Houston’s Secrets: Kelly’s Country Cookin’
There’s no massive billboards on I45 directing hungry out-of-towners to Kelly’s. It’s not on the service road. Exiting Park Place at about the 9500 block of the Gulf Freeway and go west to Erie. The sign across the nondescript store-front building makes barely a hint at the incredible food to be had inside. Only the dropped “g” on “Cookin'” implies Kelly’s is something special. It is. It’s down-home Southern comfort on a plate.
Guests enter to discover a massive dining area full of happy locals who pay no attention to the comings and goings at the front door. A sign gives the instruction “seat yourself.” There’s lots of tables but often not too many of them are free. Once seated the waitress greets with a smile and a big menu listing far more choices than a really hungry person should have to consider. Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Sandwiches to Steaks, Omelets to Oatmeal, listings cover several pages with descriptions and photo’s that make the process of choosing even more difficult.
Most guests unfamiliar with a restaurant look around at what’s on plates nearby. What they see at Kelly’s is sometimes hard to believe. Baked potatoes large enough to feed a family of four, biscuits the size of Frisbees, gravy-smothered chicken-fry’s so thick and juicy-looking it’d make a grown man cry. This could be a bit of an exaggeration but not much. Most of what Kelly’s serves comes on platters rather than plates.
First-time visitors sometimes compare the food on plates nearby to the prices on the menu; it can’t be! Almost everything under ten bucks. Most meals far less than that. A three-egg western omelet under seven bucks? In fact most everything is under seven bucks except for “hungry man” plates. Kelly means hungry man too! Lunch and dinner specials, beef tips to pork chops to roasted chicken, all dinners $6.99 or less! Senior and Kids’ selections almost all under five bucks. So the price doesn’t help. Lots of choices, affordable prices, grumbling stomachâÂ?¦ ask the waitress for more time ever so reluctantly.
With such a massive number of choices it’s difficult to make recommendations but a few selections stand out as extraordinary. For breakfast, it’s the omelets, hands down. The menu says “three-egg” but when the waitress delivers the massive meal, served on a platter, you want to ask the size of the chickens! Lunch has to be the “Texas Size” baked potato. Exaggeration aside, one fully-stuffed plate-full of Kelly’s baked potato could serve two people with average appetites. And it’s less than six bucks! For dinner, of course, there’s only one Southern mainstay: Chicken Fried Steak. But these are just suggestions. Kelly’s favorites include a fully-loaded roast beef po’boy called the “Box Car” and Chili served up on burgers, dogs, or in a delicious old-fashioned chili-pie.
Kelly’s is a diet buster if ever there was one. Few are able to resist the temptations spread across so many laminated pages of menu! But don’t let it be said Kelly’s didn’t try to help. A full page is devoted to low-carb dishes from grilled chicken to veggie plates and salads. Of course the proportions will probably exceed those “recommended” by those funny folks in tights who jump around on exercise videos. But this is Houston, no guys in purple here!
All around the walls are enlarged photos representing Houston’s history. This is important because Kelly’s fixes orders as they come rather than pulling meals from a cold table and nuking it till it’s rubber. One of the ways to tell locals from newcomers is to see who’s reading the walls and who’s engrossed in a newspaper or animated conversation with a friend. Once the order is placed diners can relax a few minutes, sip on their drinks (Kelly’s coffee is excellent!), and anticipate their feast. There’s even the temptation to get up and walk around looking closer at photos of old down-town Houston, the 1934 “Texas Rocket” or Houston main street 1939. But a grumbling stomach and indescribable aromas keeps diners in their seats waiting impatiently.
Soon the food arrives. Not soon enough! Nevertheless, the waitress scoots things around to make room for all the plates and platters. Forks clink on earthenware. With the first bite a diner knows this isn’t the last time he’ll visit. A nice, homey atmosphere, massive proportions, kind waitresses, none matters if the steak tastes like a shoe. But don’t worry! Kelly’s food is even more tasty and flavorful than it looks.
Kelly’s Country Cookin’ has a motto: “Copied by many, Equaled by None.” Even copying Kelly’s loaded platters would be difficult. As one mops up a last bit of gravy with the last bit of fluffy biscuit it becomes quite clear that it’d be virtually impossible to equal the meal just consumed. Besides the motto, the front of the menu makes several statements that diners can’t totally grasp until they’ve handed empty dishes back to their server. “We believe you only get what you pay forâÂ?¦ but at Kelly’s you get more than you pay for.” Indeed! “No fast food franchise here. Nothin’ but good country cookin’.” Certainly! “Five locations.” No kidding? Where?!
Diners can read the history of Kelly’s on the front of the menu as well. The restaurant started as a drug store eatery in 1983. J.W. Kelly, whose picture is in the menu, retired from Houston PD and founded the place. Besides the Park Place location there are Kelly’s restaurants in LaMarque, Pearland, Pasadena and League City, all suburbs of Houston. The menu gives addresses and phone numbers. For those who travel the Houston metro area it’s worth jotting down all those locations and plugging them into the GPS database.
“Good food, excellent service, reasonable price,” says the menu. More than correct on all three counts! Diners at Kelly’s get another nice thing after the dishes are cleared away: an affordable bill. A family of four can easily escape for less than thirty or forty bucks, generous tip included. Frugal couples could easily fill up for under ten dollars. Even if the food wasn’t so good, portions so huge and wait staff so nice the price would make the visit worth it. But like the menu says, it’s all good!
There’s no website listed on Kelly’s menu; another sign that Kelly’s is really old fashioned. It’s just as well. There’s simply no possible way Kelly’s could explain or even hint what hungry folks find waiting for them inside the doors of Kelly’s Country Cookin’ restaurant. It’s the kind of food, and the kind’f place that was around before Country Cooking was Kewl!
