The building at 1208 W. Magnolia Ave. spent years as Cat City Grill. It’s now home to Mary Perez’s Enchiladas ¡Olé! and her barbecue spinoff, Holy Cue, sharing one kitchen and one dining room for the first time.
Perez has earned the nickname “Queen of Sauces” the hard way. She spent 25 years in nonprofit work before turning her mother’s enchilada sauces into a side hustle in 2012, then opened her first Enchiladas Olé on Sylvania Avenue in 2013. The business grew to three Fort Worth locations before hitting a rough stretch — a prolonged liquor license fight that eventually closed her Camp Bowie spot, plus a North Richland Hills location that didn’t make it. The Magnolia Avenue combination is her answer to all of it: one roof, one kitchen, tighter control over quality. As she put it when the doors opened, “It was very difficult for me to be in two places at once when the concepts were separated.”
The room carries some of Cat City’s old bones but doesn’t feel like it. Perez thrifted much of the décor herself — flea-market chandeliers, vintage tables and chairs, one table pulled straight from her own dining room — and a fresh mural from local artist Megan Najera brightens the west wall. The old bar is now a service counter and drink station. Ordering runs counter-service, with a POS system for anyone who already knows what they want, though full-service dining is still available for the sit-and-linger crowd.
Start with the hatch chile brisket enchiladas. The sauce is the draw — Perez makes seven artisan sauces from scratch, from ancho chile and tomatillo to a smoky mole and Santa Fe red chile, and the creamy Hatch version has real heat behind the cream. The brisket tacos are worth ordering too, typically served with rice, beans, and a house-made salsa.
From the Holy Cue side, the smoked brisket — a 16-hour smoke with a custom rub — shows up in the enchiladas but is worth ordering on its own, alongside the smoked meatloaf that built Holy Cue’s reputation in the first place, a twist on the classic that swaps ketchup for ranchero sauce and melted Chihuahua cheese. The sides get more attention here than at most barbecue counters — Gouda mac and cheese, scalloped potatoes, sweet potato pie. The skillet-fried potatoes topped with queso and brisket are a holdover from Perez’s earlier locations and worth asking for even if they’re not front and center on the menu.
Lunch platters run around $14 on weekdays, dinner enchilada plates land closer to $15 to $18, and Perez has kept most of the menu under $16 on purpose — a deliberate call to preserve scratch cooking without pricing out the neighborhood. The enchilada family platter is sized for a table of six or seven. The bar keeps it simple: beer and margaritas only, no full liquor license, a choice Perez made this time around to keep the operation lean.
Parking is tight, which is true of most of Magnolia and not really Perez’s fault. Hours have shifted some since opening, so it’s worth a quick call to 817-751-5556 before you head over, especially early in the week when the schedule runs shorter.
