Fort Worth restaurant owner seeks support, faces surgery after attack
Carlos Rodriguez is working the Fuego Burger grill standing on a fractured knee, and he needs help.
For 16 years, Rodriguez and his wife, Christie, have run restaurants that rank among Fort Worth’s all-time favorites, particularly for the green-chile Fuego Burger, surrounded by a crisp skirt of melted cheese..
On May 13, their lives changed.
According to Fort Worth police, Rodriguez, 53, was assaulted by an argumentative young patron in his restaurant, 4400 Benbrook Highway.
He came away with compound fractures and ligament damage that will require surgery, he said.
Like many small, independent restaurateurs, he doesn’t have insurance. So he needs friends to buy a lot of burgers, green-chile cheese crinkle fries, Phillys and gyros. And he’s asking for help.
He’s in line for a second opinion and then faces a surgery that will require two months’ recovery, he said.
In the meantime, Christie Rodriguez and their son Alexander will keep Fuego open along with Christie’s family, he said. They used to own Chinese restaurants across Texas, including China Village in Euless.
A GoFundMe page is online for direct donations.
“My customers, they come in and give me hugs — this is like an extended family,” said Rodriguez, a fixture in the Western Hills neighborhood since 2009 when his first restaurant, Salsa Fuego, opened to statewide acclaim in a former chicken stand on the Benbrook Traffic Circle.
“We’re like a community,” he said. “They trust that I’m going to be here for them. We’re still going to be here.”
Rodriguez was still working the grill Saturday, standing with support and walking gently as he hand-carried each table orders of Texas chili cheeseburgers, bacon-mushroom-Swiss burgers or green-chile queso tater tots.
He’s there for now pending the surgery, and he said his family will keep regular six-day service and full menu as much as practical.
If you’ve never been to Fuego Burger, it has 12 tables in a nondescript shopping center on U.S. 377 at Ewing Avenue, about 1 mile south of the Benbrook Traffic Circle or about 2 miles north of Interstate 20.
The word is out that Fuego needs support. So if there’s a short line to order at lunch, it moves fast.
“Right when we open [at 11], it’s a little sleepy, but then at 12, everybody comes, so just come in a little early and you’re good to go,” he said.
Fuego Burger’s cult following began when it was ranked one of the five best Mexican restaurants in the state in Texas Monthly magazine. Rodriguez, an El Paso native familiar with New Mexico green chiles, had been a cook at then-new Texas de Brazil steakhouse.
The legend grew by 2016, when Fuego finished second only to Fort Worth favorite Dutch’s in a Star-Telegram “Burger Battle” of the county’s top restaurants.
By then, the Fuego Burger dominated orders. The Rodriguezes experimented with burger restaurants in Rendon and Mansfield. but came back to Benbrook Highway.
Now, the Fuego is still the top order along with the basic cheeseburger, Carlos Rodriguez said.
He’d like for customers to try the Phillys and gyros. The gyros come in beef, lamb or chicken.
“I wish I’d sell more of these because there’s no other place on this side of town to get a good gyro,” he said.
Fuego Burger is open for lunch and dinner daily except Sundays; 682-250-5600, fuego-burger.square.site.
This story was originally published July 21, 2025 at 5:30 AM.
