For the past month, we have made some forays into different parts of Houston to find happy hour specials and dining deals to help relieve the heat of summer and the pain of inflation. And it's been a good thing. For this writer, July and August are my cabin fever months. I don't want to venture out into the summer sizzle but I get antsy staying inside.

Indulging in frosty beverages and comfort food may not be physically healthy but while we are under this heat dome, as Frank Billingsley warns us daily, I am more concerned about my mental health. Taking a few hours to hang out with my lifelong companion or a close friend over cold drinks and hot snacks does wonders for my outlook.
This time around, my husband, Classic Rock Bob, and I decided to stay closer to home which happens to be the 'burbs of Cypress. After some online searching, I discovered that the fairly recent Austin import, Tumble 22 Hot Chicken, has a decent dine-in happy hour for cocktails and food Monday through Friday, from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Though it is close to our neighborhood, we had never visited. I thought it was more of a fast casual chicken joint but I discovered that it is much more than that.

Tumble 22 was founded in 2017 as an Austin fast food truck before opening its first brick and mortar in March 2018. It now has four locations in the Greater Austin area plus the Vintage Park Houston location which opened in November 2022. There's a second Houston location for 1017 Houston Avenue that is opening soon in Sawyer Heights.

The exterior of Tumble 22 looks like an upscale fast food business. The Vintage Park location is a bit tucked away in the trees, which is a good thing for Houston's scorching sun. We were able to park our car in a shady spot. As we approached the front door, we saw that it was "cashless", a good thing to know ahead of time, which is why we're here. We have the deets.
A small sign on the wall said happy hour was available in the bar or on the patio. While Tumble 22 has an ample, covered deck, even this normally al fresco-lovin' gal was having none of that. Instead, we sat at the small bar with windows overlooking the patio. The windows were closed that day but there were gaps that kept the bar area a little warm.

We asked our bartender about the happy hour deals. She showed us the QR code which basically brought up the online menu. We had to ask which 'signature sips" were on special because the regular menu lists the house cocktails as Cheap, Stiff Drinks and some of them are not on happy hour. She informed us of the drinks that were which included $4.50 domestic beers and craft beer from $5.50 to $7.50. The house margarita called the Big Larry, the Adult Lemonade and a John Daly, its version of an Arnold Palmer, were some of the happy hour sips for $5.95. However, there were some discrepancies. The Big Larry was actually $6.95 and the Coors was $4.75. It seems the online menu needs to be updated.
CRB saw the beer selection and commented that he had not had a Coors in years so that's what he chose. I opted for the Big Larry. It's a frozen blood orange margarita topped with Grand Marnier. I like all three of those things so I wanted to see how they all worked together.

We gave our food order then tried our drinks. CRB's Coors Banquet tastes as it has since 1873 so no news there. The "banquet" term was added in 1937 as a marketing tactic so it's the same as a regular Coors. My Big Larry was a nice-sized frozen concoction but the first sip was awfully sweet. The mix of blood orange and Grand Marnier was a bit much and I think it would have been better if the frozen mix was just lime margarita rather than blood orange. However, I squeezed the lime garnish into my drink and it was enough to cut through the sweetness.
As we were waiting on our food, a group of diners walked in and commented on how the interior had changed because there was a wall where the order counter used to be. Personally, I like table service so the transition was a positive in my opinion.  The atmosphere is casual with rustic wood-paneled walls and vintage photos and posters. There's also a second dining room with ceiling fans. The two televisions we saw are thankfully tucked up high and not distracting.

Our three happy hour dishes arrived fairly quickly. We began with the Dirty Fries ($6) since loaded fries usually need to be eaten in due haste to keep the fries from getting soggy, though some folks may like them that way. While Tumble 22 is another hot chicken joint among a plethora of such places, it offers a variety of ways to enjoy the spice. They have sandwiches, fried bone-in chicken, bites and tenders. For the Dirty Fries, it uses pulled hot chicken which was mostly thigh meat from what I could tell. Off happy hour, the Dirty Fries are $7.95.
We had chosen the Dang Hot spice level for all of our dishes and it was only slightly pushing the envelope. I think it's a safe choice for those who like things spicy but not deadly. However, those who are a little less adventuresome can start at Wimpy (traditional) and work their way up. In the future I will try one item with the Cluckin' Hot just to challenge myself but I think I'd stay away from Stupid Hot because it speaks for itself.

The matchstick fries were a good fit for the tender, spicy chicken and the bountiful queso. There were several slices of bread-n-butter pickles which was a good reprieve from the burn. They straddled the line between sweet and tart and my greedy self could have used a couple more. I love pickles.
After we had made it through more than half the fries, CRB wanted to move onto the next item. He said, "I'm done with fries." I would have fallen off my barstool if it didn't have a back because I would never have imagined those words to come out of his potato-loving mouth. I myself couldn't resist a few more. There was queso on them.

Next was the Lil' O.G.  chicken sandwich ($6). I don't know how big the O.G. is but the Lil O.G. on happy hour was plenty large. The fried chicken breast was on the long and skinny side, perfectly crispy and perfectly spicy. We may have had to take a few sips of our drinks to cool it down but the heap of coleslaw and Duke's mayonnaise helped a bit, too. The regular menu price for the Lil' O.G. is $8.50 while the larger sandwich is $11.95.

We ordered a second round of drinks. I stayed with my Big Larry and this time, the frozen drink seemed to have just the right amount of Grand Marnier so it wasn't as cloying. Unfortunately, CRB's margarita on the rocks was not so successful. It tasted fizzy for some reason and not in a good way.
We were full by this point, so we got a to-go box for the Half Cobb salad ($6). It was a little over-dressed with a creamy buttermilk dressing rather than the standard blue cheese. It had a good amount of bacon, avocado, romaine lettuce, fresh grape tomatoes and chopped egg. The happy hour portion also had four nice-sized chicken bites. It made a great lunch the next day especially since it also came with a bonus deviled egg for which I called dibs. The Full Cobb salad ($11.95) gets two deviled eggs. I think that is a most excellent touch.

As we were finishing our drinks, a manager approached and asked how everything was, then gave us a $5 gift coupon because he was told this was our first visit. He also told us that happy hour had extended to the dining room as well. We wish we had known that because the booths looked pretty comfy.  The atmosphere is casual with rustic wood-paneled walls and vintage photos and posters. There's also a second dining room with ceiling fans. The two televisions we saw are thankfully tucked up high and not distracting.
We ordered the Dive Burger to take home for our teenager but he had already ventured out on his own so CRB and I split the burger later that evening. It had two quarter pound patties that were hand-formed and cooked medium. The menu lists its sauce as "rooster sauce" but I can only say it's similar to the secret sauce that seems to be popping up on smashburgers everywhere. The thin all-beef patties, slightly toasted bun, shredded lettuce, sliced tomatoes, rooster sauce and bread-n-butter pickles made it almost a hybrid of a smashburger and a backyard grill version together. I really, really liked it. In fact, I'm craving one right now. It wasn't a happy hour item but it was still an extremely good deal for $7.95.
Tumble 22 uses Chinese takeout-style containers for takeaway and they work really well in keeping items tidy and in their place.

We were quite thrilled with another happy hour success and one that we will definitely take advantage of again very soon. While the drink specials are on the slim side, the food offers great quality and value, even when it's not happy hour. That means we have a new find that doesn't have to be at a certain time or certain day of the week.

And we have a bonus $5 coupon just waiting to be used.  The Pecan Pie milkshake is on my bucket list.

Tumble 22 Hot Chicken
10723 Louetta
281-547-6300
tumble22.com

Tumble 22 Hot Chicken
1017 Houston Avenue
Coming soon!