Wise Street Eats

We finally made it in to try this new place. Got their signature Dirty Mac & Chicken, a fish loaded fry, and a couple of sliders, with a brownie for dessert (dessert does not appear to be on the online menu, you'll have to come in for it).

The Dirty Mac & Chicken is an interesting combination--a bed of fries, then mac & cheese, with diced chicken tenders on top. Not sure what I think of the combination of textures, but all the ingredients are tasty and well prepared. Having the Boom Boom sauce on the side lets you use it to taste. I can see why it's popular.

The fish Loaded Fry combo is basically the Fish & Chips combo, but with one fried swai plank instead of two. It's plenty to eat. Swai is a softer fish than catfish or tilapia, probably a bit cheaper. It was well cooked and satisfying to eat.

We got one classic slider and one signature slider. The classic comes with mustard, while the signature comes with Boom Boom sauce. Both have grilled onions. They are somewhat similar as the Boom Boom sauce has a little mustard overtone. The sliders are small but having two patties makes the meat-to-bun ratio better. The texture was perfect and they were tasty as is or with ketchup. We got fries with it--the fries are a standard skinny model, but the seasoning on them is generous and really tasty. We finished them all.

The chocolate chip brownie is a good one, soft but not too gooey with plenty of chocolate chips. It was a nice finish to the meal.

The place has some rough edges. We got fountain drinks--one selection was marked out of order and another didn't work. Since it's self-serve you can keep trying, but I was not that impressed with the fountain drink selection. They do have Mexican Coke and Sprite in bottles. It is aggressively not decorated--nothing on the walls but gray paint. There were supplies on the back tables, and in the cubbies where previous places had put knickknacks or advertisements there were employees' personal belongings. The restrooms (gendered but identical) were clean and ready--the nice tile was most likely from a previous tenant (several restaurants have been through this space, most recently Orizaba's I think). Service was fine. It's a takeout place, but I can say for sure that they can cook. The menu is extensive and I look forward to trying more of it.

My Yelp Review

La Casa del Abuelo

Grandpa gets a shout-out at this new Central American place.  I stopped by the other day to try them out. I got the fried chicharrónes and a pupusa Salvadorena, with a jamaica agua fresca.

The pupusa is from the appetizer menu. The server said it had pork belly, beans, and cheese, but I couldn't taste the pork belly. Still it was quite good, lots of flavor and very satisfying. The chicharrónes are not like what you would get at a Tex-Mex place. Much more like carnitas--pork belly fried with no breading. The pork had great flavor. There's no sauce on the pork to begin with, and some pieces were on the dry side, others were just right. Both dishes came with a mild but sharp orange sauce that complemented them well, and helped moisten the pork. They also came with a cabbage and beet salad, which was OK but forgettable. I feel like the chicharrones dish could have used another side, and was glad I got the pupusa. The jamaica was very good, nice and strong and a good size serving.

The restaurant is where Pepperoni Pizza used to be. It's got kind of an alley feel, long and narrow. There's a beautiful mural on the long wall that really brightens the place up and is worth seeing. Service was polite and timely, and the single restroom was clean and ready. I wish them well!

My Yelp Review

The Republic Grille

The Republic Grille is an established favorite in The Woodlands, but I have never gotten around to trying it until we had a family dinner there the other night. We tried several items so this is a detailed review.

We started off with appetizers--we got the bruschetta and the mac and cheese bites. The bruschetta was a good choice since the restaurant does not start with a bread course. The bread was appropriately chewy and the marinated tomatoes went well with it. This is a generous appetizer, there were more than 10 pieces of bread, so it's good for large groups. The mac and cheese bites were a real treat. The breading had just the right crunch and was very flavorful. The mac and cheese tasted like fine cheese, as advertised. I can recommend it.

Two of our party got the tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwich, with salads--a meatless Caesar and a TRG. The salads were good representations, lots of arugula on the TRG. The tomato soup was very good, with a nice bold tomato flavor. The grilled cheese sandwiches were pretty ordinary, you might make better at home. But they did serve as a good dipper for the soup.

One of us got the shrimp scampi. The shrimp were cooked nicely--maybe just barely past fresh, but well worth eating. The pasta sauce is different than other scampis I've had. The garlic was only in the wine sauce, very subtle. The strong flavors came from the capers and the tomatoes. They use the same marinated tomatoes in the scampi as they do with the bruschetta. The scampi also comes with bruschetta bread, something you might think about when you pair appetizers and mains. The flavors were present and the pasta was cooked well, but personally I'm not sure I would get it again.

Lastly we had a chicken fried steak. It is billed as an award-winning Wagyu beef steak. The breading is quite delicious, crisp and well seasoned. The gravy is good too. But like most other CFS I've had, the breading comes off the meat as you eat it. The cut looked like eye of round, kind of dense and not as tender as you'd expect from a Wagyu billing. On the whole, it's as good as nearly all chicken fried steaks I've eaten. The only time I've really liked it is at a place that served chicken fried ribeye.  I got grilled asparagus and mashed potatoes with it.  The asparagus was done nicely, and the potatoes were fluffy and tasted fresh made.

We went for a dessert, the molten chocolate lava cake. This features a regular brownie with a fudge center, and vanilla ice cream with chocolate shavings. I liked the brownie--a lot of places have this and it's barely cooked, mushy and too sweet. This one had a firm caramelized crust and was just the right sweetness. Good way to finish.

The restaurant is tucked away in a corner of the Panther Creek Shopping Center and is usually busy. The decor is classic upscale, not obtrusive and dark but not too dark. Service was fine, we reserved online and were seated right on time. Overall it's a solid choice.

My Yelp Review

Ni Hao Chinese Cuisine

This Chinese restaurant recently opened in Spring near us (don't confuse it with NiHao Chinese on Memorial Drive in Houston--they are not related). We had a family dinner the other night.

This is an interesting and somewhat difficult place to review. The flavors and textures are not like any other Chinese place I have visited. There are many unique menu items. We didn't totally love everything but were very intrigued.

The menu has a lot of charming translation typos and non sequiturs. We started off with a cucumber salad and a Tornado Potato, and I got a Hand Punch Lemon Green Tea (I think that should be hand squeezed). Wacky Mongolian in this area serves a cucumber salad that is sweet--Ni Hao's is the savory version, spiced with curry. It was tasty and an interesting change. The Tornado Potato is a spiral-cut potato on a stick--we've had something like it at Bigotes Sports Bar and a few other places. The Ni Hao version is cut thicker and breaded. This makes it nice and crispy but very difficult to get off the stick and share. It was not seasoned, but comes with ketchup and you can also use soy sauce on it. The server said the tea had a lot of flavor, and she was absolutely right. There's lemonade, tea, ginger, limes and boba in there. I wish I'd been told about the boba, I don't particularly like it. But the tea was very good and I can recommend it.

For entrees we got beef curry fried noodles, rainbow vegetarian noodles, pan fried rice cakes with shrimp, and vegetable fried rice with egg. The beef curry fried noodles had a soft-fried texture. The curry flavor was present but very mild. Not a lot of beef but what there was was good.

The rainbow vegetarian noodles had a great presentation. The toppings--red peppers, finely chopped mushrooms, green vegetables, bamboo shoots, and one other item that I forget--are arranged in stripes across a bed of noodles with peanuts. You then mix them with tongs. The bowl was a bit shallow for the mixing and was piled past the top, but we managed. The dish is very peanut-forward, a unique flavor.

The pan fried rice cakes with shrimp conjure an image of a crisp rice cake with shrimp of some kind, but the dish is quite different. The rice cake is made from rice flour and is dense--it reminds me of mochi. It is sauteed together with the shrimp in a nice savory seafood sauce. The cakes are about 1/4 inch thick and somewhat chewy. The sauteed shrimp were done nicely. The dish is very filling, I didn't come close to finishing it.

The vegetable fried rice with egg was the closest thing to a classic dish that we got. The base dish is somewhat plain, but with soy sauce it was quite good and satisfying.

The restaurant is very pretty inside, an interesting mix of Asian and other cultural decor. They have a bright red phone booth reminiscent of London. The restaurant is bright, with white walls--no trouble seeing your food. They seem to be experimenting with self-placed orders in the restaurant--there's a kiosk that says "order here" at the entrance, and a QR code at the tables. We didn't try these out. Service was pleasant, I think the server was perhaps a co-owner. The restrooms (gendered but identical) were clean and ready. I think it's a place that will take more than one visit to form a final opinion. For now I'm rounding up to 4 stars.

My Yelp Review

Tacos El Pariente

I stopped in the other day to try this new taco place on Kuykendahl. Ordered the Asada Fries and a jamaica agua fresca.

The dish was good, and was prepared quickly. All the good things were there, plenty of steak, plenty of fries, plenty of guacamole. But next time I would try something else, not because it was bad, it's just not as good as the Burrito District version of this dish. The steak is quite lean, which is fine, but it didn't have much flavor from marinate or seasoning. They gave me three salsas to try with it. The red and pico salsas were ok but on the sharp/sour side for me. They also have a creamy red salsa (maybe chipotle?) that really packs a punch. Not what I expected, but now you know and I can recommend it if you like heat. The fries were fine, done properly, but not as good as the breaded fries that Burrito District uses with this. The jamaica was fine, not a large serving but enough and it was a good representation.

Service was prompt and polite. The restaurant is very spare, little decoration, but very clean and comfortable, there was a good crowd. The men's room was clean and ready. I would try other items, maybe their specials, next time.

My Yelp Review