Uptown News

Vintage Tex-Mex restaurant brings Beverly Hills elan to Uptown Dallas

The famed "Pink Palace."

Photo courtesy of Stephanie Fox: Newcastle & Travel

An old-school Tex-Mex restaurant with a cool L.A. vibe is coming to Uptown Dallas. Called Las Palmas, it'll open on prime Uptown turf at 2708 Routh St., taking over the space previously occupied by Social House, which closed quietly in July.

Las Palmas comes from Sina and Pasha Heidari, of the famed Heidari family. If you've been around the Dallas restaurant scene for long, you know that his father Mohsen Heidari owns Arthur's steakhouse in Addison and St. Martin's on Lower Greenville Avenue. His uncle Al Heidari owns Old Warsaw. Pasha, his brother, has opened bars such as Kennedy Room and Bowen House and is partnering with Sam Wynne on Mike's Gemini Twin, a neighborhood bar opening in the Cedars district.

Sina was on his way to law school when the opportunity to take the space on Routh Street opened.

"I'd even gone through the process of taking my LSATs and had interned with a law firm for four months," he says. "I decided, I'm young, why not try this, and put law school on hold."

Besides, he and Pasha have a very clear vision for Las Palmas, of the quintessential Tex-Mex restaurant that any native of Dallas enjoyed growing up.

"We're going to do classic Tex-Mex with combination plates and fajitas that we make on a hickory grill," he says. "Maybe even a sizzling fajitas plate. And we want to have someone in the dining room making homemade tortillas."

"We're not reinventing the wheel," he says. "But we want to give it an ambience like nothing else in Dallas."

That means waiters in white shirts with black bow ties and aprons. It means cozy booths. It means a little bit of California flair.

"It’s going to be a very cool 1950's-style Tex-Mex restaurant with lots of cozy booths and a touch of Beverly Hills," he says. "Pasha and I are designing it together. The building itself is in great condition and comes with two patios. We're painting it pink — like the Beverly Hills Hotel — with gray trim, and we'll have a beautifully manicured landscape."

Unlike the Bowen House which is right nearby, Las Palmas won't do "craft" cocktails. "I'll work with Bowen House to get a nice menu of specialty drinks, but our main focus will be frozen margaritas," he says.

His target opening date is February 19, and there's one more key point: The price point will be low.

"I'm going back to my childhood, what we remember having growing up," he says. "We don't want the price to be prohibitive. We want people to come and enjoy themselves."

tex-mex cocktails uptown

Revolving Doors

12 restaurants in Dallas that have either just opened or just closed

Harumama

Harumama Noodles & Buns

In the inevitable ebb and flow of Dallas restaurants, openings and closings are part of the deal — often coming at the end of the year, when restaurateurs, like the rest of us, take stock of the future.

When there is more than one opening and closure, it becomes difficult to keep track. For this reason, there are lists.

Here's a roundup of Dallas restaurant openings and closures, with the bad news first.

CLOSURES

Terra Mediterranean
Mediterranean favorite in Plano closed on December 8, almost four years to the day they opened. When restaurateur brothers Jalal Chanaa and Adam Shanaa opened it at the The Shops at Willow Bend, it was the third location of Terra, following the original in Fort Worth and another in Irving. Both of those locations have since closed, although they're planning to reopen Fort Worth soon. Meanwhile, the brothers are advising Dallas fans to head to Ali Baba, their other restaurant in Richardson, which they say has the same menu.

Yummies
Despite the confusingly quirky name, this Allen restaurant was a fast food halal restaurant featuring halal beef patties prepared fresh in-store every day, plus pita sandwiches, shawarma, and fajitas. They'd been open for seven years including enduring the pandemic, and locals liked their burgers. But they closed at the end of November.

Whistle Britches
Fried chicken & biscuits concept from chef Omar Flores quietly closed its location at 6110 Frankford Rd. in November. Queries about the what and why are going unanswered, but a recording on the location's phone says both that #1 the closure is temporary and also #2 a new concept will go in its place. This was the location featured in Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives, so closing it seems like a shoot-yourself-in-the-foot kind of move, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. There are still two remaining locations open, in Plano and Southlake.

Mixtitos Kitchen
Mexican-fusion restaurant in East Dallas finally closed after two years of chef-owner Jose Luis Rodriguez bemoaning a lack of interest in his unusual menu of American, Mexican, and French dishes. He earned oodles of idiotic media attention, but the menu was a tough sell in a space that was previously home to La Acapulqueña, which served cheap Mexican food and margaritas in that space for 33 years. Changing the menu or paying his rent apparently never crossed his mind.

Barley & Board
Denton brewpub is closing after nearly 10 years. According to a post from the owners, the lease was up and they opted not to renew. B&B brought a level of cosmopolitan cool to Denton, combined with an easygoing vibe that made it a fresh addition when it was opened by a hospitality supergroup in 2015. Alas, they got pummeled by the pandemic; one chef said that "things were never the same after COVID." In 2021, they pared down the menu, yet still remained a big magnet, bringing lots if revenue into the Square. A second location — which opened at Grandscape in 2018 — closed in November. Denton will close on January 6.

Taco Cabana in Murphy
The Taco Cabana location at 104 FM 544 in Murphy has permanently closed. A Taco Cabana representative said that the location was not doing enough business. People of Murphy, it's on you. Fortunately, the chain has 18 other Dallas-area locations. Support your neighborhood Taco Cabana!

Harumama cutesy bunsHarumama

OPENINGS

Rodeo Cold
Yee-haw dive bar in old east Dallas at 3826 Ross Ave., in the former Eastbound & Down space, is now open. Rodeo Cold is a sibling of Green Light Social, the Austin-born nightlife venue which opened off Good Latimer Freeway in 2021 from owners Robert Dummond and Ian Fletcher, who've partnered with Ian’s brother Eric Fletcher. Their vision is a bar with a late '70s/early '80s vibe plus a little Texas Western color thrown in, and a basic menu with American classics such as steak fingers with gravy, Texas chili, burgers, hot dogs, Frito pies, and nothing-too-fancy ready-to-drink cocktails.

MiYa Chinese
Chinese restaurant that just opened in Casa Linda Plaza in the former Pei Wei space, is the brainchild of David Romano, an industry veteran, with visionary Jia Huang, who grew up in China and has 10-plus years of experience in restaurant operations in America. They're doing classic Chinese take-out like beef with broccoli and orange chicken, plus hand-pulled noodle dishes such as Sichuan Dan Dan with cucumber, carrot, and sesame Dan Dan sauce ranging in price from $14 to $18. The space is nice but the music — pop stuff like "You're the One That I Want" by Olivia Newton-John piped in extra-loud — is iffy.

Be Home Soon
Casa Linda Plaza is en fuego right now and here's yet another opening: a place with rock-star cred that opened in mid-November. Be Home Soon is from Madison King, a onetime Dallas musician-turned-chef who envisions a warm, comfortable restaurant with a full bar and menu she describes as "home cooking, no matter where you're from." They're open for lunch and dinner with fun appetizers, soups, salads, sandwiches, and blue plate specials like meatloaf for dinner.

Kafi BBQ
This one jumps the gun a little because it isn't quite open yet — but it's days away. Kafi is an unusual BBQ restaurant specializing in halal Wagyu beef, and it will open at 8140 N. MacArthur Blvd. #100 in Valley Ranch on December 14. It's from Salahodeen Abdul-Kafi, a tech engineer and amateur chef who started bringing his BBQ to events at his mosque, where he would sell out very quickly. The menu will include $15 Wagyu brisket sandwiches, brisket on a stick, Iraqi kebab-inspired sausage, and combo plates.

Harumama Noodles + Buns
Small San Diego-based chain with five locations in California is known for "cute" steamed buns decorated to look chicks, pigs, cows, pandas, etc. They've opened a location in Carrollton — their first in Texas — at 1060 W. Frankford Rd. Beyond its twee appeal and Instagram value, the restaurant has a big menu featuring ramen, poke, bao buns, crab wontons, fried rice, potstickers, eggrolls, and salads.

Russo's New York Pizzeria - Frisco
Longtime pizza chain based in Houston which serves New York-style pizza has opened a new location in Frisco at 3420 Main St. #200, in a small new center near Teal Parkway. In addition to full pies, they offer pizza by the slice.

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