Thursday, September 21, 2023 Sep 21, 2023
92° F Dallas, TX
Pop Culture

Dallas In Pop Culture: Rihanna Enjoys A Dallas Sunday Funday

An exploration of Rihanna's journey through Dallas.
By |
Image
Courtesy of © Michelle Pemberton / The Star, Indianapolis Star via Imagn Content Services, LLC

The One Time I Decided to Stay In on Sunday, Rihanna Parties in Deep Ellum. On November 15, Dallas Twitter erupted into chaos after a series of tweets confirmed Rihanna and A$AP Rocky’s appearance at Oni Ramen and Bitter End in Deep Ellum.

According to Fenty Headlines, a Rihanna fan Twitter account, the superstar couple were in Dallas to celebrate her brother’s birthday at Theory, a nightclub in Uptown.

Prior to Rihanna’s Sunday Funday, the billionaire mogul had a girls nights out with Nini Nguyen, a Dallas-based stylist and collaborator, at Monarch at the top of the Thompson Hotel.

Of course, Dallas Twitter speculated about her low-key appearance in Dallas—rumors of a potential collaboration with Erykah Badu swirled among tweets of Rihanna’s apparent “plug” for all the hotspots in Dallas. Despite hours of investigate research (via Twitter), no one knows exactly why the superstar elected to celebrate her brother’s birthday in Dallas, but we are thankful for the small pop culture win against our sister cities of Austin and Houston.

Dine Like Rihanna

Monarch
The 49th-floor restaurant is as extravagant as it is tall. Start off with the Ossetra caviar service ($120–$230) for bites of one of the most prized and pricy wild sturgeon roe. Giant prawn and King crab cocktail is another great chilled seafood option. Don’t even want to fuss with choosing yourself? The Royale is a set menu ($290 per person) that will shower you with the best the menu has to offer. Or just get live Alaskan King crab with tableside rigatoni and more—a breezy $1,000. Read our full review here for more luxe details.

Oni Ramen
Happiness resides at the bottom of a bowl of Kyushu-style tonkotsu ramen. It’s lush and dreamy, and it consists of rich pepper pork broth, pork belly, bamboo shoots, wood ear mushrooms, mustard greens, red ginger, green onions, black garlic oil, and an egg. We can’t confirm what RiRi ate, but we can whole-heartedly recommended this dish.

Bitter End
You can hear Bitter End before you see Bitter End, located on the corner of Elm and Malcolm X in Deep Ellum. If the throbbing bass of DJ-spun music doesn’t draw you in, the freshly shucked raw oysters and stiff drinks should.

Harlowe MXM
Ever-present tweeters note Rihanna’s essence graced the ever-bustling Deep Ellum gastropub. There, we don’t skip the lobster roll, made with Maine lobster and ungodly amount of butter. We also wouldn’t say no to a platter of oysters Rockefeller. And for dessert, the rum-soaked cake with rum anglaise is both a banger and an ode to the superstar’s native Barbados in the Caribbean, where the rum cake is a classic holiday dessert. —Rosin Saez

Correction: A previous version of this story misidentified Nini Nguyen. 

Related Articles

Image
Pop Culture

Dallas In Pop Culture: Luka Doncic and St. Vincent Dominate the Masses

Luka Doncic graces the cover of November's Sports Illustrated, and Lake Highlands' most famous alum.
Dallas Mavericks 2011 NBA championship
Pop Culture

Dallas In Pop Culture: How the Internet Celebrated Dirk Nowitzki’s Jersey Retirement

From the Golden State Warriors to foil-covered to go plates and tribute videos, here's how the rest of the world commemorated Dirk Nowitzki's legacy as a sports (and pop culture) icon.
Image
Pop Culture

Dallas In Pop Culture: Sha’Carri Richardson Reflects On Her Journey in Teen Vogue

Sha'Carri Richardson is Teen Vogue's latest cover girl and Dallas-raised Caleb Pierce takes the lead in The Fairly OddParents series.