A Living Legend: Burger House Since 1951

A Greek immigrant named Prometheus “Jack” Koustabardis opened the first Burger House at 6913 Hillcrest Avenue in 1951. Dallas looked nothing like it does now — Central Expressway had just opened, “I Love Lucy” was the hot new show on television, and a cheeseburger, fries, and a drink cost less than a dollar. Jack cooked his burgers with a seasoning blend he developed himself, put that same seasoning on the fries, and built a neighborhood burger stand that people drove across the city for. He did not change the recipe. He did not need to.

Continue reading

1 Comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

Retro Movie Review: Patton (1970)

There is a moment early in Patton when George C. Scott stands alone on a North African battlefield the morning after the fighting has ended. The dead are everywhere. He surveys the carnage with something that is not quite horror and not quite satisfaction but something uncomfortably close to joy. He quotes Plutarch. He is, in that moment, exactly what the film has been telling us he is — a man who was born in the wrong century and knows it, and has never fully forgiven the world for that fact.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

The Meltdown Margarita Has Followed Eddie Cervantes to Every Restaurant He Has Ever Opened

Eddie Cervantes has been feeding Dallas Tex-Mex since 1981. He opened Primo’s Bar & Grill on McKinney Avenue in 1986 and built it into one of the most loved Tex-Mex cantinas the city has ever had — where locals, chefs, and the occasional celebrity would end up on a Tuesday night over meltdown margaritas and a bowl of queso that nobody wanted to stop eating. Primo’s ran for years. People still bring it up.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

The Best Summer Day Trip from Dallas Opens This Month

Forty-five minutes east of Dallas, train conductors stop their trains to get a scoop of peach ice cream. That tells you most of what you need to know about Ham Orchards.

It started with a firefighter and a hunch. Dale Ham had spent 32 years with the Richardson Fire Department when something came over him in 1979 — he wanted to grow peaches. He bought 23 acres just east of Terrell, planted 50 trees, and waited. Every tree survived. When the peaches came in, Dale and his daughter Sharien set up a card table on the side of the highway and started selling out of the back of a pickup truck. The railroad told them they were too close to the tracks. They moved above the tracks. The line of customers followed them up.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

Swamp Cafe Brings Authentic Cajun Joy

blue crab and crawfish

David Cui was born in Shanghai. He spent 28 years cooking Cajun food in New Orleans. Then he moved to Dallas, opened a small restaurant in a north Dallas strip center, and almost lost everything. Then the internet showed up.

The story of a true mom & pop, Swamp Cafe at 17721 Dallas Parkway is the that reminds you why small restaurants matter and how close they always are to disappearing. David and his wife Michelle have been running this place for years, with David doing the cooking and both of them doing everything else. The food is scratch-made Cajun — gumbo, jambalaya, étouffée, po’boys, beignets — and it is the real thing, built from nearly three decades of cooking in Louisiana.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

AM/FM Is the Best Thing to Happen to the Design District in Years

Ferris Wheeler’s ran for eight years on Market Center Boulevard before it closed last fall — a big backyard, a stage, cold beer, and barbecue. It was a good run. What replaced it is something harder to describe in a single sentence, which is usually a good sign.

AM/FM at 1950 Market Center Boulevard is an all-day diner, a lounge, and a backyard concert venue, and it operates as all three at the same time depending on the hour. It comes from Matthew Harber and Annette Marin, who own Spune Productions — a Dallas music and concert promotion company that books Club Dada, the Granada, Three Links, Sons of Herman Hall, and other venues around town. They had been involved with the Ferris Wheeler’s space since 2023 helping build out the live music side, and when the BBQ operation closed they took the whole thing over. The Ferris wheel is still there, by the way. It’s not rideable, but it lights up, and it is visible from the backyard stage on a Friday night in the way that only a non-functioning amusement ride in the middle of Dallas could be.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

The Most New Orleans Thing in Dallas is on Commerce Street

Walk into The Free Man on a Tuesday night and you might not immediately understand what you are looking at. There is a band in one room and a different band in the other room. Someone is eating crawfish at the bar. The owner is probably behind a drum kit somewhere. The gumbo smells like it has been going since this morning, because it has. This is Deep Ellum, but it is also kind of New Orleans, and that is entirely on purpose.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle

One of Dallas’ Most Private Dining Rooms Is Open to Everyone This Mother’s Day

Most people in Dallas have walked past The Crescent, looked up at that postcard Uptown skyline, and assumed whatever is happening on the 17th floor of the office tower is none of their business. They are mostly right. The Crescent Club sits up there in the manner of a private club from another era — hardwood floors, deep wood paneling, panoramic views over the Dallas skyline — and on a normal day it is open only to members and hotel guests. Mother’s Day is not a normal day.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Filed under Steven Doyle