sonic0boom

It's also worth noting that Frank, who designed the coffee bar and heads it up, is a former barista at Catalina. The cortado he made me over the weekend was just as good as the one I get at Catalina, so Revival is certainly a good alternate when Catalina is super busy on weekend mornings (they also sell sell the Araya coffee beans).

Do you ever find yourself in one of the following situations:

1) You are in NYC or some big city (or even Austin) and run across some locally run specialty grocer or whatnot and think: "I'd never want to live in this hellhole of a city, but, damn, it's great to have shops like this in your neighborhood that you can walk to."

2) You go to CM of WF here in Houston and think about how much you like shopping there, but also about how much of a pain in the butt it is to shop there.

Well, Revival solves both of these problems (i know, life is so hard). You won't find 200 kinds of cheeses or pasta or whatever, but based on my visit yesterday, you can stop by there and get everything you'd need to make dinner. Or to grab chips and salsa and a couple limes for a margarita. Porchman covers a lot of what's there, and there are still lots of empty racks that will be filled in the upcoming weeks. Also, I talked to Morgan for a while (very personable guy) and he is all about listening to feedback from customers on they kinds of things they should carry. Keep in mind that the idea isn't necessarily that everything here is organic or "natural", but that it is local. Not that he doesn't strive for those things, but he knows pretty much all of the producers of his products and they do tend to lack all those additives and preservatives and whatnot in their products. And here's the best part, the prices are generally cheaper than CM and WF. You might spend close to $10/lb for deli ham at one of those places. $6.99 here and he's curing it himself.

So, no, I'm not a paid spokesperson ... just a very excited customer. I admit that i am occasionally jealous of my brother in Austin because of the cool, local shops he has at his finger tips. This is exactly that sort of place that has been largely missing here in Houston.

http://blogs.houston...open_monday.php

Thanks for the updates. With all the cars in the lot this week, you would have thought they were open already....

Also in other news, I noticed some activity last night at Little Fats, the dessert place near the bead shop on White Oak. The place looked all ready to go about a year ago and then .... nothing. Driving by, i noticed some people inside and there were chairs stacked up on tables. So, it looks like they may actually be opening at long last.

Correction, it is called Happy Fatz .... I did a search and see that they had a pre-opening inspection in January, but that's about all i can find. I guess we will find out soon enough.

My Table reports that the opening has been pushed back a couple weeks ...

6th st has something along the lines of "bbs cafe coming soon" on their billboard as of last night.....so i might have inferred incorrectly!

I can confirm this, too. I tried to take a picture last night, but the camera phone isn't quite up to balancing night time with bright lights...

Also in other news, I noticed some activity last night at Little Fats, the dessert place near the bead shop on White Oak. The place looked all ready to go about a year ago and then .... nothing. Driving by, i noticed some people inside and there were chairs stacked up on tables. So, it looks like they may actually be opening at long last.

I thought there was a Subway there already... just a few doors south of Kroger. Am I making that up?

You're not making it up, but it's telling that I don't think i even noticed it until this past weekend and that you aren't even sure yourself ...

Chron reports that BB's is opening at White Oak and Studewood. YES!

The link to the article: Chron

BRC does not sell hard alcohol -- just beer and wine -- so it is likely this place will be the same. If that is, indeed, the case, how would it factor in?

Well, i heard that there were issues, but they obviously got them figured out.

Restaurant. Same owners as BRC.

Liberty Kitchen, if the name stays ....

Were they able to work around the issues with serving alcohol near the school? I thought i heard something about the building being grandfathered in since it was there before the school, but i'm not sure.

Looks like we might be getting a Sundance Cinema. I never knew such a (micro-)chain existed, but from their website it looks similar to the Angelika without the one or two major releases that used played along side the indie and foreign stuff.

My link

Guilty!

I was merely besing my reservation on the one in our neighbors to the north!

My first experience at a W was in Times Square, and it was partay central over there. But then i stayed at the location in the French Quarter and my room was in a converted carriage house (which explained the odd shape of the room). It was still modern, but of a different sort than the Dallas or Times Square locations. One of the reasons, i think, that the W is among my favorite hotel chains...

I can't really see a W or a Ritz Carlton going in that building unless they do a complete rennovation and building conversion. This is great news nonetheless!

It could be a W ... the NY Union Square and French Quarter locations are both renovated historic buildings. (I'm just assuming that your reservations are based on its more common image of being a more sleek and modern hotel chain)

Well, my wife didn't have it too bad, and we now have a pretty good list of contacts for caterers, tailors, and all kinds of random stuff that we can't afford...

Ms. Nhu will treat you right. It doesn't hurt that she always tells me how handsome i am. After she asks about the wife and baby, of course Tell her Ryan sent you, but don't hold me responsible for any flattery you might receive.

It's not the Heights, but it isn't far ... I use Ms. Nhu at Nhu's Tailors. She's next to the Alabama shopping center (ex-Bookstop, Cactus, etc). I've only used her to hem pants/jeans (she will keep the bottoms if you want), but my wife used to work as a personal assistant and her employers sent anything from everyday to couture over there.

I think it would be pretty neat to see and definitely leave visitors intrigued.

You assume that someone who would build something like this gets many visitors....

If you lost your survey ballot, or inadvertantly threw it away without realizing its importance, a new one can be issued. Let me know, and I'll tell you how to contact Planning for a new one.

Red, can you post this to the board? I don't seem to have received one.

The Village was definitely better before all of the development ruined it. But, that's the way it goes sometimes

True ... not the same since the Village Theater closed. Where else were you supposed to get your porn fix at a place like that?

No insults from this direction...

To your point, though, I sort of feel the same way about Barryhill's on 11th and Colina's on 19th. For whatever reason, I feel surprised to see both of them when i drive by (and that's pretty often), thinking of their River Oaks and Village locations, respectively. That said, they seem to do pretty well and from what I've heard, the Barryhill's is really popular with Heights families with kids (my young 'un isn't quite old enough to enjoy that yet, so we haven't been there to confirm). One thing to perhaps allay that 5% reservation you have is that I believe D'Amico's will operate on a pretty local level -- it's not the type of place that people will come from far and wide to check out, and fixing up that existing building will only serve to better the neighborhood. In terms of what it means for the Heights, I'd say a locally owned, budget-friendly, casual (and, I assume, family friendly) restaurant like D'Amico's is a good fit. And, most likely, after a few visits, we won't even remember that the Village location even exists.

Last Friday she had tamales. I brought a chipotle/ black bean home for my husband but accidentally left it in my car.

Must have left the car ... ah ... fragrant.

Radical Eats serves up gluten-free and vegan food. I've seen them at the area farmers markets if anyone wants a preview of their goods. I haven't actually tried them, though.

What reservations do you have? Are you not 100% sure about this particular restaurant or the influx of new development? Just curious.

My take (full disclosure: I live within walking distance to all this): there's a lot of empty real estate on White Oak, and not much of it particularly attractive. I'm happy to see these new, budget-minded restaurants move in rather than more bars. And with the new stationary store, I'm hoping to see more retail pop up, too. And I really like the fact that the tenants are moving in to the existing buildings rather seeing them torn down for new development. To be honest, I really had no idea what would move in to the building D'Amico's is taking over. It's a pretty ugly building with hardly any windows and surrounded by a parking lot with no landscaping. Should be interesting to see what they do with it.

Depending on how easy it is for you to get on I-10, you can get to the Bunker Hill HEB in 10 minutes... That location is sort of like a light version of Central Market.

And have you tried looking at the Kroger flier via the website? You are prompted for your zip code as soon as you access it, and it will show you the flier for your local shop.

My wife and I drove by around 5:30 to see if they were open for dinner, but we couldn't really tell if anything was open. We saw some cars but thought they were for the employees working the bakery. Any idea where the cafe part is? It's a pretty big building.