On a quiet stretch of the Chisholm Trail Parkway just south of Interstate 20, a new backroad café called Anita’s Kitchen is pulling in a steady lunch and dinner crowd. The compact spot, opened this spring by the family behind CW’s Authentic Tex-Mex Cuisine, the local business that once drew national TV attention, pairs Tex-Mex plates with diner staples like chicken-fried steak and a house buttermilk fried-chicken sandwich. Last Thursday a photographer captured a $9 enchilada special and that fried-chicken sandwich, photos that have been shared widely on social feeds, and locals say the counter hums on weekends. For a tiny roadside operation, it is already acting like more than a simple pop-up.
From TV intervention to local draw
Chef Robert Irvine’s Restaurant: Impossible came to the owners’ previous restaurant, then called Fun Time Cafe, in 2021 for an episode titled “A Big Mess in Texas,” reshaping the venue and its menu in a rapid two-day intervention. Food Network documents the episode and…..