Today a Walgreens, this was the home of one of my family's favorite places to eat in the 1990s, Confucius Chinese Cuisine (2322 Texas Avenue South). In older versions of this page, I provided two links comparing the 1995 aerial to the 2011 aerial. You can see the same thing with Historic Aerials or a copy of Google Earth (just search for the address).
While I sadly do not have a picture for Confucius Chinese Cuisine (and I did look, though buried on Project HOLD you can see the sign, however, I can't find it either), it was housed in a building at the corner of Brentwood and Texas Avenue. I still remember how cool it looked on the inside and out. It had a curved Chinese-style roof, the sign had one word in orange, one in green, and one in red. And those were lit up at night. I don't know what the history of it was. All I know was that it was open in 1989 but the building pre-dating it for a few years courtesy of an even older Chinese restaurant called "Jade Garden".
Inside, to the right you had the restrooms, a mural was toward the front, with what appeared to be a crowd of tiny Buddhas playing, and the décor was mostly red and gold, with the aquarium bubbling in the background (complete with an eel that never became a dish).
It was my family's go-to place for Sunday after-church dinners. The buffet was a single line with some really good egg rolls but I don't know if it was good or if I just thought so because I was young and didn't know what good food tasted like (it was markedly better than the old Chinese buffets in town following its closure, which admittedly isn't saying much). I seem to remember it closing a bit later than it actually did: Brazos CAD lists the Walgreens replacing it was built in 2001, and the deed changed hands from restaurant owner Jimmy Chang in early 2001 (though I do remember it was in spring), indicating it closed then. Referring to Jade Garden (as it was called in 1984, likely not built too long prior to that), it appears based on deed info that it changed names and ownership later. In 1982, the deed was transferred to Kwan and Helen Chui, then to Confucius Chinese Cuisine in 1993 (though the restaurant had that name by the time) until Jimmy Chang in 1995, which indicates that Jade Garden changed names before it changed hands.
I suppose it's better that the restaurant closed instead of selling out to new management: it never saves restaurants, just leaves a "bad taste" in people's memories of how good the food was. Interestingly, throughout the entire restaurant's "career", there was Imperial Chinese Restaurant, which moved there sometime between 1993 and 1995 (it was in the place where Wolfies was, which was Ninfa's by '95) just two doors down at Brazos Square. This one had declined from its early days, but outlasted Confucius Chinese Cuisine. Between them was College Station Pawn (2316 Texas Avenue South). The pawn shop and the empty Confucius Chinese Cuisine were demolished, with the pawn shop moving to a space at Manuel and Texas. After Imperial succumbed, the pawn shop moved back to the place where Imperial was. The restaurant closed within a few years of the Brentwood stoplight being added, too.
UPDATE 11-05-2020: Clarified previous name and date. Previously updated February 2019 to account for more accurate closing date, revisions in writing, and cutting out Brazos Square info.
