Hailey Pruitt and Lauren Beckman of Mixtli are The MICHELIN Guide Texas 2024 Service Award Winners

What is a typical night at the restaurant?

It's a very intimate space. We always try to start everybody off in the bar. Lauren makes incredible cocktails that are representative of the menu theme, and they'll have their first bite in there. We bring them into the dining room, where the kitchen is as well, so they get to witness the entire meal being prepared right in front of them.

The chefs are with the customers from the beginning to the end of service, bringing each dish instead of servers. That connection with the chefs is really important to us. We incorporate stories with everything, whether that's with the dishes, the cocktail pairing, or the wine pairing.

It’s a delightful evening, more of a theatrical production, rather than just dinner. It's a whole three-hour event. We like to make it as special as we possibly can, since they're dedicating so much time, energy, and money to us.

What's your favorite part of the guest experience?

Hailey Pruitt

It's really special to have guests who come in, and maybe they're from a specific region that we're representing, or have a special connection to that, and just talk about their personal experience with those ingredients or that specific dish, and how much memory it brings back for them.

We've had several dishes that people say, ‘this is exactly like my grandma used to make. It's taking me back.' Or, ‘I'm from Michoacan, and I never see our food represented, thank you so much for putting so much effort and dedication into representing it correctly and accurately.’ It's super special to hear those things.

The history, too. A lot of people are not aware of the historical references to a lot of the cuisine and how it became that. The learning experience is so incredibly special to see people receive well, and how excited they are to just hear us lecture them throughout their dinner about these dishes.

Lauren Beckman

I divide it into three categories. The guest experience is always going to be very personal, very interactive, and to some degree, emotional.

We meet them, we greet them, we get to know them. Get to know what they expect as a guest, or how they would like things to be tailored to them. And then we move to the interaction side, where whatever chef or bartender created what they ordered, they will be dropping it off and giving the story. It evokes a lot of emotion. It can either be a memory or it can just be inspiration.

What does "really good service" mean to you?

Lauren Beckman

There's a Japanese approach to hospitality, omotenashi, and it's essentially the mindfulness of your guests and expecting what they need before they even realize they need it. Many restaurants strive to operate this way. Throughout our evening, there are hundreds of little instances where you have the opportunity to resolve something before it even happens. A beautiful service is seeing each and every one of those instances handled with grace, poise, and mindfulness, and the guest is just beaming afterwards.

Hailey Pruitt

I like when it's very seamless and quiet, all of our team just being in sync, and there is just such a smooth character to the service, which happens quite often. In the way that we all work together, carrying people through this service without them realizing how difficult it was to get to that point is definitely a good service.

How are you able to keep the team calm?

An analogy I always love to use is a duck on water. On top, super calm. They're gliding. They're beautiful. They're glistening. Under the water, their little legs are just rapidly going. That's us all the time. We’re such a small, intimate family, and we know each other's nuances, and we're really fortunate to be able to pinpoint when someone maybe is about to have a moment, and we can be there for each other. We've been blessed with an incredible team where we all can really keep ourselves together and lean on each other for support.

Do you have any sustainable initiatives at the restaurant? How do you communicate these with the guests?

I made it a point that this would be a sustainable operating bar, and that comes in so many approaches. Currently, I'm doing extra education in different enzymes and different techniques so that you can use all of a product. You can give it two and three different kinds of lives.

The bar and the kitchen work extremely closely together. On this menu, I make a tepache, and I give that to the kitchen, and they make a tepache foam out of it. During their intermezzo, they have a fruit gazpacho, and I take those peels and make an oleo saccharum from it. We're our own little ecosystem. It's impossible to be zero waste, but you can get really close.

When I drop drinks at the table, we give a little excerpt. People love to hear that we're being sustainable. They're interested, they're appreciative, and they become mindful themselves when they go out to other institutions.

Hailey Pruitt

Lauren uses so much waste and byproduct from the kitchen [for cocktails]. As far as wine goes, we are working with many local distribution wineries. Your overhead is a lot lower from a business standpoint, and you're doing good to the environment, so there's no losing in that situation.

What is the biggest misconception about your role?

That it's always a big party. I’m dealing with cocktails and parties and celebration. There are moments for that, but really, this is a profession, this is a business, and you need to always approach it like that.

What advice would you give to someone who wants a career like yours?

Educate yourself more than you think is necessary. A lot of theory, research, and knowledge of your craft and of your environment goes a long way and helps you solve problems very quickly. Leaning on that knowledge and background is very useful.

As a woman in the industry, following certifications and accolades are really helpful to just get recognition in your industry, or at least respect. But it's not everything.

Lauren Beckman

You can't take any shortcuts. Years of experience is something that goes a long way. When you are moving yourself up the ladder, you have to stay humble. You have to find places with extraordinary culture, where they create safe places for mentorships and they create environments for growth. So almost every single little decision that you take leading up to where you are is important, and you just have to be all in. You can't be one foot in and one foot out, because you won't get there. You have to be committed, and you have to be loyal to your goals and your dreams.

Hero image: RaeAnn Sierra / Hailey Pruitt & Alejandro Deleon / Lauren Beckman