This Week in Gluttony

These are the 10 best food and drink events in Dallas this week

The Dallas Arboretum's annual Food & Wine Festival arrives this week.

Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden/Facebook

Spring officially arrives this week and events inspired by the season are right on cue. Makes plans for not one, but three food festivals, a rib-smoking class, brewery crawfish boil, and multiple wine dinners. Save room for free soft-serve cones to start the week.

Tuesday, March 19

Free Cone Day at Dairy Queen
This year’s first official day of spring is March 19 and DQ restaurants in Texas are ready to celebrate the impending arrival of warmer weather. Visit any location for a complimentary small plain soft-serve cone, no purchase required. Customers can also enjoy this month’s featured Mint Brownie Blizzard, blended with brownie pieces and chocolate chunks.

Inglenook Wine Dinner at Monarch
Inglenook dates back to the late 1800s in Napa Valley, and reps from the vineyard will visit Monarch to talk through the winery’s heritage while sharing six of its wines. The four-course dinner will include sea scallop crudo, French white asparagus with sea urchin, duck confit, Texas Wagyu strip loin, and salted caramel-filled mousse. Tickets are $300, plus tax and gratuity. Arrive by 5:30 pm for a champagne reception.

Thursday, March 21

Butcher’s Cut with Ziata Wines at Wicked Butcher
Recently opened steakhouse in downtown Dallas will host Ziata Wine founder Karen Cakebread for a five-course wine pairing dinner. The industry leader will guide guests through her selections to match up with dishes like Spanish Hamachi tartare, Atlantic salmon with brown butter and matcha cream, and roasted dry-aged ribeye. Dinner is $150, plus tax and gratuity, and begins at 6 pm.

Beyond Jameson Whiskey Tasting
Keep the St. Patrick’s Day festivities going with this Irish whiskey tasting that will take patrons on a journey beyond Jameson. Hosted by local bourbon steward Jeff Underwood, founder of Bourbon in Black, the tasting will highlight single grain, single malt, and blended malt Irish whiskies. Tickets are $45 plus tax and the tasting will take place at The Algiers Club in the Design District from 6–8 pm.

Italian Wine Pairing at Gorji
The Mediterranean restaurant will celebrate its 21st anniversary with a three-course pairing dinner featuring wines from Tuscany and Sicily. Menu items include three-cheese spinach lasagna, grilled avocado with prawns, and prime beef tenderloin with gnocchi gorgonzola. The dinner is $179 plus tax and begins at 6:30 pm.

Dallas Arboretum Food & Wine Festival
Seventh annual event will host more than 40 restaurants and chefs, serving small plates to pair with wines from two dozen wineries. Participating restaurants include Petra & the Beast, Encina, Meridian, Asian Mint, and more. Taking place at the height of the Arboretum’s Dallas Blooms display, the festival is $149 ($129 for members) with entry at 7 pm.

Saturday, March 23

McKinney Asian Festival
Historic downtown McKinney will host its very first Asian festival featuring more than a dozen street food vendors, traditional performances, dragon dances, shopping, and kids activities. Authentic dishes will range from Vietnamese noodle soup, Japanese obanyaki, and Thai sticky rice to fish cakes, bubble teas, and Chinese barbecue. The event will run from 11 am–6 pm.

Sunday, March 24

RibsU at Deep Ellum Brewing
It’s officially backyard barbecue season. Hone your rib-smoking skills during this pitmaster class that will cover the six types of ribs: beef plate short ribs, beef chuck ribs, beef back ribs, St. Louis style pork ribs, pork baby back ribs, and lamb ribs. Participants will learn how to butcher a rack, use a candy, dry rub, and sauce. It's $139 ($129 for additional participants), and takes place at Deep Ellum Brewing Company from 9 am–12 pm.

Vegan Soul Food Festival
Vegan food vendors from Houston, Kansas, Arkansas and more will embark on Dallas to serve soul food favorites, from fried chick'n to mac & cheeze. Admission is free with an RSVP. The event will take place at Lofty Spaces (816 Montgomery St.) from 12–6 pm.

Crawfish Boil at Tupps Brewery
It’s the first crawfish boil of the season at this downtown McKinney brewery. (Last summer’s extreme heat wave has delayed the harvest of the crustacean this year.) Tickets start at $25 for two pounds served with corn, potatoes, and choice of beer, seltzer, or non-alcoholic beverage. Serving times are 12 pm, 2 pm, 4 pm, and 6 pm. Future boil dates at the brewery are Saturday, April 20 and Saturday, May 25.

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Benedict News

West End Dallas breakfast favorite Ellen's makes sudden comeback

Ellen's

Ellen's Southern Kitchen will return

A beloved breakfast spot in downtown Dallas is making a surprise comeback: Ellen's Southern Kitchen, the all-day restaurant concept founded in Dallas in 2012, is reopening its original location in downtown's West End.

According to founder Joe Groves, the restaurant, located at 1790 N. Record St., will open in June, following a "temporary" closure that lasted nearly two years.

The restaurant will reopen with the same hours, menu, and down-to-earth personality, serving breakfast, brunch, and Southern comfort food such as chicken-fried steak, fried catfish, meatloaf, shrimp & grits, and macaroni & cheese.

"We're still going to be the same — but better," Groves says. "We've kept the same management team, and we're thrilled that some of our waiters and bartenders and familiar faces are coming back. We're not taking anything for granted."

Groves is a voluble sort who disappeared from public view, due to landlord lawsuits that have since been resolved.

"There were two years of silence, we didn't know if we were going to be able to reopen or not," he says.

Named in honor of Groves' mother, Ellen's made its debut in 2012 with a special focus on breakfast — pre-dating the explosion of breakfast-and-brunch concepts that have opened across DFW in recent years.

Opening at time when the West End was on the upswing, Ellen's drew tourists, conventioneers, and downtown residents, with its menu of steak & eggs, migas, huevos rancheros, and Ellen's omelet with spinach, bacon, strawberries, mushrooms, and bleu cheese, served with toast and hash browns.

Signature dishes include pancake pot pie, a layered creation with pancakes, maple cream sausage gravy, bacon, sausage, hash browns, scrambled eggs, and cheddar cheese; and benedicts in eight options including Cajun shrimp benedict and crab cake benedict.

They were open for lunch and dinner hours as well, with a full bar. Groves' mischievous charm earned a following of its own, with stunts like his fearless 2018 run-in with the NRA in which he advocated for gun regulations during the organization's convention.

Bolstered by their success in the West End, Groves and his partners Andrew Chooljian and Russell Mertz went into what Groves calls "aggressive expansion mode," opening locations in Casa Linda and Allen, with plans for more. Casa Linda remains open; Allen closed in 2023. (They also opened Jack Ruby's, a restaurant-bar in the West End, which is thriving.)

But their momentum was derailed when one of their main financiers hit a wall. They closed the West End location temporarily, but the New York-based landlord at the time locked them out, spurring a domino effect with their other landlords, as well.

The building at 1701 N. Market St. where Ellen's resides has since been acquired by Five Smooth Stones, the development company owned by Owen Hannay, a longtime proponent of the neighborhood. He's working with Groves and company to get it back open.

"I've known Joe for a long time, and feel like Ellen's has always been such a great draw for the West End," Hannay says. "We're delighted that it's reopening and that we're able to get it going so quickly."

Once Groves and his staff were able to get back inside the beloved location, they found a time capsule — a romantic concept but one that also called for updates to the furniture, AC, and kitchen gear.

"After a couple years away, those holes in the upholstery became more obvious, and some of the kitchen equipment needed to be replaced," he says.

Ellen's reopening will restore breakfast and brunch to the West End, and Groves says they also hope it will bring them back to where they started.

"We have a big hole to dig out of — we want every vendor and individual we still owe to be fully paid," he says. "Reopening finally gives us hope for that."

"Ellen is my mom, this is our home location, and I've always felt a personal connection to the West End," he says. "I want the legacy of Ellen's to continue."

openings downtown west end