Launderette Restaurant In East Austin 'Best Restaurant In America' Finalist

EAST AUSTIN, TX -- In some cases, it really is an honor just to be nominated.

The Launderette, a popular East Austin restaurant in the heart of East Austin, was recently a finalist for "Best Restaurant in America" according to the James Beard Foundation. It didn't secure the honor (it went to Israeli restaurant Shaya in New Orleans instead), but being nominated by the foundation is a heady thing indeed.

The Austin American-Statesman reported on the awards ceremony, which took place Monday night in Chicago.

Located at 2115 Holly St., the high-end diner is situated in a former laundromat (hence its name) that was once a community focal point. The restaurateurs have preserved much of the exterior of the building, one of the conditions they made with community advocates in entering into a fast-gentrifying part of the city to open the high-end restaurant.

For some months now, community advocates have sought to gain permission to repaint a mural outside one of its exterior walls depicting the Virgin of Guadalupe, an iconic religious image resonant with much of the largely Hispanic population in East Austin.

To be nominated by the James Beard Foundation is nothing to sneeze at. The annual awards for excellence in cuisine, culinary writing and culinary education established in 1990 are often referred to as "The Oscars of Food."