese he found in Mexico). With his spiky hair and rock-and-roll attitude, he knows better than to take himself too seriously. It’s just food after all, and when you’re going out and spending a lot of money, he knows there should be some bang for your buck — his dining rooms are full of buzz and electricity rather than attitude and grandeur. When Fearing is not cooking, he’s recording CDs with Robert del Grande, the equally talented chef at Houston’s Café Annie (another of my very favorite haunts) and their band The Barbwires.

When he is cooking he makes playful, and extremely tasty, nods to that country Texas favorite, the chicken fried steak. For dinner he offers up an excellent “surf and turf” comprised of a pan roasted, “bbq spiced” filet and chicken-fried Maine lobster accompanied by a spinach enchilada and some of those mashed potatoes; for lunch, it’s a chicken fried lamb chop with smoked tomato gravy.

I think I enjoyed Fearing’s even more because my visit there came on the heels of a week of eating in “serious” places in New York. I finally hit the wall one night at Eleven Madison Park. The meal took so long I had a back-ache by the time I got up from the table, and there was so much lag time between courses I spent twice as much as I ordinarily do on wine. I had the suckling pig, which I love and which I eat all the time at Cochon. And it was very good, but it had been shredded and shaped into a precise little rectangle with the “jus” puddled around it in a presentation so overwrought it was irritating — as was the $600 tab for two, and the enormously officious staff. Before the night was over, I’d received at least two unwanted tutorials from the wine steward — and I did not have a single ounce of fun.

I will likely give Eleven Madison Park another chance. I usually love Danny Meyer’s places; his new chef at Gramercy Tavern, for example, can do no wrong. I adore Le Cirque because the great Sirio Maccione knows that restaurants should be theater, and I still love Chanterelle because the room is beautiful, the food delicious, and the staff wonderful. I am also always curious to see what Eric Ripert and Daniel Boulud are up to. But in general these days, when I hit the city, I head over to places like Rosa Mexicano for the fabulous (and beautiful) frozen pomegranate margaritas and the best guacamole in town, or to Casa Mono for the spectacular Serrano ham and tapas and a cold glass of cava.

Now that Bruni has done his thing, (the individual reviews of Fearing’s and Cochon reviews are coming up within the next two weeks in the “Dining In” section) perhaps more folks will head out to the hinterlands in search of pig meat that still looks like pig, along with dining experiences that are what they should be — not high church, complete with sermons, but celebrations infused with warmth and joy.

THE END