News You Can Eat

Coffee and cocktails jumpstart this round of Fort Worth restaurant news

How about a little caffeine.

Avoca Coffee Roasters

This roundup of Fort Worth restaurant news is positively teeming with delicious tidbits. There's loads of openings, featuring coffee, cocktails, breakfast, and lunch. There are new beers, new quesadillas, new wine, and free guacamole, if you act fast.

Here's what's happening in Fort Worth restaurant news:

Avoca Coffee Roasters is now open in Mule Alley. This is the third location of this Fort Worth coffee roastery (is that a word?) and will offer specialty coffees plus beer from local breweries. Avoca is known for their micro-roasted coffee beans made in-house and their "Charlie Sheen" signature drink. To celebrate the grand opening, they'll feature their signature drink, the Bourbon Butterscotch Latte. Hmm, can you have two signature drinks? Shots will be half-price on opening weekend (July 31-August 1) and you'll get a free coffee drink if you buy beans.

Belzoni's Catfish Cafe has opened a second location at the Hulen Mall where they're open during Mall hours, seven days a week. The menu is basically the same, with fried catfish and burgers, but slightly pared down. They recently reopened their original White Settlement location, too, following a brief closure.

Mango's, the popular Southlake breakfast and brunch restaurant, opened a second location in Keller, at 900 S. Main St., Ste. 305, where it's serving omelets, breakfast sandwiches, skillets, and sweet favorites like pancakes, crepes, waffles and French toast. Lunch options include wraps, salads, burgers, and sandwiches. Cool specials include Cajun chicken 'n' waffle, a breakfast stuffed avocado, and eggs benedict with Mexican flair.

Berry Street Ice House closed on July 21. According to a post on Facebook, the closure was "due to an ongoing failure to come to a long-term lease agreement," and they departed voluntarily. The concept from the Trident Group — Kyle Bryson, Wallace Owens, and chef Stefon Rishel — opened in the thick of the pandemic in August 2020 in the former Moon Bar space. Sounds like they had a year lease and were facing a rent hike? Or as one commenter put it, "Obviously the owner is trying to get more out of the tenants just as they start to be successful. Greed at its finest!"

Coco Shrimp has moved its food truck to the parking lot out of Ace Hardware and into their new location at 7300 Denton Hwy., Watauga, where they're taking over an old Zoe's.

Maple Branch Craft Brewery has their beer now on tap at Buffalo Bros in Sundance Square. "Way back when we started homebrewing, we said if we ever opened a brewery we’d want to be on tap at Buffalo Bros, and that day has finally come!" they said. Find their Raspberry Fields at the downtown restaurant.

City Works Eatery and Pour House in Frisco and Fort Worth have an array of new dishes and cocktails including: Duck Nachos, Ahi Tuna Chopped Salad, BLTE with scrambled egg, bacon, sausage, smoked cheddar in a crispy flour tortilla, chimichurri with bacon, arugula, tomato, and egg, and a S’mores Dip dessert. New cocktails include the Negroni, Scotch Old Fashioned, and Golden Honey Margarita.

Corner Bakery has partnered with Avocados From Mexico on menu items featuring avocado including the Anaheim Panini, Turkey Avocado Cobb Salad, and Uptown Turkey Avocado Sandwich. Customers can also just go crazy and add half an avocado to any menu item for $1.

Tropical Smoothie Cafe has introduced a new line of Poolside Quesadillas for summer: BBQ Shrimp Quesadilla has BBQ shrimp, queso blanco, cheddar and smoked cheese blend, pineapple salsa, and pickled jalapenos in a flour tortilla served with BBQ ranch. Jerk Chicken Quesadilla has grilled chicken, queso blanco, cheddar and smoked cheese blend, pineapple salsa, black beans, red pepper, and jerk sauce in a flour tortilla served with jerk ranch. BLT Quesadilla has bacon, queso blanco, cheddar and smoked cheese blend, tomato, and shredded lettuce in a flour tortilla served with salsa ranch. The menu is available through August 31.

Wing Boss, the ghost kitchen concept from Dickey's, has a new sauce: Dr Pepper Barbecue Sauce, a sweet, smoky sauce inspired by the legendary flavored soft drink.

Twin Peaks has released a new beer called Twin Peaks Light. This clean and crisp American beer is brewed at the Twin Peaks Brewery Co. in Irving, and is for those who want a lighter brew with lower alcohol content: 105 calories and five carbs per 12-ounce pour. It joins their three other beers: the Dirty Blonde, Knotty Brunette, and Drop Dead Redhead.

McDonald's has partnered with platinum hip-hop artist Saweetie on a special meal to be available starting August 9. The meal will feature a Big Mac, 4-piece Chicken McNuggets, medium Fries, medium Sprite, BBQ Sauce, and Sweet 'N Sour sauce. Saweetie is the latest chart-topping artist to be featured on McDonald's menu since the Famous Orders program kicked off last year. Like many fans who have their own menu hacks, her combinations bring a creative twist to McDonald's iconic food.

Chipotle is giving out free guacamole on July 31, either as a free topping or as a side, as long as they purchase an entrée. Use the digital-only promo code AVO2021 when placing an order on the Chipotle app or Chipotle.com.

Invivo X, Sarah Jessica Parker, the somewhat awkwardly-titled yet award-winning wine from SJP, has launched a new online store in Texas - one of 14 states across the U.S. where customers can now purchase two wines: a Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand, and a Rosé from France, both for $20. Parker says that "connecting directly with our loyal clients is so important to us. I very much look forward to a new kind of content that will be available to US customers through Invivoxsjp.com." The wines have earned high ratings and awards since launching in September 2019.

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Stephanie Allmon Merry contributed to this story.

news-you-can-eat

Sports Bar News

Comfy Fort Worth sports bar Morton's Tavern debuts in Near Southside

JesCrave

Wings from JesCrave, now served at Morton's Tavern

A new bar from a veteran hospitality team has debuted in Fort Worth: Called Morton's Tavern, it's now open at 212 Lipscomb St., in the former Twilite Lounge space, where husband-and-wife owners Jimmy and Monika Morton have crafted a comfortable new place to hang out.

Jimmy, whose resume includes nearly a decade with the Pappas franchise, was the co-owner and COO of Twilite Lounge in Fort Worth. Monika, whose hospitality career goes back 30 years, also worked at Twilite Lounge, where she served as general manager.

It's a welcome return for the area, following the closure of Twilite Lounge in December 2023 after six years, on the tail end of the pandemic and at a time when crowds weren't showing up for the live music that had become an unsustainable signature for the lounge.

"With Morton's, our vision is a neighborhood sports tavern, with a game room, a large patio, food, beer, cocktails, and mocktails," Jimmy says.

The food is provided via an innovative partnership with JesCrave, the caterer and food truck revered for its tacos, birria, and pozole. Jimmy and Monika are owners of the bar, while JesCrave partners Jessica Chaves Martin and Janette Carillo own and operate the kitchen.

Their collective goal is to continue to provide a gathering place for what has become a growing neighborhood.

"After the ownership of Twilite decided to end, Monika and I couldn't let this space go," Jimmy says. "We wanted to continue to provide that community hub, but the neighborhood has also grown up a bit, with more apartments and people living in the area."

"We liked the idea of a neighborhood sports tavern — we're both big sports lovers — but there aren't many comfortable sports bars where the atmosphere is dark and relaxed," Jimmy says. "We liked the idea of a place that's not bright or in your face but where you can watch a game or sit on a beautiful patio with your dog. This was a concept we felt wasn't covered in the area."

That means some TVs but not an excessive number of TVs, Monika says.

"We'll have 20 to 25 TVs — enough that you can watch every Sunday morning football game," she says. "We're going for a more relaxed decor, lots of photos but no neon signs, where you can feel comfortable and watch whatever you came to watch, or sit at the bar and read a book."

Twilite Lounge Morton's Tavern in the old Twlilite LoungeGoogle Maps

They have 16 beers on tap, a mixture of domestic and craft beers, as well as a non-alcoholic beer on draft. Their commitment to zero-alcohol extends to an entire menu of mocktails along with signature cocktails, mostly classic — but all "very good," Monika says.

The venture provides the ideal situation for JesCrave, who were in search of a new space.

Martin and Carillo launched their food truck in 2020 and have become a big local favorite for their birria tacos. They eventually expanded into a commercial kitchen, but that lease was expiring, and their food truck had broken down.

"We aleady had a wonderful relationship with Jimmy and Monika — we had catered their wedding so they were aware of our food," Martin says. "The timing was magical for all of us, and we automatically became family."

Martin describes herself and Carillo as "both taco heads."

"Janette comes from a Hispanic family and my dad is Amerian native Indian so we've combined flavors and cuisines," Martin says. "We love spice and flavors. We take a lot of pride in a lot of our tacos, quesadillas, nachos, all your regular street food, but at restaurant-quality level with upscale ingredients and flavors."

With the food truck, they were limited on how many menu items they could offer. But with the kitchen, they can now add the items that diners expect at a sports bar such as burgers, wings, and fries, plus items like loaded asada fries topped with meat, queso, onions, tomato, and jalapeno, for $15.

"We're thankful to have a home base and not have to pack up a kitchen every night," she says.

This being a sports bar, there's the question of sports team allegiance, but Monika says they won't be team-specific, welcoming all fans and letting it evolve. But she also confesses that there may be a favorable bias towards hockey.

"My family is from Canada, so yes, we've got some vintage autographed hockey sticks, as well as my old chair from Texas Stadium," she says.

openings

News You Can Eat

Coffee and cocktails jumpstart this round of Fort Worth restaurant news

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