If we had to explain Houston to someone, we’d bring them here, to a menu that is the crossroads between Cajun frog legs and Vietnamese bo luc lac; between fried rice and nuoc mam-marinated crispy fried chicken wings. Where bowls of angry red crawfish face off against whole fried crabs, both bursting with garlic, luxurious butter, and spicy heat. Where the critters of the Gulf crawl up on the shore and get the salt-and-pepper treatment.

In fact, this happy, amphibious place has well surpassed our former East-meets-South favorite, The Boiling Crab. And the prices are all Bellaire: you can get three whole blue crabs for $14.95, and they’ll be the best in the city. Awesomesauce! For that matter, the tender and butter-beefy bo luc lac is best in class, too, coming with a heap of shallots and garlic. It kind of makes us look forward to the end of crawfish season so we can focus on the Vietnamese dishes here.

The service couldn’t be friendlier, or more helpful. Which is another perfect illustration of our hospitable city. And if they didn’t get the point by then, we’d make them suck a crawfish head. Ain’t no bunch of sissies in Houston.