Meeboon Thai Cuisine (Temple, Texas)

Photo from Google (Ebey Soman).
Previously covered at this page, this restaurant served as Popeyes from some point in the 1980s (believed to do so as H.K. Dodgen Loop addresses didn't exist prior to the mid-1990s)¹ to 2006. Afterwards, it was New Baytown Seafood Express (2007-2013), then Rice Etc. Asian Kitchen (2013 to 2021). The current restaurant, Meeboon Thai Cuisine, has been here since November 2021 (a former food truck location). The restaurant has poor access, with no entrance from either the "MarketPlace" shopping center's parking lot, nor Market Loop.

1. The current address is 1521 SW HK Dodgen Loop.

Arlan's Market of Navasota (Navasota, Texas)

Taken back in January 2016 by author. Just a short post today on Arlan's Market of Navasota. The main page of this post is on Carbon-izer.com and is worth a read. Check it out!

(We'll continue with another H.K. Dodgen Loop post in the near future.)

Taco Cabana Off the North Loop (Houston, Texas)

There's some distortion going on with Google Street View, but it's those neon signs I miss most of all. This one was changed in 2019. (Street View from 2015).
As we peel off another entry from North Loop West and just off North Shepherd Drive is Taco Cabana, and a real Taco Cabana opened as Taco Cabana (not a former Two Pesos) and one that is still open (many have since closed), originally in April 1992 (possibly the first Taco Cabana proper to open in Houston, but I haven't confirmed). Sadly, Taco Cabana (as a chain) is no longer open 24 hours, but action still happens here, just this week as of this writing, HPD responded to the scene of a "shooting in progress". A firearm was indeed discharged and one person was injured, but, well, just see for yourself.

Tanglewood Farms (Waco, Texas)

From Waco Tribune-Herald in the vacant Playhouse Cafe days (c. 2001)
While it was part of the original plan for this site, it will be difficult to work the 80+ entry "Interstate 35 in Waco" page into smaller sites for Numbered Exits. Tanglewood Farms was built in 1978 at 221 S. Jack Kultgen Expressway in Waco, soon gaining a positive reputation for its homemade biscuits and good breakfast menu. It changed hands in 1991, but business declined, cut into by things like Cracker Barrel further north and the Shoney's on the other side of the freeway. The site was soon re-developed with the Texas Playhouse being built next to the site, and the restaurant itself becoming the Playhouse's restaurant component, Playhouse Cafe, serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but it was short-lived and closed in 1999. In 2001, it was reopened as Magic China, which would open there (ultimately relocating from 1616 Wooded Acres Drive), and operated until 2015 (planned to relocate, but never did).

After that, it was torn down and replaced with Premier ER & Urgent Care - Waco, meanwhile, the Playhouse itself became a restaurant.

5151-5153 Antoine Drive (Houston, Texas)

Despite being marked as "5000 Antoine", this is the Kroger in better days. (Houston Post, 07/28/1992). Originally, 5153 Antoine Drive was home to Kroger (a "Superstore" model, store 160) from 1975 to around the mid-2000s (Fallas Paredes, which used the 5151 Antoine address, leased part of the store in February 2007, so it was closed by then). By April 2008 this was divided between Fallas Paredes and 99 Cent Only Stores (with a "Watermill Express" water kiosk in the parking lot). By 2015, this was now a vacancy on the south end of the store, YouFit Health Clubs, and King Dollar on the north end. This arrangement would be kept until 2020, and by 2022 the entire building was vacant again before Value Village opened a store in the former King Dollar later that year. March 2023 brought the opening of a Gordon Food Service Store (which makes sense--the trucks just have to travel south from their distribution center).

I visited this particular store in November 2025. While it didn't have cookies or rotisserie chicken, this location did have a popcorn shop, so I bought some black cherry flavor that mostly tasted like colored sugar, but still good anyway. (Would've preferred something like Dr Pepper, which is what the glaze reminded me of, had similar experiences).

It looks delicious but I can't fit that in my freezer.
Note: This is an ongoing effort to dismantle Antoine Drive in Houston (Houston, Texas), which still has eight other entries as of this writing.

Former Redneck Heaven (Arlington, Texas)

Redneck Heaven as it appeared in the late 2010s. (Photo by Silviu Gheorghe, source).
701 North Watson Road in Arlington, Texas started out as a Luby's Cafeteria, opening in 1982 but closing in March 2003 among other restaurants in the chain. After it's demise, it reopened as Palomino's Ranch Buffet in 2007, closing around 2012. Redneck Heaven followed soon after. It operated from about 2012 to 2020, and while it wasn't the first in the chain (it was the second), Redneck Heaven a bit over the top, even as far as "breastaurants" went with live minnow shots, scantily-clad waitresses, and more (at least when they expanded to San Antonio). Per these sorts of places, the food looked nothing to write home about, but I did find this shot buried among the photos on Google Maps.

She looks so uncomfortable. (Photo by Ryan Hitchcock, source).
Redneck Heaven and its other locations got washed out in 2020 and a few years later was renovated and reopened as a location of Bombshells Restaurant & Bar and despite technically more modest garb for waitresses, is owned and operated by a company that primarily deals with strip clubs.

Lockhart Chisholm Trail BBQ (Lockhart, Texas)

Google picture from Adrian Neubauer from 2016
One of the things that I wanted to do when I ported this over from Various Lockhart Businesses was to explain that since I last visited in the last 2010s (or even early 2020s) that Chisholm Trail has revamped the inside of its building, going from an old-fashioned local joint that felt from another era (since 1978), to a modern overhyped barbecue joint. And overhyped it might be, even in the "humble" era, when the Austin edition of Fearless Critics savagely ripped apart a bunch of restaurants, Chisholm Trail was not spared either, ranking quite poorly. While it wasn't entirely a hit piece (the sides are indeed weak), they didn't even mention the homemade bread Chisholm Trail often has available (not sure how "homemade" it is but it at least is different), as I ate here about once a year for about a decade (2009-2021, roughly). I know white bread is "classic" for barbecue but the bread they have is good too. I unfortunately don't have any Chisholm Trail pictures myself so I had to dig around in Google Maps for some of the older ones and some newer ones for comparison. The two following are about the same view from Danny Anderson (new style) and George Vandervort (old look until the early 2020s), respectively. I like the older one better.