From a ‘Restaurant: Impossible’ to a new, thriving Texas backroad cafe — how?
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- Anita’s Kitchen is at 3969 Farm Road 1187, 8 miles south of I‑20 by Tarleton Fort Worth.
- The $9 enchilada plate includes beef enchiladas with chili and green chicken enchiladas.
- Menu includes CW’s signature items like a fried‑chicken sandwich and Cowboys cheeseburger.
Once featured on “Restaurant: Impossible,” two Chisholm Trail Parkway cafes are now “Restaurants: Successful.”
The “impossible” restaurant was CW’s Authentic Tex-Mex Cuisine near Joshua, formerly named Funtime Cafe until it was reorganized amid a wild kitchen fracas on chef Robert Irvine’s Food Network show.
Now, the Lemkelde family has opened Anita’s Kitchen, a Tex-Mex restaurant with some of the same burgers and grill items. It’s at 3969 Farm Road 1187, 8 miles south of Interstate 20 near the Tarleton State Fort Worth campus and 8 miles north of CW’s.
It’s in a classic Farm Road 1187-style location: a strip shopping center next to a liquor store, in front of a mobile home community and behind a fireworks stand.
The customers come for the $9 enchilada special. Some say the old-time, dark Texas chili con carne on the beef enchiladas reminds them of the flavors at the long-gone El Azteca restaurant that used to draw diners to Farm Road 1902 near the Tarrant-Johnson county line.
The green chicken enchiladas are just as good as the others. They’re made with white meat topped with a slight drizzle of a spicy poblano sauce.
I’m not going to say they’re better than Los Asaderos’, but this is a good platter for $9.
Anita’s also offers a greatest-hits menu of CW’s best dishes along with Tex-Mex and interior Mex.
That’s why you can order CW’s popular buttermilk fried-chicken sandwich with tater tots, a double-bacon “Cowboys” cheeseburger or Irvine’s fusion beef-Swiss-and-onions “patty melt burrito.”
Or choose sopes, sandal-shaped “huaraches” or a sizzling molcajete Veracruz with beef, chicken, shrimp, sausage and queso in a stone bowl.
There’s poblano queso fundido for a starter, and funnel cake sundaes or sopaipillas for dessert.
And of course, there’s plenty of tacos.
If none of that sounds good to diners, Anita’s also serves a reliable chicken-fried steak.
There’s no liquor license yet, but that’s pending.
When Irvine brought the TV reality show to the Lemkelde’s old restaurant, he found an oddly assembled hodge-podge of a shed-like dining room filled with hunting mounts, and owners who argued often, sometimes in front of diners.
The episode was titled “A Big Mess in Texas.”
Whatever he changed, it worked.
For now, Anita’s Kitchen is open for breakfast through dinner weekdays and Saturdays; 817-585-1016.
This story was originally published April 13, 2026 at 4:23 AM.
