The 90-year-old Star Cafe, a chicken-fried steak landmark that opened in the heyday of the Fort Worth Stockyards livestock market and meat packinghouses, is dark and its future is uncertain after the chef and employees said it closed this week.
The Star opened in the 1930s as Edna’s Star Cafe in a 1920 building. It operated as a cafe and bar at 111 W. Exchange Ave. under a variety of names including Star Cafe until 1979, when it was remodeled and opened as one of the original Black-eyed Pea Restaurants.
Betty and Don Boles bought it in 1980, restoring the name Star Cafe and establishing a reputation for sizzling lemon-garlic steaks, thick burgers and one of the state’s best chicken-fried steaks. The Boles family sold it in 2022.
The Star Cafe & Cocktails, seen Sept. 30, 2026, opened in 1980. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com
Bar owner Drew Boatman bought the Star in 2024. He did not return messages Wednesday night.
The Stockyards Historic District was booming with 9 million visitors a year before restaurants began to feel the economic squeeze of high food and labor costs and a sharp nationwide downturn in dining and liquor sales.
Chef Victor Villarreal posted a video on Facebook showing the neon “open” sign going dark. He wrote that a special dinner Tuesday night marked “the closing” and thanked past and present employees.
A server was also shown in a social media video saying it was the restaurant’s last day, and another staffer also posted on social media that the Star closed.
The chicken-fried steak lunch at the Star Cafe in the Stockyards. Bud Kennedy bud@star-telegram.com .JPG "PHi_j0120_14 (1).JPG")
The baseball-cut top sirloin, a 10- to 11-ounce steak with baked potato, put the Star Cafe on top as the best cheap steakhouse in a DFW.com best of list. Star-Telegram archives Ralph Lauer
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Bud Kennedy is celebrating his 40th year writing about restaurants in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. He has written the “Eats Beat” dining column in print since 1985 and online since 1992 — that’s more than 3,000 columns about Texas cafes, barbecue, burgers and where to eat.
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