Holiday News

Celebrate New Year's Day 2019 brunch at these Dallas-Fort Worth restaurants

Mongers Kitchen and Market brunch lobster eggs benedict mimosa

You need to ease into 2019.

Photo courtesy of Mongers Market + Kitchen

The 2019 version of New Year's Day falls on a Tuesday. But with New Year's Day, the day of the week doesn't really matter. It's New Year's Day, people. The celebration must continue. You've run in your New Year's Eve with parties or with dinner, and now brunch must be consumed.

These restaurants are open on New Year's Day to help you get in the right frame of mind for 2019:

B&B Butcher's
The "hangover cure brunch" at this Fort Worth spot features dishes such as a black-eyed pea and greens special, and drinks that include the "manmosa" — like a mimosa, but served in a pilsner glass. 11 am-3 pm. 817-737-5212.

Blatt Beer & Table
Preston Hollow gastropub opens on New Year’s Day at 12 noon. 469-372-2080.

Chef Point
Watauga gas-station restaurant is open for brunch and dinner serving black-eyed peas all day. 11 am-9 pm. 817-656-0080.

Del Frisco's Grille
All four DFW locations will host a special New Year's Day Brunch with favorites like lemon ricotta pancakes, crabcake benedict, and Southern fried chicken & waffles. Brunch hours are 11 am-3 pm. Regular lunch and dinner menus will be available throughout the day.

Doc B's Restaurant & Bar
No-fuss restaurant will be open all day for lunch and dinner, serving its famous candied bacon, The Angry Meatball, shredded Brussels sprouts salad, oven roasted chicken wings, and wedge burger. Fort Worth, 682-231-8820; Dallas, 469-998-2330.

Harlowe MXM
Deep Ellum complex recently released a new brunch menu, just in time for New Year's Day. Highlights include Hawaiian doughnuts and chilaquiles verde, along with a selection of speciality toasts such as salmon avocado. 11 am-4 pm. 214-624-3310.

Haywire
Plano restaurant will serve a comfort food brunch including their venison chili with a side of buttered cornbread. 10 am-4 pm. 972-781-9473.

Knife
Both locations of John Tesar's steakhouse will serve brunch featuring specials from their regular brunch menu. 11 am-3:30 pm. Plano, 214-299-5935; Dallas, 214-443-9339.

Ida Claire
Southern-styled restaurant be open for brunch featuring regular brunch menu including signatures such as the catfish po’ boy with catfish, tomato, cabbage, and celery root slaw, pickles, and comeback sauce. 9 am-4 pm. 214-377-8227.

Mexican Sugar
Mexican restaurant will feature normal brunch menu including specials such as bone-in pork chop and eggs. 10 am-3 pm. 972-943-0984.

Morton's The Steakhouse
Uptown steakhouse will be open on New Year’s Day from 4-9 pm.

Oceanaire Seafood Room
Galleria seafood spot will be open New Year’s Day from 4-9 pm. They'll offer $1 oysters at the bar, offered all day long. 972-759-2277.

Perle on Maple
Restaurant at the Stoneleigh Hotel is in it for the long haul on New Year’s Day, open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, there whenever you crawl out of bed. 469-375-5846.

Razzoo's Cajun Café
All 21 Razzoo’s Cajun Café locations will be serving $5 Moonshine Marys and Hair of the Dog cocktails. These special prices are available all day on New Year’s Day.

Sixty Vines
Both locations of pizza and wine concept will host New Year’s Day brunch with regular brunch menu. 9 am-4 pm. Plano, 469-620-8463; Uptown Dallas, 214-814-8463.

Street's Fine Chicken
Both locations — Cedar Springs and North Dallas — will open on New Year's Day at noon serving brunch favorites like The Show Bird and Biscuit Sliders. Street’s also offers $3 mimosas.

Tricky Fish
Popular brunch is highlighted by an andouille hash, fried shrimp and oyster grits, and a New Orleans-inspired benedict. Tricky Fish now has two locations to receive guests – in Richardson’s CityLine, 972-437-3474, and Fort Worth’s Waterside, 817-731-5882. 10 am-2 pm.

Vidorra
Deep Ellum rooftop bar-restaurant is serving a Hangover Brunch with $5 Margaritas and $8 Mimosa Pitchers. 10 am-3 pm. 972-215-0640.

Wheelhouse
Design District pub will be serving a "Rehab/Relapse" brunch on New Year’s Day all day long. Recover with juice tonics - or a little hair of the dog. Bring a party of 8 or more and get free house-made pretzels. 11 am-10 pm. 214-307-5690.

Whiskey Cake
Both locations will be open for New Year’s Day brunch featuring regular brunch menu with dishes such as French toast "monte cristo" with Niman Ranch ham, cheese, jam, maple syrup, and mixed berries. 9 am-3 pm. Plano, 972-993-2253; Las Colinas, 469-941-2253.

Yard House
Brunch will be served starting at 8 am and offer $15 mix and match bottomless beverages — house beers, Mimosas and Bloody Marys.

holidays brunch

Phone Flip

Alamo Drafthouse makes big change to ordering food in DFW theaters

Alamo Drafthouse/Facebook

Alamo Drafthouse will allow phones, but only for one reason — so far.

Despite Alamo Drafthouse’s famously strict no-phone policy, the dine-in movie theater chain soon will require customers to use smartphones to order food and beverages via QR code.

Austin-based Alamo says that beginning in mid-February, it’s ditching its longtime old-school ordering system — jotting down your order on paper, then pressing a call button that summons a server to grab your order and then deliver it.

“Yes, it means you’ll need to use your smartphone and a custom-built 'dark screen' to order food or drink during the movie,” Alamo says in an FAQ post on its website. “This doesn’t mean we’re changing our rules on talking or texting during the movie.”

Variety reports that mobile ordering has already been tested in several Alamo markets and is expanding to certain other theaters this month, with plans to roll out the system to every theater throughout the year.

Forty-four Alamo theaters operate nationwide, including five in Dallas-Fort Worth, five in Austin, one in Katy, and two in San Antonio. The chain’s 45th location is opening soon in Bentonville, Arkansas.

The theater chain says the new digital ordering system — enabling guests to use a smartphone to browse a digital menu, place an order, and pay for the order — will improve the Alamo experience. A dark-screen QR code lets you scan the code to tackle ordering tasks while keeping your phone screen extremely dark or mostly black. This prevents “screen glow,” which can annoy others in a darkened theater.

“Putting ordering control directly in our guests’ hands allows us to move faster and more efficiently, creating a smoother, more responsive experience without added distraction,” Alamo says.

According to Variety, servers will still bring food and beverage orders to guests. And the chain says if you run into a problem with your phone or order, a greeter or manager will be ready to help.

“There will be newly structured roles for hourly staff at theaters, but this switch to mobile won’t take away any jobs,” Variety reports. “Alamo isn’t implementing any layoffs, and all base wages will remain the same.”

“It’s worked great in testing so far,” according to Alamo, “and we’ve been pleased that the vast majority of guests use the system quickly and efficiently.”

Alamo stresses that the new ordering system won’t kill the chain’s firmly stated no-phone rule. Therefore, you still won’t be able to scroll social media posts, make or take a phone call, or send a text once Alamo’s no-phone-zone warning pops up on the movie screen. If an Alamo worker catches you violating the policy, you’re ejected immediately without a ticket refund. Alamo says its employees are trained “to distinguish between a dark ordering screen and disruptive phone use.”

The move to mobile ordering is one of the biggest changes at Alamo Drafthouse since Sony Pictures Entertainment bought the chain in 2024. Sony didn’t divulge the purchase price, but media outlets estimate it was anywhere from $174 million to $258 million.

Another major change happened in early 2025, when Alamo laid off 15 corporate employees and an untold number of hourly theater employees.

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