Restaurants

Cinco Ranch
09/26/14 2:00pm

A San Antonio Import 24-Hour Taco Drive-Thru Adapts Itself to Katy

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Katy, Openings and Closings, Restaurants
7 Comments

Los Robertos Taco Shop, 3200 S. Fry Rd., Katy, Texas

This fire-lane-accessible structure at 3200 S. Fry Rd., on the eastern edge of Cinco Ranch, will soon be the home of Los Robertos Taco Shop, a 3-location (soon to be 4-) chain expanding east from San Antonio. The taco outpost, which will stay open 24 hours, 7 days a week, will be taking over for the Chicken Express that closed at this spot earlier this year. Conveniently located immediately north of the Cinco Ranch Alzheimer’s Special Care Center, the drive-thru lies just one parking lot south of Westheimer Pkwy.

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Los Robertos Taco Shop
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Featured Posts
09/23/14 11:45am

Build-It-Yourself Burgers for the Downtown Tunnel and Feeder Road Crowds

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FM 1960, Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Strip Centers
8 Comments

eT Craft Burgers & Beer, 19841 Northwest Fwy., Houston

eT Craft Burgers & Beer, 19841 Northwest Fwy., HoustonAlonti Catering has done so well with the build-your-own burger spot it’s been operating in the Downtown tunnels since 2010 that it’s taking the concept straight to a feeder-road strip center — a mere 21 miles away at the intersection of Hwy. 290 and ring road FM 1960. The new eT Craft Burgers & Beer taking the place of Kim Kim Vietnamese and Paragon Pools in the end slot at 19841 Northwest Fwy. is scheduled for an official opening this Thursday, and will feature interiors by Uchi designer Michael Hsu and the entrance to the nearby Starbucks drive-thru around back.

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FM 1960 and Underground
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Featured Posts
09/23/14 10:15am

How Spanky’s Pizza Plans To Be Open Again So Quickly After This Morning’s Devastating Fire

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Fires, Gulfgate, Openings and Closings, Restaurants
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Fire at Spanky's Homemade Pizza and Bar, 7210 South Loop East, Gulfgate, Houston

A fire that broke out in the kitchen of Spanky’s Homemade Pizza early this morning did considerable damage to the structure, reports Click2Houston’s Courtney Gilmore. But if you’re wondering about the “kitchen staff wanted” sign posted outside, or how owner Frank Roache could possibly declare on camera that the restaurant, which has been open on the South Loop feeder road at Woodridge only since 1976, would be “back up and running in about 6 weeks,” here’s a little background:

The much larger Gabby’s Bar-B-Que next door to Spanky’s at 4659 Telephone Rd. closed down earlier this year.

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Scooting Over to Telephone Rd.
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Featured Posts
09/10/14 1:45pm

Barnaby’s Cafe Is Coming to the Heights

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Houston Heights, Leasing, Openings and Closings, Quicklink, Restaurants, Retail
22 Comments

BARNABY’S CAFE IS COMING TO THE HEIGHTS Mockup of Proposed Barnaby's Cafe, 2802 White Oak Dr., Houston HeightsThe spot at 2802 White Oak Dr. from which City Oven and before that D’Amico’s Italian Market Cafe departed will soon be home to the seventh location of Barnaby’s Cafe, reports the Chronicle‘s David Kaplan. Landlord Revive Development produced the mockup of a Barnaby’s sign on the building pictured above. Revive’s Bryan Danna tells Kaplan Barnaby’s signed a lease for the 3,300-sq.-ft. space earlier this month and expects to open by the end of the year. [Houston Chronicle] Photo: Revive Development

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Featured Posts
09/09/14 11:30am

Boulevard Coffee Is Giving Up on Heights Blvd. After Just 7 Months

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Houston Heights, Openings and Closings, Restaurants, Retail
20 Comments

Boulevard Coffee, 1030 Heights Blvd., Houston Heights

Boulevard Coffee, 1030 Heights Blvd., Houston HeightsThe Heights coffee shop that took over the former Waldo’s Coffee House bungalow on Heights Blvd. just south of 11th St. earlier this year will be shutting down at the end of this month, a reader reports. Boulevard Coffee had opened at 1030 Heights Blvd. in March of this year. A note taped to the shop’s cash register (at right) tells customers the story. Photos: Laura H. (patio view); Swamplot inbox (note)

The Last Drop
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Montrose
09/05/14 2:45pm

Canopy’s New Way In

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Quicklink, Restaurants, Signage
No Comments

CANOPY’S NEW WAY IN Improvised Entrance to Canopy Restaurant, 3939 Montrose Blvd., Montrose, HoustonA drive-in customer may have destroyed Canopy’s front door on Wednesday, but a bit of paint and re-engineering (a chair has been removed from the patio to make more room) now guides visitors to the side entrance. A special short-term exhibition of an improvised piece by artist Amy C. Evans now adorns the replacement plywood covering the spot where the car came in; it notes a few items on the restaurant’s menu and points customers both to the way in (through the patio door) and the neon OPEN sign. Well, used-to-be neon: The letters aren’t lighting up anymore after the accident, so more paint has been pressed into service (and applied directly to the window) to recreate their effect, below the still-lit neon tree. [Previously on Swamplot] Photo: Swamplot inbox

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Featured Posts
09/04/14 12:00pm

In Midst of Carefully Planned Restaurant Expansion, Canopy Gains Sudden Drive-Thru Addition

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Montrose, Restaurants, Strip Centers
5 Comments

Accident at Canopy Restaurant, 3939 Montrose Blvd., Montrose, Houston

Accident at Canopy Restaurant, 3939 Montrose Blvd., Montrose, HoustonAbout 3 years ago, Canopy added an actual canopy to the south side of its spot at the end of the 3939 Montrose strip center. (It required a variance from the city.) More recently, the restaurant has been busy installing a new coffee bar and bar bar in the space next door, which it’ll be expanding into. (Former neighbor Montrose Dry Cleaners relocated further north in the same center a while back.) But the latest addition proceeded much more suddenly: Yesterday afternoon, around 2:30, a customer saw fit to install a drive-thru directly in front of the restaurant, by stepping on the gas pedal while under the impression that the car was in reverse.

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Not So Fast
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Downtown
09/02/14 5:15pm

A Chick-fil-A Is Going Inside Pennzoil Place

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Office Buildings, Quicklink, Restaurants, Retail
4 Comments

A CHICK-FIL-A IS GOING INSIDE PENNZOIL PLACE Pennzoil Place, 711 Louisiana St., Downtown HoustonIf there’s gonna be a downtown office building collecting a few fast-food drive-thru franchises in its basement — minus the drive-thru parts, that is — it might as well be one with some street cred, right? Last year, a Sonic moved into the basement of Pennzoil Place, the Philip Johnson-designed double-trapezoid building pair on the block bounded by Milam, Rusk, Capitol and Louisiana. The building’s owners are now about to carve out more space for retail on the building’s lower floors — though only one of the added slots (at the corner of Rusk and Louisiana) will actually have direct access to the street. Joining Sonic in the building’s underground tunnel zone — along with an expanded eating area, revamped escalators, and a few more lease spaces — will be downtown’s fourth Chick Fil A. But don’t line up quite yet: The projected $1.2 million in renovations necessary to create the new spaces won’t be complete until early next year. [Houston Business Journal; previously on Swamplot; more info (PDF)] Photo: Flickr user telwink [license]

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Featured Posts
08/25/14 11:00am

Judge’s Order Keeps Zelko Bistro Alive, Requires Mediation of Dispute with Landlord

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Houston Heights, Lawsuits, Leasing, Restaurants
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Zelko Bistro, 705 E. 11th St., Houston Heights

Zelko Bistro, 705 E. 11th St., Houston HeightsLast week Judge Randy Wilson (yes, the same judge who ruled earlier this year in the Ashby Highrise case) granted a temporary injunction preventing the owner of the converted bungalow at 705 E. 11th St. from locking out or evicting Zelko Bistro — or putting a for lease sign in front of the Heights restaurant (as caught in the photo at right from last month). Zelko was required to post a bond equal to a single month’s rent under the previous lease; the ruling requires the restaurant’s owners to comply with the terms of that lease as well.

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Still Serving
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Downtown
08/21/14 12:00pm

Acting on Her Own, Mayor Will Allow Food Trucks Downtown

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Public Safety, Quicklink, Restaurants
1 Comment

ACTING ON HER OWN, MAYOR WILL ALLOW FOOD TRUCKS DOWNTOWN Coreanos Food Truck at GreenStreet, Downtown HoustonNote: Story updated below. Hopes there wouldn’t be much opposition this time to changing the city’s fire and health codes to allow food trucks a few niceties such as the ability to park near seating for their customers (if not actually provide it) may have been dashed by objections aired by restaurant owners and the Greater Houston Restaurant Association at yesterday’s city council committee meeting, but Mayor Parker said she plans to go ahead and let propane-fueled mobile food units operate downtown anyway, by acting on her own — an administrative change that doesn’t require council approval: “Parker said she has received an opinion from the fire marshal’s office deeming propane tanks of up to 60 pounds safe for mobile food units in the downtown area. It was not clear Wednesday when that rule change would go into effect, though it is likely to be coupled with smaller, more technical regulatory changes to the food truck policy that the City Council could vote on as soon as this fall.” Update, 1:30 pm: A spokesperson for Mayor Parker tells Swamplot the fire department expects to implement the propane rule change, which would allow trucks in the Texas Medical Center as well as Downtown, sometime in September. Changing the rules to allow a food truck to park closer than 60 ft. to another food truck — another administrative change not requiring a vote from city council — “isn’t likely to be considered until the end of the year or early next year when other changes to the fire code are proposed.” [Houston Chronicle; more info; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Coreanos food truck

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Public Health
08/20/14 12:00pm

City May Soon Can Rules That Force Houston Food Trucks To Space Out

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Quicklink, Restaurants
4 Comments

CITY MAY SOON CAN RULES THAT FORCE HOUSTON FOOD TRUCKS TO SPACE OUT Waffle Bus and Bernie's Burger Bus Food Trucks, University of Houston, HoustonWhat makes Houston’s food truck scene so quirky, so scrappy, so outré? Well, it could be some of the wacky rules mobile food units are required to follow when they’re operating within city limits — to guard against terrorism, major explosions, and other all-too-common street-food hazards. Three such rules — the fire code regulations that mandate that trucks park no closer than 60 ft. away from one another and that propane-equipped vehicles stay out of Downtown and the Texas Medical Center, and the health code ruling that subjects owners of mobile food vendors to fines if they’re found parking within 100 ft. of any table or chair — could be going away soon, however. A task force charged with looking into the issue is recommending the city 86 those particular regulations but keep in place others, including the requirement to visit a commissary every day. A city council committee meeting this afternoon will be the first opportunity for public comment on the proposed changes; the city’s Laura Spanjian tells Culturemap’s Eric Sandler that she doesn’t expect to the Greater Houston Restaurant Association to object to the recommendations. [Culturemap; more info] Photo: UH

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Featured Posts
08/19/14 12:00pm

Raising Cane’s Is Almost Ready To Grab the Corner of Hazard and Westheimer with Its Chicken Fingers

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Montrose, New Construction, Restaurants
53 Comments

Construction of Raising Cane's, 1902 Westheimer Rd., Montrose, Houston

The signs are now up at the new building under construction at 1902 Westheimer Rd., across the street from the Winlow Westheimer shopping center. And they say: Raising Cane’s. And that means your center-of-Montrose drive-thru chicken finger spot will be opening very soon. Raising Cane’s is no stranger to Westheimer; the new restaurant will mark Raising Cane’s fourth location on the street (it’s got the 12201, 7531, and 5015 spots already). But this’ll be the first one inside the Loop.

More pics of Lower Westheimer’s fast-food future:

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Montrose Drive-Thrus
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Montrose
08/19/14 10:30am

The Empty Lot on Westheimer Where the Edmont Will Land

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Proposed Developments, Quicklink, Restaurants
12 Comments

THE EMPTY LOT ON WESTHEIMER WHERE THE EDMONT WILL LAND 1634 Westheimer Rd., Montrose, HoustonThis long-vacant lot at the corner of Westheimer and Kueter, next to the Central Houston Animal Hospital and the recently shuttered EJ’s Bar on Ralph St., has been tagged as the future home of the Edmont, a new restaurant being planned by the people behind Paulie’s and Camerata and a former chef at the Vallone’s steakhouse. Paul Petronella, David Keck, and Grant Gordon have hired Abel Design Group to cook up a new restaurant from scratch at 1634 Westheimer — the same site eyed 6 years ago as a possible spot for a 75-room hotel. The restaurant, scheduled to open sometime near the end of 2015, is being named after a different hotel that never existed, though: a Manhattan spot patronized by Holden Caulfield in J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye. [Food Chronicles; previously on Swamplot] Photo: Allyn West

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Downtown
08/11/14 4:30pm

Macondo Latin Bistro, El Gallo Rojo Involved in Possible Downtown Restaurant Shutdown Shuffle

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Openings and Closings, Restaurants
2 Comments

Macondo Latin Bistro, 208 Travis St., Downtown Houston

We’ve got a couple of possibly linked downtown restaurant shutdowns to report: Macondo Latin Bistro, at 208 Travis St. just off Market Square, closed at the beginning of last week. “I look forward to serving you again at a new location,” owner Delaila Ocasio writes on the restaurant’s Facebook page. Meanwhile, around the corner at 917 Franklin St., chef Mark Latigue’s 4-month-old triple-threat Creole, Cuban, and Caribbean venture has also closed, but no announcements about the future of El Gallo Rojo have appeared on Facebook so far. A Swamplot reader was alerted to the missing red rooster after spotting a chafing dish sitting on the sidewalk in front of the property last Saturday evening. The Red Lantern Vietnamese restaurant closed in the same location last year.

Beyond the finishing of fusion cuisines, what’s the connection between the endings of these 2 restaurants?

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Fusion Cuisine Restaurant Spot Fusion?
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Pearland
08/07/14 3:45pm

Is Houston a Melting Pot, a Salad Bowl, or a BBQ Kolache?

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Quicklink, Restaurants, Shadow Creek Ranch
11 Comments

IS HOUSTON A MELTING POT, A SALAD BOWL, OR A BBQ KOLACHE? Peña's Donut Heaven and Grill, 11601 Shadow Creek Pkwy., Shadow Creek Ranch, Pearland, TexasChron food critic Alison Cook frames the new Killen’s barbecue brisket-filled kolache from Peña’s Donut Heaven & Grill in Pearland (pictured above at 11601 Shadow Creek Pkwy.) as a mere restaging onto a dinner plate — or in a to-go bag at least — of the larger metropolis’s cultural blend: “Mixing and matching has become our culinary birthright. In the nation that is Texas, Houston — with its port and its flourishing economy and its early influx of international immigrants — has been the leading edge of this trend. Whereas 20 years ago, the advent of a huevos ranchero kolache at the Kolache Factory attracted a bit of delighted surprise, now the reaction to Peña’s idea of stuffing the Tex­Czech bun with Killen’s sanctified brisket is more along the lines of ‘What took you so long?‘ Indeed, just hours after the brisket kolache was announced to the world, kolache baker extraordinaire Victoria Rittinger was already riffing further on the idea.” [Houston Chronicle] Photo: Peña’s Donut Heaven & Grill

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