Historic Houston Restaurants

[brucesw]

I realize 46 pages is a lot to read but probably all of the places that have been mentioned recently have been mentioned before and the HAIF search feature works pretty good.  Just confine your search to this thread and you'll get links to individual posts.  It may help to jog some memories.

 

And then there's this thread in the Dining, Shopping and Entertainment forum.  It's only 15 pages .

 

This Historic Houston forum used to be one of the most active on this board.  I miss those days.  It's good to see some activity.

[brucesw]

Correcting myself (I think) - the original Hobbit Hole was on Shepherd north of Vermont, not Welch, in an old house.  It was not right on the corner.  Best guess is the place now occupied by Who Made The Cake?

Edited September 12, 2017 by brucesw

[brucesw]

19 hours ago, DanH said:

 

No, I remember the Hobbit Hole as being further north, a cozy place mostly of wood (maybe a converted house?). The place I'm thinking about was directly south of Jamail's on Kirby toward Southwest Freeway (essentially right next door), was large and bright and airy, lots of glass, and it was definitely not vegetarian. You ordered and picked up your food at the counter and they gave you a quart-sized plastic tumbler for your drink. I think the drinks station was to the left of the order/pickup counter, and they had blackcurrant iced tea, which I had never had before and thought was delicious. Maybe the name of the place was something like Cafe Jardin? I'm wracking my brain and still can't come up with it for sure! They had really good soups, and my favorite sandwiches of theirs were their chicken salad and BLT's.

I think I finally figured out what you're talking about.  One of the first locations of Cafe Express was on Kirby; I remember it was the first one I went to.  Robert Del Grande of Cafe Annie was part of the ownership and they had (and still have) Black Currant tea.  According to their history they first went into business in 1984.

[DanH]

On 9/12/2017 at 11:29 AM, brucesw said:

I think I finally figured out what you're talking about.  One of the first locations of Cafe Express was on Kirby; I remember it was the first one I went to.  Robert Del Grande of Cafe Annie was part of the ownership and they had (and still have) Black Currant tea.  According to their history they first went into business in 1984.

OMG I think that's it! Cafe Express! And it makes sense that the Cafe Annie owner was involved; the food was really good. Thank you! Huge relief!

 

Dan

[DanH]

On 9/12/2017 at 5:29 AM, brucesw said:

I realize 46 pages is a lot to read but probably all of the places that have been mentioned recently have been mentioned before and the HAIF search feature works pretty good.  Just confine your search to this thread and you'll get links to individual posts.  It may help to jog some memories.

 

And then there's this thread in the Dining, Shopping and Entertainment forum.  It's only 15 pages .

 

This Historic Houston forum used to be one of the most active on this board.  I miss those days.  It's good to see some activity.

Thank you! I'm a total newbie and it didn't even occur to me that I might be able to limit a search to a single thread. And thanks for the link to the DS&E forum! I'll check it out.

[ggmsmolly]

I miss the old Kapans and Valians Seven Seas Villa.  Mr. Valian was a wonderful host.  When my family would come in to dine, he would always prepare a special small pizza just for my son.

[Alanda]

Does anyone remember Petty's Steakhouse? That was my parents place. Still have my Dad's gavel from when he was president of the Houston Restaurant Association. And the only surviving ashtray plus a ton of pictures.

[dmil]

Alanda, my family and I ate often at the Post Oak location. The steak dinners were to die for as was the French Onion Soup. Later I had some business lunches at the Richmond Ave. location. Do you have any of the Recipes? Didn't the steaks come with a little pouring cup of steak sauce? I remember the Post Oak location being a hangout for Houston Golf Pros. Thanks for bringing back dining memories. Back then I bet your Dad knew the family that owned The Las Vegas Inn, Sonny Look, Granny Harber, Charlie Lung, Bud Bigalow and Bill Bennett real well. Pls follow up with any more information. I love Nostalgia.

Tks!

[Texmex1]

On 6/27/2009 at 3:38 PM, debmartin said:

a few places from my early days:

thornhill cafeteria in palm center, where my dad's record store "harmony hut" was located

albrittan's cafeteria

sky terrace (sakowitz where my mom worked, we would go as a treat)

warwick hotel (few rare dinners with my dad's business associates)

youngbloods (fried chicken family place, now aunt beas on the northside)

gee's (airline @ crosstimbers, chinese my mom & sibs loved where i could get a cheeseburger & jukeboxes on the table:)

princess hamburgers downtown, eat in the car (as a teen drink orange tommy's with my mom)

shakey's pizza by northline mall

piccadily cafeteria in northline mall

windmill dinner theater

howard johnson's I45 & crosstimbers (waitressed as a teen, they made saltwater taffy) its now something of a crackhouse

monterrey house - they put candy at the bottom of the bowl of chips!

antione's on taft

santa anita's (downtown, an elderly gentleman served us who also served my parents in the late 50's)

gallagher's steakhouse (served great bread & wisconsin cheese spread)

mr. bake-a-tater (around the westheimer curve, late 70's)

one's a meal (next to river oaks theater) now by katz's deli

sam's bbq on airline, late 70's, great food & they sponsored my softball team

bennigins (late 80's, my kids loved it, took my son to 59 location every st. patricks on his birthday

old san francisco steakhouse on westheimer

boston sea party also on westheimer

never been here but my parents met at a place called the "buccaneer drive-in, 1955, currently 2016 main residential & sammys

my mom had 4 kids in tow & liked cafeteria dining. we also drove to the country to visit my grandparents often down I45 north outside centerville, stopping at stuckeys in conroe, madisonville & centerville. the corral cafe in madisonville was so good my grandparents drove there many sundays from marquez where they lived, a considerable distance!

 

Mr Bake a Tater was on Shepherd across the street from St Ann school, my Mom used to take me there, it was great!

[6thgentxn]

On 2/3/2006 at 8:17 PM, 57Tbird said:

Wow!! Subdude...You continue to impress me with your collection, or expertise, on where to find things like this. I will forward this piece of memorabilia to the former owners. I am sure they will be most appreciative. Thanks! I have them looking for an old menu from their establishment. They said they have a bunch of them stored away in a box somewhere. I will post, if I get one. Hebert's Ritz was a fine dining establishment in its time. Would be interesting to compare prices with today's menus of comparable restaurants. I am curious about the spelling of McGowen. On the card, it is McGowan. I thought it was spelled with an "e".

Looking through really old memories. I was at Hebert's Ritz a number of times but always at lunch with Dad and business associates. I seem to remember a specialty was a slice of prime rib cooked like a steak ,which was very popular with our group. ALWAYS a pleasant experience.

[dmil]

The steak at Herert's Ritz was called their Rib Steak. It was actually a Bone-in Ribeye. A late uncle of mine went there often. It was a neat old place.

[mkultra25]

I remember the neon sign at Hebert's Ritz, but was unable to find a pic of it online during an admittedly cursory search. In addition to the restaurant name, it depicted a bear standing upright on its hind legs, in keeping with their familiar advertising tagline "pronounced A-Bear".

[dmil]

I'm thinking it might have been called the Cattle Yard. There was also one on I-45 just north of Greenspoint Mall. I believe it was a Franchise started in Dallas.

[Purpledevil]

@TimoricThere was once a place on Richmond Avenue that was called the Trail Dust Steakhouse. They'd cut off your tie and nail it to the wall if you wore one inside.

[IronTiger]

12 hours ago, Timoric said:

They cut off your tie if you wear one inside

That sounds like it might be a liability. Then again, I've heard stories of all sorts of strange restaurants with concepts that wouldn't fly today (and dubious back then).

[Timoric]

-

Edited July 12, 2019 by Timoric

[EspersonBuildings]

On 09/08/2008 at 1:33 PM, val619 said:

Does anyone remember an Italian market called, Zampieri's.... or something like that. It was a god-send to my Sicilian grandmother who transplanted herself in Texas in 1970. I thought it was where Mandola's Deli is on Telephone Rd./Leeland.

And what about the LC Cafeteria downtown under Woolworth's?

I apologize if I've responded to this in the past (or maybe I just read it a while back).  LC Cafeteria was under Walgreen's on Main @ Walker, not Woolworth's (Main & McKinney)  You could enter from the front entrance on Main @ Walker via an escalator (right next to the entrance to Walgreen's) or from the back entrance on Travis @ Walker (right next to the back entrance to Walgreen's).  It was huge, occupied the entire side (the basement) of the southern half of the block (Walker, Travis, Rusk & Main) directly under Walgreen's.  I came back to Houston in 1998 (gone for 15 years) and by this time it was an all you can eat buffet but only occupied the western half of the original LC Cafeteria, you could now only enter and exit at Walker and Travis.  Don't think it lasted very long after this and years later the entire San Jacinto Building was demolished.  Across the street on Main was James Coney Island, so many eating places on street level in those days!

[dmil]

Mandola's Deli is still at the corner of Cullen and Leeland. Across the street is Rainbo Bread Bldg. Just east of the bakery is the former East End State Bank Building. Across Leeland is the original bank building. After being a bank it was the location of Ballatori's Italian Restaurant. It closed several years ago. Could the deli you mentioned could have been Samperi's? I don't know the history of Mandola's Deli location. I do know that they are related to the Mandola Restaurants Clan.

 

[Specwriter]

According to a June 2007 entry in this same thread there was a Samperi's on Telephone road at some time.

 

My mother was an educator in the Aldine district at one time and she spoke of a Therese Samperi who was a high school principal and whose family had a delicatessen but that is all I remember.

Frank A. Mandola owns and operates Mandola's on Leeland. His son, Joseph is playing an increasing role in the operation of the restaurant. I love their spaghetti with Italian sausage which they make right on the premises.

[UofH-1965]

Does anyone remember the Red Windmill Dinner Theater? I think it was in southwest Houston, possibly Town & Country Mall area. In the late 70s - early 80s I worked for Channel 39 and an actor named Gray (I don't  remember his first name. The only possible name that comes to mind is Roger.) worked part time as a newscaster in the early morning. He left to become the manager of the Red Windmill Theater. (or Theatre?)

Edited April 15, 2018 by UofH-1965
Add detail

[brucesw]

I think it was just the Windmill Dinner Theater, I don't remember 'red' being part of the name, in T&C.  I went there just once.  Couldn't tell you what we saw (or ate).

 

There was a Roger Gray.  I never knew he worked for 39; I worked with him briefly at KLYX, the precursor to Majic 102.  I think he worked at several radio stations and was a talk show host at one time, as best I recall.   Last I heard of him I think he was up in East Texas, but that's been a couple of decades ago.

Edited April 15, 2018 by brucesw

[brucesw]

Some Google hits for 'roger gray houston radio' if you were wondering.

[UofH-1965]

On 4/15/2018 at 5:42 PM, brucesw said:

I think it was just the Windmill Dinner Theater, I don't remember 'red' being part of the name, in T&C.  I went there just once.  Couldn't tell you what we saw (or ate).

 

There was a Roger Gray.  I never knew he worked for 39; I worked with him briefly at KLYX, the precursor to Majic 102.  I think he worked at several radio stations and was a talk show host at one time, as best I recall.   Last I heard of him I think he was up in East Texas, but that's been a couple of decades ago.

Thanks for the confirmation of the name Roger Gray. As for the theater name, I don't know if my memory is better or yours. I just appreciate being able to reestablish the information and memories.

Between 1978 and 1985, our TV studio productions included numerous sessions with Bum Phillips (Bum Phillip's Coach's Show), Mickey Gilley (Gilley's Place), and Paul Bosh (I. W. Marks commercials and Houston Wrestling). PM Magazine hosts at KHTV39 included Bill Worrell and Giff Nielsen. I did not really know radio people then. I did a little radio DJ-ing at college in California.

[UofH-1965]

On 4/15/2018 at 6:02 PM, brucesw said:

Some Google hits for 'roger gray houston radio' if you were wondering.

Thank you.

[Jose Torres]

On 7/24/2014 at 0:51 AM, Libbie said:

 

I started eating at Cardet's in the late 1970s. The food was good, and the restaurant was attached to a little grocery store--Cuban, of course, like the restaurant--that sold normal groceries and also a few exotic vegtables, like malangas (google it), as well as Cuban records and even books.  I'm pretty sure the Cardet family originally lived above the store; in later years it appeared that the cook and her family lived there.

I would see Cubans and people who seemed to be from the West Indies shopping there. After the 1980 Mariel Boatlift catapulted a lot of destitute Cubans into the country, I noticed several new employees. The food, if possible, got even better. Then, in 1983, it was sold to some Koreans,who re-named it Latina Cafe (this name jarred a bit if you knew Spanish and caught the incorrect grammatical gender of Latina + Cafe). But they kept the same cook and wait staff. I remember seeing a diminutive oldish Cuban waiter upbraiding his Korean lady boss in Desi-Arnaz-rapid-fire Spanish (the time I remember it was something about that customer didn't want his milk-coffe pre-sweetened). The new Korean owners soon learned enough Spanish for self-preservation, and I remember seeing their pre-school daughter sitting at the counter, the pet of elderly Cubans doting on her. The Koreans tried a Korean dish or two but eventually reverted to all-Cuban food. I didn't go for several years. When I went back, the daughter was old enough to take my order! A few years later, I heard it had been sold to some Indonesians, who, fortunately, kept the menu and the cook. Not all that many years ago, it ceased to be Cuban/Korean/Indonesian/Cuban, and became The Roost. I ate there once. The food is quite good, but the place was too noisy for quiet conversation, at dinner time, anyway.

 

Lived there from 1975 -80, I was 10 years old when we left back to Miami. My mother Josefa was one cooking in the kitchen during that time. We lived upstairs. Hector Cardet and his family lived above the Market on the corner. Chances are that I was running around the front of the restaurant during that time. 

[Jose Torres]

12 minutes ago, Jose Torres said:

 

Lived there from 1975 -80, I was 10 years old when we left back to Miami. My mother Josefa was the one cooking in the kitchen during that time. We lived upstairs. Hector Cardet and his family lived above the Market on the corner. Chances are that I was running around the front of the restaurant during that time. 

 

Attached are photos when my brother visited some years ago I think in 2007 and him with my father in front of Cardet's Cafe in the 70's.

Edited May 12, 2018 by Jose Torres
missing word

[uncsig]

Cortes Deli--Started out on Alabama in a strip center off of Revere. Opened a second location in the "jinxed" location further east on Alabama across from the Menil parking lot (Jenny's Hideaway, Michaeline's, etc.). Then moved to corner of Feagan and Shepherd closing about a dozen years ago. I would kill to be able to eat their migas again.

Shakey's--I've seen a lot of references to pizza places, but don't think I've seen this one mentioned.

The Anchorage--best seafood restaurant in town in the 1970s. Located adjacent to what was the Hilton on 610 at TC Jester. Simply spectacular fried shrimp and fresh seafood flown in from all over the country.

Rainbo Bakery at Astroworld--Mini loaves. Enough said.

Western Kitchen--BBQ at the corner of Greenbriar and Richmond 

Burgerville#2--Times and Kelvin. Had totally forgotten about that one until I was almost through with this list.

And would second the mentions of the Green Parrot, Hebert's Ritz, Kaphan's and Sonny Look's.

Edited May 17, 2018 by uncsig

[dmil]

My wife and I had an excellent meal at The Anchorage one night. She had their Fried Shrimp  and I had Filets of Sole wrapped around Abalone in a Creamy Sauce. I've had Dover Sole in England and other Sole dishes, but nothing like the dish at The Anchorage.

[dbigtex56]

On ‎9‎/‎12‎/‎2017 at 7:29 AM, brucesw said:

I realize 46 pages is a lot to read but probably all of the places that have been mentioned recently have been mentioned before and the HAIF search feature works pretty good. 

Checked the search feature for this thread and didn't see Hamburgers By Gourmet.
It was located on the southwest corner of W Alabama and Yoakum Blvd. It was torn down in the '80s, about the same time work began on St. Basil's; the lot where it stood is now a lawn.
They had pretty good hamburgers, but my most vivid memory of the place was on a windy spring day about 35 years ago.  I had been sitting next to one of the large plate glass windows on the east side of the building, and had just gotten up to return my tray to the counter when BAM! The window exploded inside in a thousand jagged pieces. There were other patrons in the place and the glass flew everywhere.
Miraculously, no one was hurt.

[brucesw]

1 hour ago, dbigtex56 said:

Checked the search feature for this thread and didn't see Hamburgers By Gourmet.
It was located on the southwest corner of W Alabama and Yoakum Blvd. It was torn down in the '80s, about the same time work began on St. Basil's; the lot where it stood is now a lawn.
They had pretty good hamburgers, but my most vivid memory of the place was on a windy spring day about 35 years ago.  I had been sitting next to one of the large plate glass windows on the east side of the building, and had just gotten up to return my tray to the counter when BAM! The window exploded inside in a thousand jagged pieces. There were other patrons in the place and the glass flew everywhere.
Miraculously, no one was hurt.

Wow.  No mention of HBG????  I know it's been talked about several times here on HAIF and last year there was a thread about an attempt to revive the chain down in Clear Lake.  (There's a similar thread to this one in the Dining, Shopping and Entertainment forum, too).

 

The HBG on Kirby (where Castle Dental is now) was the second restaurant I went to when I first arrived in Houston in Sept 1970.  I was hooked immediately.  I think it may have been the original location/first one.  All my new co-workers raved about it.  The one on Yoakum was one of the last ones.  I started work in Montrose in '83 and worked in that neighborhood thru early '95.  I went to HBG on Yoakum often for lunch when i got off.  I can't remember when it was torn down but I know I missed it.

Edited May 18, 2018 by brucesw