Weirdly, Old Austin Restaurants Live On at the Airport

It’s become a common question in the Texas capital: Is Austin — a city whose culture is rooted in laid-back vibes — still the same? The city is rapidly changing and many of our classic restaurants have closed. But weirdly, enough, there’s still a place where the old soul of the city lives on, a bastion if you will, of foods from a time before the high-rises and luxury developments moved. Believe it or not, it’s the Austin airport.

Yes, you read that sentence correctly. The Austin-Bergstrom International Airport prides itself on embracing local small businesses, which extends to restaurants. Consequently, storied establishments that have long since departed from their original city addresses live out their twilight years as shadows of their former glory within the terminal, ready to feed travelers a plate of nostalgia.

Some closed-in-Austin-restaurants-that-exist-in-the-airport include Annie’s Cafe; Departure Lounge (the bar and cafe that was run by the travel agency of the same name, which remains open), Ruta Maya Coffee cafes (the roastery is around still too), Sushi-A-Go-Go (the name of the original food truck run by the still-standing Kome team). And then, to a degree, there’s New American restaurant Parkside, whose original location is still temporarily closed because of renovations, but its airport restaurant is still going strong (run by international restaurant company HMSHost).

Nadia Chaudhury/Eater Austin

There’s Hut’s Hamburgers, a downtown old-school burger joint that dated back to 1939. Co-owners Mike and Kim Hutchinson closed Hut’s singular West 6th Street location (now a higher-end Italian American restaurant named Sammie’s) in October 2019.

Yet, Hut’s airport restaurant remains open. For those who want a dose of the spot’s classic charms while waiting to board a flight, the dining room pays tribute to the original space — the Hut’s font, the black-and-white tiled floor, the red chairs. The menu is a truncated one with some familiar cheeseburger options like the classic Hut’s Favorite (American cheese, bacon), the Fats Domino (grated cheese, jalapeños, chopped tomatoes, New Orleans seasonings, mayonnaise, and mustard), and the Ritchie Valens (guacamole).

While the airport restaurant might look and feel like its original location, it’s just not the same. Since the Hutchinsons left the restaurant business, it’s run by Paradies Lagardère, another giant company that operates airport restaurants throughout North America. And that disconnect shows: the burgers don’t taste the same. I still personally remember my first bite of the burger at the physical restaurant. The perfectly standard meal was missing that sense of — for lack of a better word — nostalgia, which really is the whole point of Hut’s. A bite of Hut’s burger should be able to transport you back to a cozy retro space and time when a simple cheesy, juicy beef sandwich was all you needed for a satisfying meal.

Nadia Chaudhury/Eater Austin

The airport Noble Sandwich Co., on the other hand, holds up to its storied legacy. Co-owners John Bates and Brandon Martinez opened the lauded physical shop in 2010, known for very meaty sandwiches. But, in September 2019, the duo closed the shop, leaving a then-still-under-construction airport version on the horizon; it eventually opened in April 2022.

Noble’s airport sandwich menu is also short but sweet. There’s the namesake the Noble Pig (pulled pork, ham, and bacon) and — my personal favorite — the Turkey Chop. What makes this airport restaurant more successful is that Bates is still actually involved. Laura Beck, who is the catering and events manager of Interstellar BBQ — Bates’s still-in-operation barbecue restaurant — tells Eater that while although the airport restaurant is technically a franchise, he still works on training, menu development, and quality control with the team. And that attention to detail shows in the quality of the sandwiches, that are actually tasty and good.

Austin travelers probably don’t realize — or maybe don’t care — that some of the city’s culinary legacies still prevail in the airport. For them, an airport restaurant is just a dining necessity before flights. But for Austinites who travel, visiting the transportation hub is like traveling back in edible history.