Regular Joe's Guide

There are 5 locations still open: 3 in the south part of Fort Worth, including Crowley. The other 2 are in DFW airport. Latest visit: Mar 2018 (Fort Worth - far north - closed) First visit: 2003 (Keller - closed) We've written about Cousin's before, when they had a little shotgun shack over in Keller. But with Back Forty recently arriving in NRH, I thought it would be a good time to revisit the mothership. Or actually a branch of the original. They shut down the to-go only place in Keller, so that they could open this very large location in the Alliance shopping area of far north Ft. Worth. This is the second visit here for the RJG (and the 3rd is this update!). We first went in December of 2010. So obviously we haven't done our part in helping the restaurant along. There's really no explanation as to why we've been infrequent visitors, as I've been a fan of Cousin's since we moved back to DFW 10 years ago. Mrs. RJG had the baked potato with smoked turkey, ...

Last visit: Mar 2018 First visit: May 2015 Maria Cuca's opened up a couple of years ago in Keller, and we've been infrequent visitors ever since (~6 to 7 times). To summarize, this is a place  we so bad want to love ... and we don't. We'll still go on occasion of course, but I'm afraid the food just doesn't measure up to others in the area, at least for our tastes. Up until the main course, Maria Cuca's is absolutely spot on. The chips are great. The salsas are great (they have more than just the table sauce, be sure to ask). Their famous homemade corn tortillas are great. And while we hardly ever talk about service, we have to say it's been uniformly excellent throughout, including the owner. And then comes the most important part: The entree. Sigh. We'll give Maria Cuca's this: They are entirely unique, and will not remind you of the other Mexican restaurants. That is definitely a plus, and something for you all to consider when reading this ...

Latest visit: Mar 2018 First visit: May 2017 As stated in my "Howdy" comeback note, it's somewhat surprising to me how many new "regular" restaurants we've discovered in the last half of 2017. This was not by design either. With that, let me introduce you to Cardona Cafe. We went here on the strength of their chips. It started with a visit to one of the RJG's favorites this past summer: Tolbert's. The chips were unusually delicious one unsuspecting afternoon. So we asked our waiter where did they come from. Sure enough, Cardona Cafe. They go by the brand name Gloria's, and you can by them in large bags, but they are not to be confused with the Salvadoran restaurant of the same name (somewhere in these pages). So off we went one Sunday morning toward Meacham Field in Fort Worth. In short order, Cardona has become our go-to Sunday breakfast place, when the spirit moves us to have breakfast on a Sunday that is. Well actually, on that point, the R...

Latest visit: Mar 2018 First visit: Nov 2017 With Bangkok Cuisine under new ownership, we felt we needed a "4th hand" to complete the game. It's been a long time since we found a new Thai restaurant to compete with Sea Siam, Sweet Basil, and Magic Springroll here in Northeast Tarrant County. Oh sure, we've tried some others. Some very good, but not great either. Enter Thai Hut. We have a new challenger to the throne of best Thai in our area! We've been three times now recently, the first couple with the official Mrs. RJG's mom. She has now flown back to Arizona, and we just enjoyed our first trip together to Thai Hut. All dinners start with a ginger dressing based salad, which a nice touch, though I'm not overly fond of it. Mrs. RJG loves it and finishes mine. For an appetizer, on that third visit, we tried the chicken satay. Very nice season charbroiled chicken, which comes in varying sizes. It comes with two dipping sauces, one being the traditional p...

First visit: Mar 2018 (Andrew Dr.) They have another location in the Lawrenceville neighborhood in central Pittsburgh. Now this one comes with an interesting story. I was in Baltimore for business, as I often was back then, and was ready to head to the airport on Friday late morning. But there was a problem. The area was experiencing ridiculously high winds, and all flights along the eastern seaboard were cancelled until Sunday. Now normally I would have just stayed the weekend in Baltimore on the company dime. However one of our official nieces (who incidentally is getting married in the San Diego area next weekend - look for new posts then, depending on where we go!) - was visiting us back in DFW from Denver. Not that we knew it then, but that was also our last month in NE Tarrant ourselves. So I really wanted to get home. The best option was for me to rent a car and drive to Pittsburgh, and then catch the first flight home on Saturday morning. So that's what I did. The first par...