Watertrade
Caviar came with sansho-dusted Funyuns, which Raphael Brion called probably one of the very few places in the world you could order that.
Why go
The list ran to a large selection of Japanese whisky and sake, and cocktails Brion rated highly enough to name the off-menu Old Fashioned as the thing to ask for.1 The food came from the kitchen next door as a small izakaya menu, running from crudos to grilled fish.1 The room itself was cozy and dark, attached to the omakase restaurant inside the South Congress Hotel.1
Order this / avoid
- Order: the off-menu Old Fashioned, which is the drink Brion tells you to ask for by name.1
- And: the caviar with sansho-dusted Funyuns, if any of it survived to the end.1
- Avoid: planning a visit. See the status note below.
What locals & experts say
- Raphael Brion, The Infatuation Austin:
this is probably one of the very few places in the world where you can get caviar that comes with sansho-dusted Funyuns
.1 - On the drinks, same review: he records a rather large selection of Japanese whisky and sake and comes down firmly behind the cocktails.1
- Why there is no score: the Infatuation rates only places where you can eat a full meal, so there is a byline here and no number.1
Good to know
- Status, and read the caveat. The operator's own site states that the attached omakase restaurant has closed after ten years and that Watertrade's last day of service was 30 May 2026. That page does not load for anyone, the last archived copy of it predates the notice, and no Austin outlet has reported it. So the closure is recorded as the operator's claim rather than as a verified fact, and the entry is filed closed on that basis.
- Hygiene: there is no Austin Public Health record for this bar, and four other hotel businesses hold rows at 1603 S Congress Avenue. Absence from the register is never a clean bill of health.2
- Age of what is written above: the only published account read here is from May 2022, so the list and the snacks described are four years old.
Verdict
listed — A dark cocktail bar attached to the omakase room at the South Congress Hotel, built around a large Japanese whisky and sake list with an izakaya menu from the kitchen next door. The plate that made it worth the trip was caviar served with sansho-dusted Funyuns, which is the kind of joke that only works if the caviar is good. The operator's own site says service ended on 30 May 2026, and that notice could not be read at source, so the closure is recorded with its gap showing. Nothing here is actionable now beyond knowing what it was.