No Dinner at Revival

Heights gourmet restaurant ends dinner experiment to concentrate on private events

Revival Market will stop serving dinner effective November 1.

Photo by Eric Sandler

Revival Market's five-month-long experiment in offering dinner service has come to an end. Partners Morgan Weber and Ryan Pera announced Friday that the gourmet food store and restaurant will be a breakfast and lunch-only affair beginning November 1.

Instead, the partners will seek to utilize the space for private events under their newly launched Agricole Hospitality brand.

"This wasn't an easy decision for us," Pera said in a statement. "We were committed to a family-oriented bistro with well-sourced foods, but there hasn't been the supper demand that we expected. Meanwhile, the requests for us to continue popular neighborhood events such as our butchery and cooking classes, to resume the fine dining series, and to do private dinner parties have continued unabated.

"We have been turning down private event opportunities on a weekly basis because we don’t like to close the restaurants to our regular diners. This direction makes the most sense for us and the neighborhood.”

The space also never had the opportunity to serve alcohol, which might have helped draw additional diners. That won't be a problem at Agricole's soon-to-open icehouse 8-Row Flint, which has secured a liquor license and will have a full bar.

Diners who have private events at Revival Market will be able to choose from its signature charcuterie plates, pastas and vegetable dishes from sister concept Coltivare as well as tacos from 8-Row Flint. Newly promoted general manager Layne Cruz adds that she's looking forward to working with clients select on casual parties, formal sit down affairs and even cooking classes.

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better than blini

Houston pizzeria unveils indulgent caviar pizza for the holiday season

Courtesy of Pizaro's Pizza

Get the Holiday Decadence pizza through the end of December.

One of Houston’s most well-regarded pizzerias is giving diners a way to splurge this holiday season. For a limited time only, Pizaro’s Pizza is topping one of its Neapolitan-style pies with caviar.

Called the Holiday Decadence, it’s a personal-sized, 8-inch, Neapolitan-style pizza topped simply with Pizaro’s housemade mozzarella cheese and seasoned with a little furikake. Alongside, the restaurant provides diners with lemon zest crème fraîche, a small bottle of prosecco, and a one-ounce jar of paddlefish caviar from Houston’s DR Delicacy. Priced at $59, it’s either an indulgent treat for one person or an extravagant appetizer for two.

Pizaro’s co-owner Nicole Bean tells CultureMap she sees the new pizza as an improvement on the caviar special the restaurant tried two years ago, which used its thicker, Detroit-style pizza.

“This year, we simplified things,” she says. “We made it more affordable. We added more caviar. The feature is the caviar, focusing on having a whole, one-ounce container either for yourself or to share with one other person.”

In this configuration, the pizza crust essentially serves as an oversized blini, with the furikake boosting the caviar’s oceanic flavors. Serving the caviar in the jar allows diners to add as much or as little to the pizza as they want. Introduced last week, Bean says the restaurant hasn’t sold that many caviar pizzas yet, but that doesn’t surprise her.

“People are a little hesitant with it being caviar and the $60 price point,” she says. “It’s not for everybody. It’s for people who are curious and want to try it or really love caviar and want to try it every way they can.”

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The restaurant always uses its monthly specials to experiment beyond familiar toppings like pepperoni and mushroom. Next month, Bean and her brother, co-owner Matt Hutchinson, will present dueling pies — his topped with crispy prosciutto, sautéed onions, and balsamic drizzle and hers a simple tomato pie, anchovies optional but strongly encouraged.

“The fun thing about pizza is you can literally do anything with it,” Bean says. “I want people to try different things on pizza. It can be decadent. It can be upscale. It can be fresh and new.”

The Holiday Decadence is available at both Pizaro’s locations through December 31. Find more details at the Pizaro’s Pizza website.

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