Crystal Wise
Hao Tran (left) and Dixya Bhattarai (right)
Hao & Dixya | Reader Pick: Best Pop-Up
Hao Tran came to Texas at age 6, her family among the first refugees who arrived in Arlington after the fall of Saigon. She speaks fondly about Arlington’s robust Asian food scene, with its massive supermarkets and buffet of restaurants serving everything from pho to dim sum.
But coming to Fort Worth, Tran found there wasn’t much of an Asian culinary presence, at least nothing as diverse as what’s found in Arlington. So, it’s no surprise that when she and friend Dixya Bhattarai launched a dumpling pop-up in the Near Southside, foodies craving Asian cuisine came in swarms.
“There was a line formed out the door before we even opened,” Tran says, noting that she and Bhattarai prepared about 400 dumplings for the event. “Needless to say, we probably needed 800 dumplings.”
Today, their pop-up — Hao & Dixya — occupies The Table, a grocery and event space on South Main Street. They share the space with bread makers Icon Bread and catering company Mockingbird Food Co. and also hosted cooking classes before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The pandemic would challenge The Table to restructure its business, forcing them to take sales online and offer curbside pickup. Tran says The Table’s retail side — through which Hao & Dixya has been able to sell frozen dumplings — has carried the company over the past few months.
“Working in this industry is so hard; Fort Worth has really made an impact on our business,” Tran says.
Hao and Dixya themselves still have day jobs. Tran is a science teacher at Trimble Technical High School, while Bhattarai works as a dietician. But Hao & Dixya is their culinary outlet, and Tran says she’s glad to do her part in expanding Fort Worth’s flavor palate.
“If I can bring ethnic, Asian foods to Fort Worth, celebrate, and open people’s eyes to what it can taste like — I’m so happy,” she says.
Crystal Wise
Jesus BBQ
South Main Staple: Jesus BBQ | Reader Pick: Best Tex-Mex
Jesús Borja shuffles from one end of his restaurant’s tiny kitchen to the other, slicing up the meat for his chicken-fried steak, checking on the fried pies he just put in the oven, rolling an enchilada here and there.
At 90 years old, Borja is the Tony Bennett of Fort Worth’s restaurant scene, an artist so devoted to his craft that, no matter his age or frailty, he absolutely refuses to give it up.
“Every day he can be here, he’s here, making sure everything is up to his standard,” says his daughter, Maria Martinez, who helps run the restaurant with her daughter, Luisa, and son, Andrew Gomez. “And if there’s something he doesn’t like, he lets us know.”
Borja’s high standards are what has kept Jesus BBQ going for more than 50 years. Beloved by everyone from the city’s upper crust to its downtrodden, the tiny, colorful restaurant on South Main Street has been a bastion for Tex-Mex, barbecue, and home cooking ever since Borja opened the joint in 1969.
The restaurant’s namesake dishes, barbecue brisket, chicken, and thick pork ribs, are smoked daily, usually by Andres, in an outdoor smoker. The chunky pork ribs, in particular, are some of the best in town.
The Tex-Mex dishes are dynamite, too, and the reason why readers picked Borja’s spot as the city’s best Tex-Mex. Slide into a green booth for the fantastic chicken enchiladas, filled with tender pulled chicken and topped with unimaginably creamy sour cream sauce.
Elsewhere on the tiny menu is the chicken-fried steak, which many locals swear is the best in town. Chalk that up to the yellow gravy, made with secret ingredients that Borja may very well take to his grave.
“I can tell you the main ingredient,” he says. “It’s love.”
Crystal Wise
Mia Moss
New on the Bean Scene: Black Coffee | Reader Pick: Best New Coffee Shop
It was over a cup of coffee, interestingly enough, that Mia Moss decided to open her own coffee shop.
“My husband and I had to drive several miles from our house to get a good cup of local coffee,” she says. “When we got back home one day, I told him, “I’m tired of driving somewhere else to get a cup of coffee. I want to do this on our side of town — the east side.’”
The east side of Fort Worth has long been bereft of a good local coffee shop. But that changed earlier this year when Moss put her money where her determination was and, with the help of two local investor couples — Jalea and Ryan Seals and Hailey and Christian Froberg — opened Black Coffee near Texas Wesleyan University. Located in a refurbished 1940s building, the charming java spot won Fort Worth Magazine’s Readers' Choice for Best New Coffee Shop.
In a serene, relaxing atmosphere, customers sip on cappuccinos and lattes, along with specialty drinks, such as the must-have Black Eye, an espresso mixed with your choice of a house blend.
The house blends are incredibly popular. Moss went the extra mile that other coffeehouses sometimes skip by creating two of her own, both inspired by the neighborhood. A medium roast is nicknamed The Eastsider Blend, while The Poly Blend pays tribute to nearby Polytechnic High School.
“It’s my way of honoring the neighborhood,” says Moss, who grew up in the Rolling Hills area of Fort Worth’s east side, not far from Black Coffee.
Moss says her interest in coffee goes back to one of her first jobs, at a Seattle’s Best Coffee at the airport. She learned the business end of things during her time as a business management major at UTA. She sharpened her barista skills by taking courses at a barista school in Portland.
"If I was going to open a coffee shop, I wanted to do it right on all fronts,” she says.
When the shop opened, the mother of two encouraged customers to use it as a hub for community engagement. COVID-19 put a dent in her plans, but she has improvised.
“Last week, we had a group of white female students and a few of their black female friends meet in our parking lot and talk about [Black Lives Matter] and what they can do to help,” Moss says. “Even if people don’t feel comfortable coming in and having a face-to-face discussion, I still want them to use our space as a place to engage. That, to me, is what a coffee shop is — a place to have a good cup of coffee and a good conversation.”
Crystal Wise
Coffee/Tea: Reader Pick | Volunteer Coffee
One could call Volunteer Coffee the Toms Shoes (another company masterminded by a Fort Worthian) of caffeine. The micro roaster based near Lake Worth not only provides some robust beans, but they also give a portion of their proceeds to charity. Sans a storefront typical of most coffeehouses, Volunteer Coffee instead offers coffee catering service they dub The Pour Over Factory.
