Greens | Blue Eyes and Bluebonnets

Update: Dot’s closed in February 2010. The line for the final day wrapped around the corner. Dorothy “Dot” Hewitt had been serving wonderful southern-style cooking for more than 30 years. A local paper joked that heart doctors in Austin could breathe a sigh of relief for the no-longer-to-be-clogged arteries. We’ll miss the food!

I have been a fan of Dot’s Place for years. When the original restaurant off of Howard Lane in Austin burned down, I cried for a week. I thought I’d never have their chicken with dumplings, catfish or cornbread again. Not so. Dot’s Place is now serving up heaps of comfort in Pflugerville.

Dot's Place

Photo: tomato salad (sliced tomatoes marinated in Italian dressing), catfish, cabbage, broccoli cheese rice, yam pie and a dinner roll. Comfort food deluxe!

Dot's Place in Pflugerville, Texas

Old timers will remember that this location used to be Mr. Gatti’s Pizza.

Texas Monthly and Dot’s Place

In 2005, Texas Monthly rated comfort around the state. Here’s what they wrote about several items on the menu at Dot’s Place:

Pie: It’s hard to obey the rule to never eat anything larger than your head when faced with the monumental dessert portions at Dot’s Place, including an irresistible yam pie and a deliriously sweet peach cobbler with a fabulous crust.
Okra + greens: Greens always have an undercurrent of bitterness—that’s what makes them interesting. The yummy fresh collards at Dot’s Place balance the bitterness with salt. The humble spot’s stewed okra with juicy tomatoes gives that much-maligned vegetable a good name; the seasoning is Southern sweet, and there’s no hint of okra’s dreaded slime.
Meat loaf: A near-Platonic meat loaf emerges from the to-go window of Dot’s Place; the beefy slices crumble as you cut into them, melding with the tomatoey topping to form a sort of glorious, Southern-style Bolognese sauce.
Cornbread: The moist cornbread muffins at Dot’s Place walk the line between sweet and unsweet, so as not to offend patriots on either side of the great cornbread divide.
Chicken and dumplings: Whoa! You don’t get just some stringy bits when you order chicken and dumplings at Dot’s Place; you get whole pieces of baked chicken. The dumplings, somehow fluffy and substantial at once, may be the world’s best use of white flour.

I totally agree with Texas Monthly. I’d add Dot’s catfish and chicken fried steak to this list because they are among my favorite comfort foods at Dot’s Place.

Beef tips at Dot's Place