Jugs of Suds

The beer growler go-to guide for Dallas-Fort Worth

As more craft beer gets released into the world, it’s perfectly natural to want to try them all. Unfortunately, not all those beers are available outside of bars, and at some point you can’t be going out every night.

Growlers offer a great avenue for trying new beers at home. Although it’s a limited market, there are a handful of places that will fill you up. Texas is behind growler-centric states like Colorado and Oregon, but it’s not a complete desert out there.

Craft and Growler
What you need to know: This is the biggest on the growler scene, with 30 taps, each equipped with beer guns that put CO2 in the growler before the beer so the liquid never touches air. This ensures the beer stays fresh in an unopened growler for at least two weeks. But we know your beer won’t make it that long.
Price per growler: Craft and Growler has a huge array of growlers, ranging from disposable ones for 50 cents to ceramic ones that cost $150; sizes range from 16 to 64 ounces. It’s a real buyer’s dilemma.
Price per fill: Some of the more rare beers can cost up to $40 per fill. For the most part, expect to spend $8-$10 for a 64-ounce fill.

Humperdink’s Restaurant
What you need to know: Humperdink’s brews its own beers, so if you’re looking for something outside the rest of the craft beer circle, you can head to any of the five locations. The beer is poured straight out of the tap, so it’s best to consume the growler within 48 hours of filling it; otherwise you’ll be dealing with flat beer.
Price per growler: A 64-ounce glass growler is $11.
Price per fill: If you buy a growler, it’s just $1 to fill it; refills are $5. However, they will only fill Humperdink’s growlers.

The Bottle Shop
What you need to know: The Bottle Shop is more about the bottles (around 500 of them), but it has 20-plus taps of craft beer from all over the country. Bottle Shop fills from the tap, so there is a 48-hour window to consume.
Price per growler: The 64-ounce glass growler is $7.99.
Price per fill: It starts at $8 and can go can up to $25, but most stay below $15. Bottle Shop requires that your growler has a surgeon general’s warning regarding the effects of alcohol on a pregnant woman. Most growlers have this, but some, like the hydroflask at Craft and Growler, do not.

Whole Foods Market
What you need to know: Three Whole Foods locations — Shops at Park Lane, Lemmon Avenue in Highland Park, and Abrams Road in Lakewood — can fill your growler needs with nine taps, most of them local.
Price per growler: Whole Foods sells a 32-ounce and 64-ounce, both for $6 and both glass.
Price per fill: The locals are $6 and $9 for the two sizes; other craft beers generally cost more. Like at Bottle Shop, your growler must have the surgeon general’s warning label. However, Whole Foods has a sticker version if your growler is missing the label.

Brewed
What you need to know: This Fort Worth coffee shop/gastropub has 12 taps of Texas beers and two kombucha taps. They rotate fairly often, but it’s always Texas beer.
Price per growler: There is a 32-ounce version for $8 and a 64-ounce for $10, both made of glass.
Price per fill: Brewed rates each fill per the 8-ounce price, so the 64-ounce growler is about $15 to $20 to fill and half that for the 32-ounce version. Brewed accepts other growlers and doesn’t require a surgeon general’s warning.

Zio Carlo Magnolia Brew Pub
What you need to know: Another Fort Worth spot, this brewpub has 10 taps devoted to beers from around the state and well-known, out-of-state brews, as well as a couple of original recipes. Zio Carlo has an attachment on its taps that limits the exposure to air, so the beer in a sealed growler should be good for up to a week.
Price per growler: A 64-ounce glass growler is $10.
Price per fill: The house beers are $12. Most others range between $15 and $20, though nicer beers can be more expensive. You can bring in other growlers, and Zio Carlo doesn’t require the surgeon general’s warning.

Haus of Growlers
What you need to know: This Dallas-based website sells 10 growlers with different phrases or illustrations on them, ranging from the molecular makeup of beer to one adorned with a variety of mustache styles.
Price per growler: Each 64-ounce growler is $12.99, plus $10 shipping. So $22.99.
Price per fill: They don’t fill the growlers, so if you buy one from the site, you’ll have to take it to one of the places mentioned above.

Craft and Growler has an array of growlers for any occasion.

Photo by Teresa Gubbins

Craft and Growler has an array of growlers for any occasion.

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Mex-Mex News

Popular Plano restaurant Mexican Bar Company to spin off sibling

Photo courtesy of Mexican Bar Company

Fajitas at Mexican Bar Company

An acclaimed Mexican restaurant in Plano is expanding: Mexican Bar Company, which has been a bright spot at The Shops at Willow Bend for eight years, will open a second location in Allen at 800 Shelby Dr. in Sloan Corners, a master-planned community from the Billingsley Company located at the intersection of SH-121 and US-75.

The Mexican Bar Company is from Brian Dunne, a hospitality industry veteran from the northeast who has run many restaurants and bars. He opened the original Mexican Bar Company in 2018 — part of an initiative to draw customers to The Shops at Willow Bend.

The restaurant has shone as one of the standout success stories and is among the few businesses that will remain during a major transformation at Willow Bend, which closed in August, into a mixed-use destination incorporating a new arena that would become the future home of the Dallas Stars.

Food
Mexican Bar Company debuted with a menu created by Patricio Sandoval, a James Beard-featured chef and brother of global restaurateur Richard Sandoval, with whom Dunne had worked decades ago in New York. The menu combines Mexican flavors with "Texas attitude," with house-made tortillas and regional Mexican dishes cooked on a rustic wood and coal-burning grill.

It includes a number of ceviches, such as scallop, lime-cured shrimp, lobster, and even a vegan ceviche with hearts of palm. There's traditional guacamole but also a chef-driven guacamole with habanero, mint, and pomegranate seeds. One customer-friendly option they offer is samplers, in which you can combine three ceviches, or else guacamole and queso.

A dozen street tacos include brisket, pork belly, beer-battered fish, chipotle-marinated shrimp, al pastor, and a vegetarian battered cauliflower, priced from $17.50 to $19.50, three to an order. There are also entrees such as fajitas, ribeye with lobster mashed potatoes, chile relleno, and enchiladas, priced from $23 for the enchiladas to $54 for the steak.

Dunne says they've survived in Plano due to a combination of quality and innovation.

"During COVID, we did the opposite of everyone else — we raised prices and raised quality," he says. "We went 100 percent seed oil- free. We cook our wings and French fries in beef tallow and everything in extra virgin olive oil. We have 23 TVs, so on weekends, we morph into a sports bar."

The Plano location also boasts a robust social scene, with DJs and live music, lots of dancing, and even dance lessons.

Expansion
Allen came about because one of their regulars was Lucy BIllingsley, partner of the Billingsley Company, which is developing Sloane Corners.

"Lucy was a big fan of Mexican Bar Company — she would come in for dinner, she liked our signature Pollo A Las Brasas [adobo marinated half butterflied chicken with plantain rice and garlic mojo], and invited us to open a location in Allen," Dunne says. "It's been a long time in the works."

Dunne also lives in Allen — "I live about seven minutes away," he says.

Allen's menu will be similar although they'll institute nightly chef's specials. And unlike Plano's mild swinger vibe, Allen will embrace more of a family focus, to meet the needs of the neighborhood.

"That will include a play area off the main dining room so that the kids can go enjoy themselves while the parents sit and talk," Dunne says. "There'll also be a 1,700-square-foot patio with retractable roof and roll down system that overlooks a two-acre park."

Allen will have double the size of its private dining facilities with a few bells and whistles including what Dunne calls his "piece de resistance": a 220-square-foot dining room, dubbed the Miami Cabana, that seats a dozen people, with bi-fold doors that open onto a pond, suitable for bachelorette parties or football parties, since the room will have two TVs.

Construction is ongoing. Dunne, who also co-owns Centro on the Square, which he opened in downtown McKinney in 2025, is visibly excited, calling it "the best build-out I've ever been a part of — I put in all the things over the years that I've accumulated," he says. The goal is to be open by December.

"We're hoping to take Allen to a higher level of hospitality," he says.

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