Ninfa's facts for kids
The Original Ninfa's on Navigation is a super famous Mexican restaurant located at 2704 Navigation Boulevard in Houston, Texas. It serves yummy Tex-Mex and traditional Mexican cuisine. This special place was started by Ninfa Rodríguez Laurenzo, an amazing Mexican American woman, right inside her old tortilla factory! Mama Ninfa, as she was known, is famous for making fajitas popular in Houston. She became a full-time restaurant owner, and her tortilla factory closed down.
Contents
History of a Famous Restaurant
The Early Days: The 1970s
In 1973, Ninfa Laurenzo was a widow with five children. She was having money troubles with her tortilla factory. To help, she decided to open a small taco stand as a side business. Her factory was losing money, and she needed to buy new equipment. When she decided to open the restaurant, banks wouldn't lend her money. But a friend in Mexico City loaned her several thousand dollars.
Ninfa divided her factory in half. The back part still made tortillas, while the front had ten tables and 40 chairs. She even used old furniture and pots from her own kitchen! The Ninfa's restaurant opened in July 1973. The food was different from other Tex-Mex restaurants at the time. Just one week after opening, a fire almost closed the restaurant, but it survived! Soon, everyone was talking about the great, cheap food and the friendly "Mexican Mama" who welcomed everyone.
Ninfa made the original restaurant three times bigger and stopped making tortillas. The restaurant became a family business. By 1976, it was super popular with people from Downtown Houston, local politicians, and many others. It was so popular that in 1975, Ninfa opened a second, bigger location on Westheimer Road. In 1977, a writer for Texas Monthly magazine said that no other restaurant in Texas was as important to how people ate out in Houston.
Around June 1977, the original Ninfa's on Navigation served about 400 customers for lunch and 700 for dinner every day. The Westheimer location served even more: 600 for lunch and 1,000 for dinner daily. By 1978, the restaurant chain had 500 employees, including 60 kitchen workers. Many of Ninfa's family members worked there too. Her five children helped manage different parts of the business.
Many famous people visited Ninfa's, including the band Aerosmith, former President George H. W. Bush, John Travolta, Reba McEntire, and ZZ Top. John Travolta even had a special corner at the Westheimer Ninfa's while filming Urban Cowboy. He would often stop in Houston just to pick up Ninfa's food! Eating at Ninfa's became a must-do for tourists visiting Houston.
Growing Pains: The 1980s
By 1980, Ninfa's had seven restaurants. Roland Laurenzo, Ninfa's son and head of the company, wanted to open even more. In 1980 and 1981, four new Ninfa's opened in Dallas. By 1981, the chain made $30 million! In 1982, there were 13 restaurants. However, some of the new Dallas locations had problems and had to close. Later, another Dallas location and one in San Antonio also closed. Expanding the business wasn't always easy.
In the early 1980s, there were nine Ninfa's restaurants. The money from the first two popular locations helped open the others. By 1983, Ninfa's became the biggest business in Houston owned by a Hispanic family. In September 1987, the Westheimer restaurant celebrated its tenth birthday with a week of fun events.
Changes and Challenges: The 1990s
By 1993, Ninfa's had 43 restaurants in Texas and Louisiana. The company tried to expand even more, opening six new restaurants in one year in places like El Paso, Texas, Killeen, Texas, Tyler, Texas, Waco, Texas, Shreveport, Louisiana, and even Leipzig, Germany! Opening all these new places cost a lot of money. The company bought many supplies on credit, which led to a lot of debt.
When the chain expanded outside of Houston and Dallas, people who didn't know the name "Ninfa" were confused. So, restaurants outside these areas were called "Mama Ninfa's Mexican Restaurants."
In 1996, the company faced financial difficulties because of its rapid expansion. A supplier sued them for unpaid bills. To deal with this, the company had to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. This meant the family was no longer in control of the Ninfa's restaurants.
Today's Ninfa's: The 2000s and Beyond
Ninfa Laurenzo, the amazing founder of the restaurant, passed away from bone cancer on June 17, 2001, at 77 years old.
In 2001, another company controlled 55 Ninfa's locations. The restaurants in Georgia and Louisiana were run by independent owners. In 2005, Ninfa's still had locations in Texas, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Shreveport, Louisiana, and Georgia.
In 2006, Niel Morgan, who owned the Antone's Po' boy chain, bought the rights to the original Ninfa's on Navigation. He took direct control of it, while other companies continued to use the Ninfa's name for eight other locations. After Morgan took over, he started making improvements. He added plants, a Spanish-style bench, VIP parking, upgraded restrooms, an outdoor deck, and a new parking lot.
The Original Ninfa's on Navigation has been owned by Legacy Restaurants since mid-2006. The head chef is Alex Padilla, whose mother actually worked for Ninfa Laurenzo when he was a kid in Houston! Legacy Restaurants has made many improvements, like a lighted parking lot and covered outdoor seating.
There are still other "Ninfa's Mexican Restaurants" in Houston and other places. These are run by independent owners who got permission to use the name from the Laurenzo family a long time ago. They are not connected to the Original Ninfa's on Navigation. In 2008, there were 14 of these independently licensed Ninfa's locations.
In 2012, some of these licensed Ninfa's locations became "Maggie Rita's Tex-Mex Grill & Bar," a restaurant chain partly owned by comedian Carlos Mencia. Many Houstonians were upset about this change. People felt the food at these new restaurants wasn't as good as the original Ninfa's.
In 2012, a food critic said that while the original Ninfa's was "still reflective of the restaurant chain when it was in its prime," other locations had "fallen away significantly from the high-quality cuisine." This means the original location kept its great food, but others didn't.
In November 2013, a new enclosed patio opened at the original Ninfa's. The owners of the original Ninfa's plan to open another branch in Uptown Houston in 2019.
Delicious Food: What's on the Menu?
Ninfa's has always been known for its Tex-Mex and Norteño style Mexican dishes. Ninfa Laurenzo got ideas from her mother's cooking and her own trips to Mexico City. The food even had a little Italian influence because Ninfa's husband was Italian American. So, ingredients like Mozzarella, olive oil, and Parmesan cheese were sometimes used.
The most famous dish was "tacos al carbon," which later became known as "fajitas." Ninfa's fajitas were made with chopped, grilled beef fillets served in warm, handmade flour tortillas. The restaurant used a smoky marinade for the beef. Ninfa's made fajitas super popular in Houston. By 2001, almost every Tex-Mex restaurant in Houston served a version of Ninfa's famous fajitas!
The second most popular dish was the "Green Sauce," made with avocado and tomatillo. Ninfa Laurenzo created this sauce on the spot when a customer asked for "salsa verde." Her son, Roland, later made a slightly different version for his own restaurant, using pureed avocados, tomatillos, cilantro, garlic, and jalapeños. It was described as "creamier, more luxurious." Ninfa's also offered stuffed jalapeños. These became a popular item at Tony Mandola's Gulf Coast Kitchen, a restaurant run by Ninfa's daughter, Phyllis, and her husband.
In 2004, a food critic said that the beef fajitas at the original Ninfa's "still have their old magic" and that the flour tortillas, still made fresh, "are truly carb-addictive." After Neil Morgan took over in 2006, Chef Alex Padilla added new dishes like crab cakes with poblano sauce and Spanish lobster in tequila butter sauce. He also made sure the restaurant ground its own beef for crispy tacos and used fresh tomatillos for the green sauce.
The original Ninfa's also has several delicious torta sandwiches, including the fajita burger, which people always love. By July 2012, they added three new tortas: Al Pastor, Chicken Adobo, and Puerca (Pork).
