Spiral Diner Turns Seven

August 21st marked the seventh anniversary of Spiral Diner, the now-legendary vegan restaurant that has become an institution on Magnolia in the Near Southside. A big congratulations to the Amy, James, Lindsey, Britt, and everybody else at Spiral for all their well-deserved success. Here’s how the crew puts their story in their own words:

Spiral Diner & Bakery opened its door on August 21, 2002. But first, let’s go back a little further than that. The founder of Spiral Diner & Bakery, Amy McNutt, started out in filmmaking. She graduated from the famed USC School of Film. While making a short film about factory-farmed cows in California she learned about the heartless practices of the dairy and egg industries. Overnight this experience turned the long time vegetarian into a vegan. Amy began to research and study the plight of animals, soon extending her studies to environmentalism as well. She began to take part in educational activism and tried her best to keep an open dialogue with people about Veganism and its relation to the environment. In doing this she discovered that most people, once they have a total understanding of Veganism, agree it’s a necessary step for survival on this planet. However, they have difficulty changing their lifestyles for lack of access to information and most importantly, GOOD VEGAN FOOD. So, after a year of working in the film industry Amy decided to move on to her other love: Food. In an attempt to provide delicious cruelty-free and organic food to those who need it most she left L.A. and moved back home to Texas and at the age of 22, she opened Spiral Diner in Fort Worth.

And so it began: vegan food in the heart of Cowtown. The original location was a small lunch counter at the Fort Worth Rail Market in downtown. There was only 800 square feet of kitchen space, 5 employees, and less than ten items on the menu! After being open a few months Amy and James started dating and after only two months they got hitched. Turns out that James was an old school vegan foodie himself so he quit his lucrative job as a bounty hunter and immediately joined Amy to help run Spiral. Having James on board helped Amy concentrate on keeping the place running smooth while he worked on expanding the menu.

After a year and a half at the Rail Market Spiral was bursting at the seams. The customer base was growing and growing and they were running out of space in the kitchen. They needed a bigger and better place. With financial support from Amy’s wonderful mom (who took out a second mortgage to fund the expansion) and many regular customers who came on board as lenders the move to Magnolia was on. They found an old gutted building in the Near Southside and along with the landlord built it up from scratch. And on their second anniversary Spiral Diner Fort Worth was born anew. With fancy new digs and expanded menu Spiral quickly became a Fort Worth institution and a destination for vegan travelers. All the while they kept a great core crew of employees that stuck with them through thick and thin. In 2007 Spiral pulled off a real coup: The little vegan restaurant in Cowtown, TX was awarded Best Vegetarian Restaurant in America by VegNews magazine! (That’s right, Texas!).

After being opened 5 years Amy and James decided there was some more expanding to do. So they licensed the rights to Spiral to Sara Tomerlin, a recent TCU grad and longtime Spiral manager, to open a location in Dallas and in February of 2008 Spiral Oak Cliff opened its doors. At the same time our other wonderful longtime manager Lindsey Akey bought the rights to Spiral Fort Worth. Today, Amy and James still own and run the company while Lindsey and Sara own and run their respective locations.