The Mecca is a Dallas institution with a 70-plus-year history of serving home-cooking type meals to churchgoers and late-nighters. This greasy spoon had been over on Harry Hines since the 60s, and I’d never even heard of it. Call me a neighborhood xenophobe. Harry Hines is too far away.
But now The Mecca resides at Live Oak and Skillman, in the old Tipperary Inn. Although it’s a little strange to be inside a pub that’s actually a diner, it’s cool. The place looks great.
We went for lunch and tried the daily special, chicken and dumplings ($6.99).
The entree was not bad, with homemade dumplings. The mashed potatoes and pea salad I ordered with it, not so much. I don’t know what I expected “pea salad” to be, but I love peas, so I just ordered it. It turned out to be canned peas mixed with some creamy concoction. I still ate it, but I don’t think I would order it again. The mashed potatoes were gluey.
Photo by Melissa Thrailkill
My pal ordered the cheeseburger ($7.49), and she loved it. Our server also brought us a basket of yeast rolls and cornbread muffins, along with a basket of butter. Mmmm. Butter.
We are told we ordered the wrong thing here. Chicken-fried steak is The Mecca’s best dish, we hear. So we’ll try that next time. And maybe the cinnamon roll, which allegedly is as big as my head. And that is big.
The Mecca serves breakfast all the time, and they are open from 6 a.m.-11 p.m. Sunday-Thursday and until midnight Friday and Saturday.
