Went to dinner with a HS friend I haven’t seen in @2 years or so. He was in from Seattle to see his folks, wanted to hang. So we went to a creole restaurant/bar I know…that’s owned by Indians. While you can see the traditional Mardi Gras throws and masks, there’s also cricket bats and soccer jerseys, soooooo…
But the food is good, and I knew they’d be open, and it was just a few miles from his parents’ current house and the place they used to live in the 1980s, so it would be easy to find.
The strip mall it is in was a real litmus test of the changing local demographics. The city of Irving (its location) used to be the most segregated suburb in the D/FW Metroplex. There was a KKK membership drive a couple hundred yards from my Dad’s brand new MD practice back then. As the Klan’s power waned, Irving diversified rapidly. By the time I went to college, this mall had gone up, and it contained mostly restaurants: an Asian fusion place, a Boston Market, a BBQ place, a Lebanese place, an Italian place, a cookie place, an Edible Arrangements, a Japanese market, and others.
Today, Boston Market is the only original restaurant tenant there. The Japanese market is an Indian market. And after a few years of turmoil, almostall of those other places have been replaced by Indian restaurants. The exceptions are the Lebanese place, which was replaced by the (Indian owned) creole location and the Nepalese place that is in the suite formerly occupied by the Italians. (That makes it the 4th Nepalese place I’ve found in Irving.)
A further oddity: one of the Indian places replaced a different Indian place, and this newer place says it is Indian-Mediterranean, making it the second such place I’ve seen in 3 days. I have NO idea what to expect. Curry carbonara? Tandoori chicken parm?
So it’s something I mainly drink at home. (Dad’s almost a barista.)
