The Classics is an occasional series that spotlights and celebrates Houston’s oldest bars and restaurants.

It’s lunchtime at Cleburne Cafeteria. Thanksgiving—one of the restaurant’s busiest days—beckons, just over a week away. But Cleburne owner George Mickelis, 65, is completely immersed in the steady hum of an ordinary Tuesday.

“It’s chicken and dumplings day!” Mickelis exclaims. He talks like he walks and works: nonstop. “I have a huge Italian contingency here today—they’re all in their 80s and 90s. The men sit over there, and the women sit in there,” he says, motioning to a private room, just off the cavernous main dining area. Another guest appears to say hello, and Mickelis wishes him a belated happy birthday. “He just turned 95 years old!” he says, then turns back to his guest. “You’ve got more hair than I do! Still driving? Good, good. How’s your son?”

Warm chatter, full trays, and chirping service bells create a symphonic murmur at the beloved family-owned cafeteria, which has served impressively consistent homestyle cooking in Houston for almost 85 years. Most of Cleburne’s recipes date back to 1941, if not earlier, and are still prepared the original from-scratch ways, with one notable exception: Mickelis’s father, Nick, made the decision to replace lard with olive oil in the early ’70s. “It was unheard of at the time, but my father was from Greece, and very health-conscious,” Mickelis says.

A stubborn insistence on organic produce and premium imported ingredients such as Cokinos extra virgin olive oil, combined with vintage recipes and techniques, makes Cleburne somehow not your grandmother’s cafeteria, and—simultaneously—proudly, defiantly, literally your grandmother’s cafeteria. In fact, Cleburne makes the argument that modern health food and traditional comfort food can be the same delicious thing. “It’s heart-healthy cooking. I probably don’t advertise that enough,” Mickelis quips. “I use organic broccoli, organic spinach, organic carrots. I should say it!”

Cleburne’s hearty entrees such as corned beef and cabbage, country steak and potatoes, baked ham, and Cornish game hen are offered alongside bright sautéed vegetables and crisp salads. The old-fashioned macaroni and cheese derives wholesome richness from milk, eggs, and shredded Vermont cheddar.

When Mickelis’s parents, Nick and Pat, purchased the cafeteria from Anabelle Collins and Martha Kavanaugh in 1953, the spot had already been open on the corner of Cleburne and Fannin for more than a decade. Nick had immigrated to the United States from Patmos, Greece, in 1948, after serving with allied troops in World War II. He arrived in Ellis Island, then made his way to Houston, where he found work washing dishes in his brother’s cafe. A promise to send a portrait home to his mother in Patmos led Nick to a photography studio, where the owner and photographer Pat Canfield snapped his picture—and would later tell their children it was love at first sight.

“My mother owned her own business, and that was rare for a woman in the ’40s,” Mickelis says. “She was very smart. My father was too, and an artist.”

Cleburne’s walls serve as a gallery of Nick’s paintings: Supple oils on canvases pay moving homage to remembered Greek vistas and vignettes. In a stunning portrait of Pat, who passed away at 96 two years ago, Nick captures her beauty to regal effect.

Then, there are Cleburne’s buildings—sagas themselves. Nick, Pat, and their two children lived above the original downtown cafeteria in a 12-room house that was a former speakeasy, where 1930s Houston snuck through secret passages to gamble. In 1969, the family moved the cafeteria to its current Bissonnet Street location. Fire decimated Cleburne not just once, but twice: first in 1990, just one year after Nick passed away, and then again in 2016. Each time, the community rallied, and the Mickelis family rebuilt.

Ninety-one-year-old Nuncio Martino, one of Mickelis’s aforementioned “Italian contingency,” has eaten at Cleburne for decades. “It’s the only place I know of that you can get really fresh vegetables and just good food,” Martino says. “George only buys top quality produce. Everything now is fast-food and fried. You used to be able to go to a cafe and get a plate with meat and vegetables. You can’t do that anymore. Where can you go get collard greens?” Martino laughs.

Savory greens are indeed a draw, along with turkey and dressing, which are on the menu Thursdays and Sundays, year-round.

For generations of Houstonians, going home for Thanksgiving has long meant going to Cleburne. “We see people weekly, daily. They get to know you, you get to know them,” Mickelis says. “That’s the beautiful part.”

The cafeteria is always open on Thanksgiving, as well as Christmas, 11am to 8pm, for both dining in and takeout. But it wasn’t always that way. On Thanksgiving and Christmas, the Mickelis family originally gathered with cousins, aunts, and uncles to cook in the cafeteria’s kitchen—and left the doors unlocked. Driving by, customers saw the activity, and stopped.

“People walked in and asked, ‘Are you open?’” Mickelis says. “My father said, ‘No, we are just here with family, but get a plate. Come in and eat.’”

Word traveled fast: Cleburne Cafeteria was serving. “My mother and father saw there were a lot of lonely people. Not everybody is blessed to have children in town, a spouse still alive, a brother or sister they can go visit,” Mickelis says. “We’re that family for them.”

Family, yes—and comfort food maestros. Cleburne Cafeteria turkeys are boiled for several hours with onions, carrots, celery, garlic, oregano, kosher salt, and fresh-cracked black pepper. Then, the turkey is basted with paprika, butter, more black pepper, and salt, and roasted in the oven. It’s a sure-fire way to get a golden, juicy turkey breast. The liquid is used to make the corn-bread dressing and the giblet gravy.

“It’s backbreaking work. A 28-pound bird in an 80-quart stock pot? You get four or five birds in there. The water is boiling and splashing as you pull them out. That’s one thing about the Cleburne: We do things the hard way,” Mickelis says, grinning.

Mickelis praises his staff, many of whom have worked in his kitchen for decades, including 14 people with more than 30 years and five with over 40 years of service. The team brings their families with them when they work on holidays, and are paid double, plus bonuses.

For Mickelis, family has always been the point. “If I found out I was dying tomorrow, I don’t think I’d do anything different,” he says. “I really love the cafeteria. It reminds me of my parents. It reminds me of a simpler time. As the world changes, the cafeteria doesn’t really change. There’s comfort to that.” He grins again. “If I can’t crack the eggs, grate my own cheese, and boil the turkeys, I don’t want to do it.”

Cleburne Cafeteria closes early at 2pm on Thanksgiving Eve. On Thanksgiving Day, Cleburne is open regular hours, 11am to 8pm, for both dine-in and takeout.