Smoke from popular Third Ward turkey spot has some fuming
There are plenty of people blowing smoke in the city of Houston on any given day.
Nakia and Lyndell Price, the founders of the Turkey Leg Hut on Almeda Road in the Third Ward, are among those doing so literally.
Many Houstonians have been delighted by the results. Since the restaurant opened at its current location in the summer of 2017, it has emerged as a culinary and cultural phenomenon, with thousands lining up each week for its signature spiced and stuffed turkey legs, among other things.
On Friday morning, several dozen people queued outside its doors, waiting for the restaurant’s 11 a.m. opening. The air smelled of wood smoke.
But not everyone is delighted by the smells emanating from the neighborhood turkey joint, even with Thanksgiving just around the corner.
Some of the Turkey Leg Hut’s neighbors are tired of the crowds the business has attracted, the noise its fans make, and the smoke emitted by its outdoor smokers, which operate for most of the day. And some neighbors say the smoke is making them sick.
On Wednesday, six area residents filed suit in Harris County’s 152nd District Court, seeking a temporary restraining order, temporary injunction, and permanent injunction on Turkey Leg Hut’s operations.
The lawsuit alleges that the restaurant is an “unpermitted, illegal, and unregulated business” that is operating in violation of municipal ordinances, as well as presenting health hazards to neighborhood residents.
“I’ve had to use my inhalers more often than I’ve normally been using them,” said Patricia Bird, one of the plaintiffs, in a phone interview Friday. “At first I just thought, ‘OK, I’m getting older, maybe it’s something like that.’”
But the 63-year-old Bird said she came to realize other neighbors were having similar health
concerns — and she suspects it is connected to smoke from the restaurant.
That’s certainly plausible. A PurpleAir sensor outside Turkey Leg Hut showed an air quality index in the low 600s Friday afternoon — well above the “hazardous” threshold for particulate matter, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Pit plan in place
On Friday morning, co-owner Nakia Price was visibly frustrated, about both the lawsuit itself and its timing.
At a news conference outside the Turkey Leg Hut, she explained that she and her husband Lynn are aware of the smoke issue and have been planning to address it by building an enclosure around the pits that produce the restaurant’s turkey legs.
“We have been and are ready and willing to do whatever we have to do to solve this concern,” said Nakia Price, a Chicago native who attended the University of Houston on a basketball scholarship and earned a degree in business. Her husband is a Houston native who was raised in the Third Ward and played baseball at Rice, according to the business’s website.
In the meantime, Nakia Price said, the Turkey Leg Hut will continue to operate as usual.
“This Monday, we will be handing out 3,000 free turkey legs to Houston kids and adults for Thanksgiving,” she said.
“The plaintiffs of this suit tried to stop us from providing free food to families right before the holidays with their emergency restraining order to shut us down,” she continued. “This would have also not only affected those in need of food but our hardworking staff as well, putting them out of jobs right before the holiday season.”
Price emphasized that although a handful of local residents have complaints about Turkey Leg Hut, the business enjoys “overwhelming” support from the community — and indeed, many Houstonians have been weighing in to support the restaurant on social media.
Some scoffed that the lawsuit itself was a symptom of gentrification in the Third Ward, if not an attempt to undermine a couple of African-American entrepreneurs, neither of whom has any formal culinary training but who have transformed a hobby into a bustling city business.
Sudden success story
And Turkey Leg Hut’s success has indeed been striking. The Prices relayed their unlikely origin story last month during an appearance on The Madd Hatta Morning Show on KBXX.
“We’ve always had good food,” Lynn Price said, explaining that in 2015, they had decided to start cooking turkey legs for hungry, tipsy Texans leaving the Houston Rodeo.
“At the end of the day, I felt like we had a product. It was a great product. And I felt like, if people followed us and they patronized us in the field, they would patronize us anywhere,” Nakia Price added.
That’s certainly proved to be the case. But it’s easy to understand why Third Ward residents who live in the immediate vicinity of the restaurant might be exasperated by the side effects of living next to a successful smokehouse. And the key issue raised by the lawsuit — about the noxious smoke fumes — is one that Turkey Leg Hut can, and should, remediate, via the installation of smoke-mitigating devices.
“That’s all I’m asking,” Bird said. “They have a very popular business. It’s a top-notch product,” she continued. “I’m asking that they do something to make it safe for everybody.”