The Babe’s chicken family expands with Sweetie Pies Ribeyes in North Richland Hills

Put Sweetie Pie’s Ribeyes, the family-oriented steakhouse in North Richland on your list.

This great little place offers authentic home-style dishes using Texas-raised beef and locally grown produce. It carries on the tradition of the old restaurants that helped bind communities together, providing an experience that is worth more than the total on the bill. Paul Vinyard and his two adult children, Joel and Tiffany Vinyard, co-own Sweetie Pie’s Ribeyes, as well as hugely popular home-cooking chain Babe’s Chicken. The restaurant’s name was inspired by the nickname for Paul’s late wife (and the kids’ mom, Mary Beth).

As with Babe’s, the Vinyard family uses high quality ingredients (including hand-cut, Texas beef) and treat their staff well. During a recent visit, Joel told me nearly everything on the menu is scratch-made from fresh ingredients. Popular dishes include a chicken-fried ribeye with cream gravy, filet mignons, steak kabobs, and hand-formed burgers. Someone doesn’t like beef? That’s ok; there’s fried catfish, lemon sole, pork chops, and chicken, a variety of salads and good sides like green beans, mac & cheese, and baked potatoes. Four $5 by-the-glass wines, too.

The restaurant’s original Decatur location and the new outlet in North Richland Hills  share a reverence for Texas history. The NRH location, for example, takes its design cues from the building’s century-old Smithfield Gin Mill. The interior uitlizes reclaimed wood, Texas antiques and commissioned paintings styled on Texas history. Several themed dining rooms celebrate Texas’s frontier roots, including a Wolf Room, two Patriot Rooms that feature portraits of heroes from the Texas Revolution, and a River Rock Room.