Houston

Houston is the most underrated food city in America. The most diverse city in the United States — with significant Vietnamese, Indian, Nigerian, Mexican, and Chinese communities — it has a food scene that reflects that diversity in extraordinary ways. And Anvil Bar & Refuge, on Westheimer Road, is the bar that put Houston on the cocktail map.

THE BARS

Anvil Bar & Refuge on Westheimer Road opened in 2009 and immediately changed Houston's cocktail culture. Bobby Heugel's 100 Cocktails list — a rotating selection of 100 classic and contemporary cocktails — is a masterclass in cocktail history. The staff know their product and wear that knowledge lightly. The Negroni is one of the best in America.

THE FOOD

Houston's food scene is extraordinary. Underbelly Hospitality — Chris Shepherd's group of restaurants — is the best expression of Houston's multicultural food culture: dishes that draw on Vietnamese, Korean, Indian, and Mexican traditions, executed with technical precision. For Vietnamese food, the Bellaire Chinatown neighbourhood has some of the best pho and banh mi outside of Vietnam.

NASA SPACE CENTER

The NASA Johnson Space Center is 45 minutes from downtown Houston and it's extraordinary. The tram tour takes you through Mission Control — the actual room where Apollo 11 was guided to the moon — and the Saturn V rocket hall, where a 363-foot Saturn V rocket lies on its side. It's one of the great American experiences.

THE MUSEUM DISTRICT

Houston's Museum District has 19 museums within a 1.5-mile radius, most of them free. The Museum of Fine Arts Houston has one of the finest collections in the American South; the Menil Collection in Montrose is one of the great private art collections in the world — a Rothko Chapel, a Cy Twombly Gallery, and a permanent collection that includes extraordinary works by Magritte, Ernst, and de Chirico.