Carrabba's San Felipe Campus Starts With the Restaurant Built to Travel
Westminster United Methodist Church sits at the corner of San Felipe and Bering Drive. Its sanctuary is the large building facing San Felipe, and on Sunday mornings the congregation parks in two lots on the north side and walks a covered path to the back doors for services at 9:05 and 11:05. The church still lists 5801 San Felipe as its home and still holds worship in that sanctuary.
Part of that property now belongs to a restaurateur. Johnny Carrabba recently bought 3 acres of the church grounds to build a multi-restaurant campus a short distance from Uptown, the Houston Business Journal reported in October. Only one concept has been confirmed so far. On Kirby Drive, the Carrabba family's restaurants came together slowly over decades. That history helps explain why Mia's Table is the first name on the San Felipe plan.
The deal was first reported by the Houston Business Journal and summarized by KHOU. Carrabba, the restaurateur behind Grace's, Mia's Table and the Original Carrabba's, told the Business Journal he wants a destination like his company's Kirby Drive campus, where his three signature restaurants sit within steps of one another.
He also told the Business Journal that the plans will be worked out over 2027, and that a Mia's Table is already part of them.
"We are not sure what the other concepts will be, but we know we are going to do a Mia's," Carrabba said. "We love our property on Kirby, and, if I am being honest, we love the property on San Felipe just as much."
So the story for Tanglewood today is mostly about land. The model is known, the planning year is next year, and the one restaurant he has named is a Mia's.
The Kirby campus was built in stages. The Original Carrabba's ran on Kirby alone for 26 years before anything else joined it, and the third restaurant arrived two years after that.
| Year | What happened | Location |
|---|---|---|
| 1986 | The Original Carrabba's opens on Kirby Drive | Kirby Drive |
| 1988 | A second family-owned Carrabba's opens on South Voss Road | South Voss Rd. |
| 1993 | An Outback Steakhouse joint venture begins, leading to more than 250 Carrabba's Italian Grill restaurants nationwide | Nationwide |
| 2012 | The Original Carrabba's is rebuilt and reopens, and Mia's Table opens one block behind it | 3115 Kirby Dr. and 3131 Argonne St. |
| 2014 | Grace's, named for Johnny Carrabba's grandmother Grace Mandola, opens as the family's fourth restaurant | 3111 Kirby Dr. |
The Carrabba family's company history and a 2022 What Now Houston report give the dates. The rest of the campus formed in about two years. In 2012 the family rebuilt the original restaurant at 3115 Kirby and opened Mia's behind it, and Grace's followed in 2014.
The family also kept investing in the Kirby site after that. In late 2022, Hieu Nguyen, president of Johnny Carrabba Family of Restaurants, told What Now Houston it had been about 10 years since the Kirby rebuild. The company planned to renovate two dining rooms that double as private event spaces and to remove columns from the patio to make room for more tables, a project he expected to take four to six months.
On Kirby, the campus grew up around a restaurant that was already there. San Felipe starts in reverse. The land came first, the campus is the plan from the start, and the restaurants will be chosen next year.
The family's restaurants have spread in very different ways. The family still owns and runs only the two original Carrabba's, on Kirby and on South Voss. The hundreds of Carrabba's Italian Grill locations came out of the 1993 Outback joint venture. Grace's has one location, on Kirby.
Mia's is the concept the family has spread around Houston on its own. The Mia's Table location directory currently lists seven Houston-area restaurants.
The newest is Bellaire, which the Houston Chronicle reported in February 2026 as the chain's seventh Houston-area location. Mia's opened 14 years ago as one fast-casual spot behind the Kirby restaurant. Since then it has grown to seven locations, in suburban shopping centers and inside the Loop alike.
That makes Mia's the natural first commitment for San Felipe. The family has built it repeatedly and it is a proven, flexible format. The other concepts for the campus will be worked out over 2027.
Mia's describes itself as fast-casual with full-service hospitality. Guests order at the counter, staff bring the food to the table, and drinks are refilled without being requested. Every dine-in guest gets a free self-serve frozen custard cone, and some locations have kids' play areas and patios.
The menu is Southern comfort food. It includes chicken fried chicken with jalapeño cream gravy, burgers, fried catfish, meatloaf and homemade sides. Carrabba created the restaurant as a tribute to his daughter, Mia. He wanted it to combine the speed of counter service with the feel of a sit-down family meal.
That format puts a casual, family-friendly restaurant at the San Felipe and Bering corner, on church property that has held Sunday services and parking lots. The finished campus will depend on which restaurants are planned to join Mia's next year. If San Felipe follows the Kirby model, the goal is several restaurants close enough to walk between.
Until San Felipe is built, the full three-restaurant model is on Kirby Drive. Grace's is at 3111 Kirby, the Original Carrabba's at 3115 Kirby, and Mia's Table around the corner at 3131 Argonne. Mia's locations closer to Tanglewood's west side include Memorial City at 1035 Gessner and the newer Bellaire location at 5413 Bellaire Blvd.
On San Felipe, Westminster United Methodist Church still holds its 9:05 and 11:05 Sunday services in the sanctuary facing the street. Carrabba has said the restaurant plans will take shape over 2027, and the one restaurant he has committed to is Mia's Table.
A new restaurant campus can change how a stretch of San Felipe works day to day, from traffic and parking to which nearby streets fill up at dinnertime. If you own in Tanglewood or are thinking about the blocks near Bering Drive, Uptown Real Estate Group can walk you through how changes along this corridor fit into your plans. Book a private real estate consultation.
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