It’s a rite of passage for UT students to have a meal in the wee hours of the morning at the Drag’s Kerbey Lane. (One of the last standing denizens of the Slacker-era Drag. Sigh.) The original—a leafy, creaky house just a little north of it—features long waits for breakfast on weekends (if there’s a home game, just forget it). Both locations are charmingly ragged, and totally Austin; the newer branches are a bit more generic. It’s a reasonably priced menu of the requisite Tex-Mex, sandwiches, and vegetarian food, plus an appealing seasonal insert featuring whatever’s freshest in Texas at the moment. We’ve found some great options there, particularly among the soups and breakfasts.

Year-round, the buttery migas are fine and creamy black beans are actually salted enough for a change, and don’t pass up gigantic short stacks of pancakes that come in gingerbread, pumpkin, apple, and so on. It’s home fries here, instead of hash browns, in case that’s a deal-breaker for you. Tortilla soup’s terrific, complex and herb-spicy. Kerbey queso, white rather than the usual yellow, is truly a thing to experience, and salads are better than you’d expect, as are pan-veggie-fusion tacos. Just avoid most of the straight-ahead Mexican stuff, which you can get better elsewhere. (Just not at 3am.)