Tex-Mex restaurants in the United States

Tex-Mex is not 'badly made Mexican food': it is a border cuisine with its own history, born among Texan communities of Mexican descent and documented since the nineteenth century. Its markers are unmistakable — chili con carne, fajitas served on a sizzling skillet, melted yellow cheese, flour tortillas, cumin and refried beans — and most of them do not exist in central Mexico, just as mole poblano is no part of the Texan repertoire.

What to look for: good Tex-Mex shows in hand-made flour tortillas, in chili built without industrial thickeners, and in fajitas that still crackle when they reach the table. The numbered combination plate is part of the format's tradition, not a shortcut.

This directory keeps Tex-Mex separate from regional Mexican cooking so you can choose deliberately, without one label swallowing the other.