Nutty Brown Cafe

Nutty Brown Cafe

12225 Hwy. 290 W., Cedar Valley, 512/301-4648

Restaurant: Monday-Sunday, 11am-10pm

Bar: Sunday-Friday, 11am-12mid; Saturday, 11am-2am

Your first impression upon walking into the Nutty Brown Cafe is that this place must have been here when the cattlemen were still using the Chisholm Trail. Everything looks cleanly lived-in and timelessly comfortable. To the right is a small dining room with tables, benches, and chairs. To the left is a full-service bar, where you can still smoke, if you so desire. The real beauty of the place is the outdoor seating area, most of which resides under a huge old oak tree. It's a beautiful place to while away a balmy afternoon, or it's a hopping party-animal hangout on weekend evenings when acts like Billy Joe Shaver or Asleep at the Wheel tear down the house.

But our assignment this time was to check out the food and drink. We started on a late afternoon lunch. The dining room was about half full, and we were seated at a comfortable distance from our fellow diners. The owners call Nutty Brown food "American Cuisine in a Texas Hill Country Style," and, true to description, the menu was full of familiar faces: hamburgers, chicken-fried steaks, enchiladas, fajitas, frito pie.

We began with a dish that looked like a guaranteed heart attack on a plate: Cheeto's Cheese Fries ($5.95). Cheeto is the parrot that lives in a big cage in the back, and I can only guess he's a fan of the dish. I am. It's a big oval platter, covered with ultra crispy, battered, and highly seasoned fries, all slathered in a delicious queso and topped with jalapeño slices. Be prepared to lick your fingers.

Nutty Brown advertises that "Every single bite of beef we serve is 100% all-natural, free-range Kobe beef provided by Henry's All Natural Meat Market." We checked, and that did indeed include the burgers. Now, I'm not the type to look a gift cow in the mouth, but I can assure you that there is no place on earth where you can buy a half-pound of Kobe beef, in a restaurant, for $6.95.

We tried both the Cedar Valley Burger ($6.95), a half-pound hamburger served with one side, and a Patty Melt ($7.45), also served with a side. Both burgers tasted like they were made from exceptionally good beef, but both also tasted like they had suffered at the hands of a hyperactive cook: the kind that makes the burger cook faster by pressing it with the spatula, squeezing all the precious juices out with each squeeze. The side-order of jalapeño cream corn was rich and laden with cream gravy, while the coleslaw was sweet and juicy.

Our waiter was spectacular in every way. He also seemed to have pretty good taste, so we asked him what we should order next time we came. He didn't waste a second. "Chicken-fried steak, blackened salmon BLT, ribs, and the rib eye steak. They're all great." We chalked those down for our next visit.

We came back on the Friday night before Labor Day with a party of five at 7:30pm. We were sure there would be a wait when we saw the parking lot jammed like a can of sardines, but instead, we got a seat almost immediately. Again, we were rewarded with a stellar server.

This time, we decided to go for the adult drinks and tried the wine list. It was short, but had a few nice surprises. A bottle of La Crema Chardonnay for $24.95 was a good buy, as was the Hogue Merlot at $26.95. Of course, this is really a beer joint, and they have a nice selection, almost all of which are under $4.

One of the most fun things to do at Nutty Brown is to sit outside and spend the evening sampling from the appetizer menu while having a beer or wine or margarita. We tried a few to check out some possible recommendations. Nutty's Queso ($8.95) is a basket of only mediocre tortilla chips, but they come with a platter with four bowls: queso, guacamole, pico de gallo, and taco meat. With this they give you a large bowl, so you can mix the four in any order you like, a really nice idea and one that everyone at the table loved. The Nacho's Nachos ($6.95 or $7.45 with beef fajitas) was a huge platter piled up with chips and covered with melted cheese and topped with melt-in-your-mouth tender fajitas, sour cream, guacamole, and jalapeño. Coco Nutty Shrimp ($8.95) is six good-sized shrimp, fried nicely in a coconut batter, and served with an overly sweet ginger jam. Our last appetizer wasn't an appetizer at all – the Frito Pie ($7.95) – but everyone at the table wanted it, so we ordered it that way. It was comfort food of the highest calling: crisp Fritos covered with good quality chili and doused with grated cheese. Simple but perfect.

We took the previous waiter's recommendations to heart for the main courses, until we found out that the kitchen doesn't offer blackened anything or ribs on the weekends. So we ordered the Chicken Fried Steak ($8.95) and Ribeye Steak ($19.95)., the biggest surprise of the night. Perhaps wrongly, I hadn't expected too much in the way of great beef, but here was a truly excellent steak, cooked properly to order, nicely marbled, flavorful, tender; in short, everything you could ask for. Get it with an order of fries and the bottle of Hogue Merlot, sit out under the trees, and you'll have a great French bistro experience at Hill Country prices!