Stockyards

Stockyards get taste of Lebanese dining

Picture by Glen E. Ellman.  Marios nd Joseph Hedary’s new  Lebanese restaurant is a bold attempt at diversity in an area dominated by Hispanic, blue-collar, African-American and cowboy cultures.

Article by Worth Wren Jr.

Quote:” The more business, the better, especially for this little block.” Alex Gallegos Jr..

Paper: Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Title: Stockyards get taste of Lebanese dining

Hedary sons’ new eatery serves jalapenos on side

Date: August 3, 1992

Food Industry

FORT WORTH – Two of Antoine Hedary’s nine offspring have gone out on their own to create a Lebanese dining experience on the north side.Joseph and Marios Hedary have opened Byblos Lebanese Restaurant in the heart of jalapenos, fajitas and steak and potatoes grazing territory between the Stockyards and downtown.

But the Hedary brothers’ venture – pursued independently of their parents’ business – is a bold move for new diversity in an old area dominated by Hispanic, blue-collar, African-American and cowboy cultures.

“It’s a healthy sign for the area,” said Jerome Mosman, executive director of the Fort Worth Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. “I think they will be successful. . . . Hispanics, they like other foods. They’re not limited to tacos.”

But just in case the neighbors don’t think the brothers’ rather spicy Lebanese cuisine is hot enough, Joseph and Marios are offering a side dish of jalapenos for topping the tabbouleh, falafel, shawarma and other traditional Lebanese dishes on the long menu.

Both brothers cook at the restaurant, which opened July 14 and now has three waitresses.

Byblos, 1406 N. Main St., is next door to the popular El Rancho Grande Restaurante, on the same block as the 33-year-old Los Alamos Cafe and not far from the critically acclaimed La Playa seafood restaurant on Central Avenue.

The brothers did everything from renovating their 90-year-old building and designing their restaurant to rebuilding floors and buying, refurbishing and installing fixtures and mostly used equipment.

Joseph Hedary, 32, designed and built the half-wall of brick separating the diners from the open-view kitchen and the brick oven in which the brothers bake their from-scratch pita bread.

Byblos, BEE-bluhs in the dictionary pronunciation,  is the Lebanese name of an ancient Phoenician seaport, its Mediterranean coastal ruins and a modern community near Beirut.

But the restaurant’s name, a common one for Lebanese firms in America, is pronounced BEE-blose.

The brothers expect to draw diners from the tens of thousands of tourists who visit the Stockyards  every year, the downtown lunch crowd, the area’s Lebanese cuisine lovers who don’t want to drive to the Camp Bowie Boulevard site of Hedary’s Lebanese Restaurant and even the more stubborn neighbors.

But Byblos is much more than a new place to eat.

Through no deliberate design, it has become a symbol of the area’s potential for economic rebirth outside the immediate Stockyards neighborhood.

“The more business, the better, especially for this little block,” said Alex Gallegos Jr., Los Alamos’ manger.

Los Alamos, owned by Alex and Sara Gallegos Sr., doubled its size about two years ago, upgraded the interior and built a handsome brick facade.

Business is picking up at night, and the owners are considering improvements and development of two others buildings they own on the block, Alex Gallegos Jr. said.

“The more business, the better, especially for this little block.” ALEX GALLEGOS JR.

Mosman said that both the 1300 and 1400 blocks of  North Main Street have been cleaned up and are prime for economic growth if property owners and small business operators can get professional advice and financial help on leasing selling developing and enhancing their properties.

There’s plenty of room for new growth, with eight vacant buildings on Byblos’ east side of the 1400 block.

That stretch had been home to three bars, where some shootings had occurred and too often endangered nightlife in the area, the area’s veteran business owners said.

But the bars have been closed.

“We are glad, because it’s always nice to have a restaurant row instead of what we had,” said Brenda Martin, a co-assistant manager at El Rancho Grande. “We do have a lot of tourists.”

Gus Garcia, who owns and operates Garcia Tire Co. across the street, said that Byblos is the latest of several area additions, expansions and improvements, including a convenience store, a law firm, an auto mechanic’s shop, and a temporary employment placement firm.

The Hispanic chamber has joined with the Fort Worth Metropolitan Black Chamber of Commerce to petition the federal government for a $50,000 economic development grant to hire an ombudsman to help coordinate development in the area.

It’s time, Mosman argues, to activate the city’s dormant 5-year-old economic revitalization plan for North Main, as wealthy investors develop the StockyardsStaion and complete the Tarantula Railroad and possibly a trolley service.

For Joseph and Marios Hedary, too, the time is now. five years ago, Joseph, oldest of the Hedary children, chose the Byblos site.

The brothers learned the business from their father, Antoine Hedary, who brought his family from Lebanon to the United States in the early 1970s. Joseph Hedary started work in Antoine’s cafe in Lebanon and worked in a “classy” French-European restaurant in modern-day Byblos.

Marios Hedary, despite his new venture, remains the chief cook at Hedary’s and helps his mother, Leila, manage the restaurant, said Antoine Hedary, who spends most of his working hours mananging his approximately 30 thoroughbred racehorses.

But he said his sons rely on their own resources.

When the brothers bought their 1902 – vintage building, it was “a mess” of rotting wood interiors, crumbling brick walls, defective wiring and plumbing and other challenges, Joseph Hedary said.

It was all but vacant, featuring only a record shop in a niche of the hazardous structure, he said.

The building originally housed a cafe downstairs and a hotel upstairs, and later became a clothing store for many years, Joseph Hedary said.

After one day of renovation efforts, Marios Hedary dropped out of the venture, his brother said.

Joseph Hedary who sold his insurance agency to pursue his restaurant idea, later persuaded Marios to return.

Then, about 18 months ago, the part-time project became a serious full-time restaurant endeavor, Joseph Hedary said.

Byblos’ 14-foot dining room ceilings soon will have a wall decorated with scenes from bygone days in Lebanon, he said.

Joseph Hedary estimates that they have invested $150,000 in the venture, excluding the price of the building and the value of their own labor.

By buying used equipment and scavenging for construction materials, he figures they have saved more than $350,000.

The large walk-in freezer and refrigerator units, two stoves and some other equipment came from the former Bill Martin’s Seafood Restaurant on University Drive.

The brick for the oven came from an elementary school torn down four years ago; the wood trim, from a wrecking yard; the bar tile, from a tile supplier’s closeout sale. Joseph Hedary paid $25 at an auction for the wood he refurbished into Byblos’ bar, cabinets and shelves.

Their work ethic – plus their culinary skills – spark optimism in their father.

“They got the energy…They all can cook,” Antoine Hedary said.

“They’re going to make it.”

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