The Best Restaurants in Mount Vernon, Texas

Brad and Stephanie Hyman moved back to Mount Vernon in 2010, bought the building on the square in 2012 and renovated it themselves. Brad grew up here and is now the city's mayor, which he has never hidden. The kitchen serves prime graded steaks, seafood and pastas, the Chophouse Board is steak trimmings with German sausage, cheeses and bread, and the bar keeps what the restaurant describes as the largest bourbon collection in Northeast Texas, which is their claim and not an award.

The building is half the reason to come. It stands on the site of the Ruth Hotel of 1861, and after a 1912 fire took the neighbouring bank, cotton trader Guy P. Hill rebuilt this one with a freight elevator big enough for cotton bales and vehicles. The elevator still works and sits above the bar. A G.P. Hill mark in white tile survives near the hostess stand, and a hardware display case from a 1912 photograph is still in the room. It carries about 4.7 across 300 or so bookings on OpenTable, the strongest record in Franklin County.

Open since March 1996, which makes it the longest running kitchen on this list by about fifteen years, and it carries roughly 4.7 across more than 370 public ratings. That is the highest rating at the highest volume of anything in Mount Vernon. The three things reviewers name over and over are the brisket, the sausage and the loaded baked potato, and more than one says the potato is the reason they keep coming back.

It is second only because The Chophouse has the building, the published hours and the outside coverage. On the food alone this is a genuine argument for first. It is a small roadside place on the service road rather than anything smart, and the hours published against it vary by source, with one listing showing Tuesday to Friday from 11am to 7pm and Saturday finishing at 3pm.

A family owned grill on the square doing burgers, Tex-Mex and salads, with a dining room inside and a patio out the back. The orders that keep coming up in public reviews are the patty melt, a burger called the Ranch Hand, the Reuben and a hot honey chicken sandwich, and at least one reviewer calls the hamburgers the best around.

It is third because it is the best casual lunch within a block of the courthouse and because it is the only kitchen in Mount Vernon doing burgers and Tex-Mex under one roof. The hours are the weak point. We found one listing showing it closed and another showing it open for the same period, and nothing authoritative to settle it.

A full service sports bar rather than a tavern that happens to serve food, which is a distinction worth making in a town where the alternative is the interstate. The two dishes reviewers name are the fried pickles and the chicken fried steak, and it sits a short walk off the square on North Kaufman beside the chamber of commerce.

Fourth place is about the record rather than the room. The review volume is modest and the published hours contradict each other, so we are giving you the phone number instead of a schedule. A separate Tag's at 36 East Hearn Avenue in Paris, Texas is a different business and should not be used to work out this one's hours.

This was Steve-O's Pizza and Pub for years and most people in town still call it that. Its own page describes The Spot as the next chapter of what locals knew as Steve O's, and directories now carry it under both names at the same Houston Street address. The reviews are straightforward about what it is: pizza and cold beer, with the Italian side of the menu getting the praise.

We rank it fifth and we flag the ambiguity rather than hiding it. A rebranded restaurant is the hardest kind to verify, the hours published against it conflict, and its own site would not load for us when we checked. The address and the continuity of the business are consistent across every source we found.

Labelling this honestly: it is a chain, but an East Texas one. Milano's runs branches in Grand Saline, Van, Edgewood, Bullard, Royse City, Quitman, Waxahachie and a handful of other towns across this part of the state, and it grew county by county rather than franchising nationally. The Mount Vernon branch takes orders through its own ordering platform, which is more than most independents here manage.

It earns its place on reliability. Mount Vernon has two pizza options and this is the one with a published menu, a working order page and a phone number that is consistent across sources. On a night when The Spot's hours are a guess, that counts.

This is barbecue inside a truck stop and we are not going to dress it up. Cotton Belt is Duke's own barbecue restaurant, inside Duke's Travel Plaza at exit 147, alongside a Taco Casa franchise and a bakery. Duke's is a Canton, Texas operator and Mount Vernon is its second location, built for drivers coming off Interstate 30 but with a real local following according to reviewers.

It is last on this list and it is here for one reason: hours. The independents on the square close early and several of them keep inconsistent weeks. If it is late, or Sunday, or Monday, this is open. The reviews are thin in number and positive in tone, naming the pork and the brisket.