Food Hall News

Tacos, tortas, and lobster rolls bring fresh taste to new downtown food hall

Understory, downtown's newest food hall, is beginning to take shape. Located in the Capitol Tower in the heart of downtown's central business district, the new dining venue will feature a third Houston-area location of lobster roll purveyor East Hampton Sandwich Co. and a new taco concept from the owners of The Original Ninfa's on Navigation.

The food hall will serve as the first location of Mama Ninfa’s Tacos y Tortas, a new fast casual concept from Ninfa's owner Legacy Restaurants. As the name implies, the new restaurant will focus on street style tacos and sandwiches, but it will also include Ninfa's signature items like tacos al carbon, red and green salsa, and handmade flour tortillas.

Legacy intends to open three or four additional locations across the Houston area. Like the Understory outpost, future restaurants will serve breakfast, lunch, dinner, and late night. These locaitons will be relatively small with seating for between 80 and 100 people. Of course, it will also include a full bar featuring the restaurant's popular margaritas.

“It’s exciting and gratifying to bring this new concept to the Houston dining scene – and we’re very pleased to launch Mama Ninfa’s in such an excellent location, which combines steady foot traffic in the tunnels with unique street-level exposure,” said Legacy Restaurants CEO Jonathan Horowitz in a statement. “With the history surrounding The Original Ninfa’s brand and the public’s appreciation for the tradition and quality associated with The Original Ninfa’s on Navigation, we think Mama Ninfa’s Tacos y Tortas will find an enthusiastic audience in Houston and in the surrounding areas.”

East Hampton will join Mama Ninfa's in the location. While the menu will match those of the Dallas-based restaurant's Montrose and River Oaks District locations, a new online ordering system will be designed to speed up to-go orders, which should suit downtown office workers who won't have time to wait for a lobster roll.

When it opens next year, Understory will be home to seven food stands, a full service restaurant, and a bar. With five points of tunnel access and direct access to the street, its owners, real estate development and construction firm Skanska, anticipate it will be both a lunch spot as well as an evening destination for Theater District patrons and downtown's growing residential community.

“We’re trying to create more than a place to eat,” Matt Damborsky, executive vice president for Skanska USA Commercial Development in Houston, told CultureMap earlier this month. “We want to partner with the visual and performing arts for more than food. In the end, we want it to be a place for people who are visiting Houston to go see and go visit.

Ninfa's tacos al carbon are coming downtown.

Photo by Cooper + Ricca

Ninfa's tacos al carbon are coming downtown.

news-you-can-eat openings downtown

a CultureMap Exclusive

Houston's 'Chinese takeout bar from the future' touches down in Webster

Courtesy of The Rice Box

A rendering previews The Rice Box's new location in Webster.

Houston’s Chinese takeout bar from the future is coming to the Bay Area. The sixth location of The Rice Box will open in Webster later this summer.

Located at 114 El Dorado Blvd, the new location will be called Rice Box Space Center after NASA’s headquarters at the nearby Johnson Space Center. Founder John Peterson tells CultureMap that it’s a bit of a homecoming for him and his wife/business partner, Jenny Vo, as they grew up in the area. As with every new location, the restaurant created a movie-style poster to announce its opening.

Rice Box Webster movie poster The Rice Box Space Center is expected to open later this summer.Courtesy of The Rice Box

For its first truly suburban location, Peterson plans to offer a more efficient pickup system for to-go orders. Dubbed The Rice Box Pickup Reactors, the system applies Rice Box’s sci-fi aesthetic to curbside ordering. As seen in the rendering above, the building will have six slots that drivers will pull into to get their orders.

“The goal is to have guests in and out with food in hand in around 90 seconds,” Peterson writes in an email. “It’s still pickup, but we’re trying to make that moment feel more intentional and more connected to the digital side of Rice Box instead of treating it like an afterthought. We’re looking at this opening as both a new store and a prototype for how Rice Box can work in more suburban markets without losing the part of the brand that makes it feel like us.”

Bay Area-area diners can expect the same menu as the Rice Box’s other locations. That includes staples such as General Tso’s chicken, sesame chicken, beef with broccoli, and orange peel beef. The restaurant also serves traditional Chinese-inspired fare such as Chongqing chicken, cumin beef, mapo tofu, and chow fun noodles.

Recently, Peterson rolled out a new version of Rice Box’s dumplings. Available in chicken, pork, or vegetable, each style of dumpling comes with a different wrapper that enhances the filling’s flavor. They’re also available either steamed or fried.

The Rice Box started as a food truck in the early 2010s. After moving to a permanent location in the Greenway Plaza food court, it has opened brick-and-mortar locations in the Heights, River Oaks, Rice Village, and Memorial.

openings news-you-can-eat the rice box