R. J. Goodies opened three decades ago after owner Lori Cervantez’s parents, Norma and Robert Tyler, moved to Houston from Cincinnati in the ’80s and noticed a dearth of bakeries.

A lifetime baker, Cervantez’s mother thought Spring needed a bakery.

“We were used to being in Cincinnati with a bakery on every corner,” Cervantez said.

Cervantez helped her parents run the 30-year-old business, and while her parents are now deceased, the legacy lives on with the name. The bakery is named after her father, Robert James, and the second part of the name comes from what it sells.

Drawing from family recipes reworked to feed larger numbers, the restaurant began as a bakery and then added breakfast and lunch.

R. J. Goodies began as a six-table establishment on Theiss Mail Route Road, and later moved into the HEB shopping center at Louetta and Stuebner Airline roads. It has been in its present location on Stuebner Airline Road since 2013.

When she is not overseeing the business end of the eatery, Cervantez loves the creative part of her job—decorating the cakes and cookies with colorful lines of carefully placed icing.

“I love decorating homes and anything that’s artsy, so this gives me the ability to do that,” Cervantez said.

In addition to a variety of sandwiches, the restaurant serves potato bacon soup every day and rotates its daily soup offerings.

Weekly lunch specials give the cook a chance to explore different flavors, such as Tex-Mex dishes, including chicken quesadillas and charro beans, Cervantez said.

The week of Thanksgiving is one of the busiest times of the year. Although the shop is closed on Thanksgiving Day, pie orders are filled from Monday to Wednesday of that week and the line goes down the block, she said.

“We just appreciate being part of the community and all the support they’ve given us,” she said.