Texas French Bread Is Back on Rio Grande — Here's What Actually Changed

Texas French Bread is back inside its own dining room on Rio Grande Street, more than four and a half years after a January 2022 mechanical fire gutted the West Campus building. According to ATX Things, the bakery quietly reopened indoor breakfast, lunch and dinner service this summer — and most of Austin still doesn't know it happened.

What actually happened to Texas French Bread?

The fire hit on a Sunday night in January 2022. An accidental mechanical failure tore through the building at 2900 Rio Grande St., the same corner the bakery had worked out of since it opened in 1981 — a 41-year run that made it one of the older continuously operating restaurants near the University of Texas campus. Damage came in at roughly $1.6 million, and for a while it looked like that might be the end of it.

Owner Murph Willcott didn't close the business. Within months, a 1970s Airstream trailer — donated by Aaron and Stacy Franklin of Franklin Barbecue — was parked in the garden next to the old parking lot, and Texas French Bread kept baking out of it. Willcott has chronicled the whole stretch on a Substack newsletter with more than 13,000 subscribers, and in a March 2025 post announcing construction had finally started, he wrote about the years running the trailer: "That we pulled back from the brink at all, much less made it this far feels like a miracle." Demolition of what remained of the old structure wrapped in June 2025, and the new building went up on the same footprint.

Is Texas French Bread actually open right now?

Yes. The dining room reopened this summer with full table service, and as of this week the bakery is running a real seven-day schedule — including dinner service back on the menu for the first time since the fire.

That's according to the bakery's own site as of this week — a real change from the trailer-only years, when there was no indoor seating and no dinner service at all. Beer and wine are back on the menu too, which the Airstream never had. The bakery's Substack has framed weekend brunch — a beer-and-wine-license-era addition — as one of the biggest wins of the whole rebuild.

What changed since the fire — and what stayed the same?

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"The other day I found myself thinking wistfully about brunch — BRUNCH! ...brunch has been extraordinarily good to us at Texas French Bread."

A few things carried over from the Airstream years on purpose, and locals who only knew the trailer version should know both are still true:

• The Texas Farmers' Market booths are still running. Texas French Bread still sells Saturdays at the Texas Farmers' Market at Bell District and Sundays at the Mueller location — the same booths that kept regulars fed with no indoor seating for three-plus years.
• Table22 home delivery is still an option for anyone who'd rather not make the West Campus drive.
• Online preorder for bakery specials is still how the busiest items move, especially around holidays — a habit built during the trailer years that the new building kept rather than dropped.

What's new: an actual dining room, a full weekday breakfast-and-lunch counter that doesn't require standing outside, dinner service Tuesday through Saturday, and the beer-and-wine brunch that wasn't possible without four walls and a permit.

What locals should know

• Address: 2900 Rio Grande St, Austin, TX 78705, near the UT campus/West Campus corridor.
• Phone: 512-499-0544.
• Dinner is new again: Tuesday–Saturday, 5–9:30 PM — the first regular dinner service since the January 2022 fire.
• No Sunday or Monday dinner: both days close at 2:30 PM.
• Farmers markets still running: Saturdays at Bell District, Sundays at Mueller.
• Home delivery: available through Table22 for the West Campus-averse.

Is it worth the trip back?

For a wider swing through what else has reopened or opened new in Austin this year, ATX Things has been tracking it: see this week's Austin Restaurant Weeks guide for citywide prix-fixe deals running now through mid-September, the Restaurant Health Report before booking anywhere new to you, and Leander's new banh mi opening if West Campus is too far a drive. For the market booth schedule, Texas Farmers' Market at Mueller's new pavilion has the full rundown of what else is there on Sundays.

FAQ

Is Texas French Bread open again in 2026? Yes. The bakery reopened its dining room at its original 2900 Rio Grande St. address this summer, more than four and a half years after a January 2022 fire, with breakfast, lunch, and — for the first time since the fire — dinner service.

What are Texas French Bread's current hours? Monday and Sunday: 7 AM–2:30 PM. Tuesday through Saturday: 7 AM–2:30 PM, then dinner from 5–9:30 PM, per the bakery's own posted schedule as of this week.

Does Texas French Bread still sell at farmers markets? Yes — Saturdays at the Texas Farmers' Market at Bell District and Sundays at the Mueller market, the same booths that operated through the whole rebuild.

Did Texas French Bread ever fully close? No. It ran out of a donated 1970s Airstream trailer parked in its garden from late 2022 through this year's reopening, plus a wholesale bread business, while the building itself was rebuilt from the ground up.

Is there still an Airstream on-site? The trailer's role has shifted with the new building open; the market booths and wholesale program that ran alongside it are still active. Call ahead (512-499-0544) if a specific service depends on trailer hours.