A River Runs Through It

New Fort Worth restaurant sings a love song to the Trinity River

Fish seafood dinner plate potatoes generic

Tributary Cafe will have a nautical theme and serve fresh fish, among other tasty dishes.

iStock

A new cafe celebrating the Trinity River will open in a charming old house located in an up-and-coming neighborhood on the outskirts of downtown Fort Worth. Called the Tributary Cafe, it's going into the space at 2813 Race St., and comes from a couple, Cindy and Roney Wheeler, who live in the neighborhood.

Cindy is a Fort Worth native who's been in the restaurant business most of her life, working at places such as Neiman Marcus' Zodiac Room. She had her own restaurant in Waxahachie for several years before moving back to Fort Worth.

"I'd been wanting to do my own thing," she says. "I live in Oakhurst, close to Race Street, where they're doing improvements. I have a real interest in bettering the area, because it’s my neighborhood. That's when I started getting involved."

The little green building they're in serves as a counterpoint to the fancy new Race Street Lofts next door.

"It was once a home, a 1940s bungalow," she says. "The good thing is, there are high-end high-rise apartments and condos going up all around there. And they've already broken ground on more, going almost down to the river."

As for their menu, she says it's not just going to be bar food.

"We'll have a bar, but it's going to be mostly a restaurant, and I'll have some unique things coming to the table," she says. "We'll have fresh fish, never frozen, delivered three times a week."

The design will be a river theme.

"I'm hoping to have a big map of the Trinity on the wall, with a nautical décor," she says. "I don't have the menu to show yet, but to give you an idea, we'll incorporate river-related terms. 'The current' will be the daily special. 'What moves the water' will be what is available now. Desserts will be 'the mouth,' the end of the river."

The house also came with a fringe benefit that's become almost essential these days: a patio with outdoor seating.

Wheeler aspires to have the same kind of plucky spirit as other unique spots in Fort Worth that make the fabric of life more interesting.

"Part of the beauty of an area like Magnolia is that it still has some dive bars," she says. "I love Fred's Cafe in the middle of the West Seventh district. I hope we'll be like that."

openings

Chef News

Fort Worth's Will Rogers Memorial Center welcomes bright new chef

FortWorthtx.gov

Will Rogers Memorial Center

There's a new chef in town: Waylon Cornelius, named executive chef of catering and concessions for Craft Culinary Concepts, the food and beverage provider at Will Rogers Memorial Center.

Will Rogers Memorial Center is the 120-acre entertainment complex anchoring Fort Worth’s Cultural District, owned and operated by the City of Fort Worth. Cornelius will oversee menus for trade shows and other events at the center which bring in more than 2 million visitors a year.

Craft Culinary Concepts is headquartered in Glendale, Arizona, and manages food and beverage programs for entertainment, sports and cultural facilities.

Chef Waylon Corneliusfortworthtx.gov

According to a release, Cornelius joined the team this summer and is already shifting the expectations of guests from a typical “BBQ and beans” menu to a bill of fare satisfying every kind of palate.

“We always have fajitas ready to go, but we also make a beautiful Beef Wellington or baked salmon with a pink salt crust,” Cornelius says in a statement.

For consumer trade shows, Craft and its partners Caribou and Taco Heads offer more choices for the thousands of guests who attend events at WRMC annually.

“Some of our equestrian guests are away from home and here for several days, and they need more than popcorn and hot dogs,” Cornelius says. “Our concessions offer biscuits and gravy, burritos made in-house, strawberry salad, fruit and yogurt cups.”

A native of Mansfield, Cornelius grew up helping in a farm-to-table kitchen. He was raised on a farm with his mother, grandmother, and grandfather -- a Vietnam veteran who enjoyed vegetable gardens and raising hogs and chickens. He studied computer science after high school and holds an associate's degree in Cultural Resource Management and Policy Analysis from Tarrant County College.

He's a 2003 graduate of AIMS Academy of Culinary Arts in Dallas where he was mentored by a number of great chefs. While training as assistant executive sous chef at the AAA four-diamond Grand Hyatt DFW, he worked with Executive Chef Sutti Sripolpa, chef Eric Dreyer (who went on to be Oprah Winfrey’s personal chef), and Chef Jean-Claude Plihon, under whom he honed his French cooking skills.

As executive sous chef at the opening of Perry’s Steakhouse and Grille in Southlake, Cornelius gained expertise with volume. While at HG Sply Co., he learned about gluten-free items and other food allergies.

HG Sply is also where he crossed paths with Chef James R. Schell III, Craft’s general manager at WRMC, who recruited Cornelius to the complex.

"James said he needed someone who can hit moving targets, push the culinary team to be more avant-garde and use locally sourced, seasonal ingredients, so here I am," Cornelius says. "Culinary is a small world."

“I want people to say, ‘When we were in Fort Worth, you won’t believe what we got at Will Rogers!’” Schell says. “Even the celebrities who perform [in the auditorium] are surprised. When Chicago played here recently and we served dinner backstage, they said they felt treated like the Rolling Stones.”

chefs