The Room
B&B Butchers opened on Washington Avenue in 2015 — Benjamin Berg (formerly of New York's Del Frisco's group) building Houston's most-architecturally-ambitious modern steakhouse. The two-floor dining room runs a butcher case at the front of the ground floor (a working retail butcher operation) and a formal dining room and bar on the second floor.
The butcher case is the room's design centrepiece. Beef is dry-aged on premise in a glass-walled aging room visible from the dining room. The Houston Press has held B&B Butchers in its top-five steakhouse rankings every year of operation. The Wine Spectator awarded the room its Award of Excellence.
The Food
USDA Prime, dry-aged on premise. The 60-day-aged ribeye is the menu's calling card. The dry-aged tomahawk for two is the order for a celebratory four-top. The Wagyu programme runs at multiple tiers — American Wagyu, A5 Miyazaki on the upper end. The seafood tower at $95 is the order at the bar.
Wine programme is one of Texas' most-considered American-wine lists, weighted toward California Cabernet. Cocktails run the steakhouse standard — a working Manhattan, a properly-stirred Old-Fashioned. Service is the New York-steakhouse brigade book Berg trained in.
Best Occasion Fit
Close a Deal: B&B Butchers is the Washington-Ave deal-dinner address for the meeting that does not need a chain steakhouse's brand visibility. The booth tables on the second floor are quiet, the wine programme is the closer, and the working butcher case at the front is the conversation-starter.
Team Dinner: The private dining rooms hold groups of twelve to thirty and the kitchen will run a set steakhouse menu — seafood opening, ribeye centrepiece, sides, dessert — that the corporate dinner needs without negotiation.
Birthday: Birthdays at B&B Butchers are quiet, dry-aged-led, candle-on-the-cake affairs the room handles with the practiced ease of a steakhouse-veteran operation.