My wife and I are standing under the Cattlemen\u2019s sign everyone in our city knows and loves, its twinkling lights firing up North Main as they have for decades, that big fake cow just a few feet above our heads. Before going in, we\u2019re pausing for a moment while I try to remember the last time I was here. Twenty years? Thirty years? All I remember is I took my parents to dinner here, then we walked over to Billy Bob\u2019s to see a Willie Nelson concert. Yeah, must have been 30 years ago, now that I think about it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Matter of fact, that was my first and only time to visit Cattlemen\u2019s. It\u2019s funny, you live in this city your whole life, and you only visit Cattlemen\u2019s once? But, as I recall, the food and service were a little too rough around the edges for me, and I do like my edges rough sometimes. I think at that point, Cattlemen\u2019s had established itself as one of the city\u2019s premier tourist traps, not necessarily a place where locals go, and after our visit I knew chances would be slim that I\u2019d go back.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet here I am, 30 or so years later, about to walk into the restaurant reborn. I\u2019ll admit it: When word started circulating that Cattlemen\u2019s was getting a multimillion-dollar makeover at the hands of Taylor Sheridan<\/a>, I was a little apprehensive. I mean I love\u00a01883\u00a0and all, but Fort Worth has learned, sometimes the hard way, that when one of our beloved institutions gets \u201creimagined,\u201d its soul can be collateral damage. Whatever Cattlemen\u2019s of yesterday lacked, it most certainly made up for with soul. That I remember.\u00a0<\/p>\n So with a bit of trepidation, we walked in, expecting to mourn; instead, we were a bit shocked, a bit excited and pretty much floored. This wasn\u2019t the Cattlemen\u2019s we remembered \u2014 and I can\u2019t tell you how much of a good thing that is.\u00a0<\/p>\n Opened in 1947 in the heart of the Fort Worth Stockyards, Cattlemen\u2019s has always been more than a restaurant. Like so many of our other long-running culinary institutes, from Carshon\u2019s to Fred\u2019s to Joe T.\u2019s around the corner, it\u2019s a landmark, an entity stitched into the city\u2019s DNA like the Wrangler patch stitched into the jeans of everyone swirling around us as we\u2019re led to our table. Over the decades, it has fed ranchers and tourists, Stock Show regulars and politicians, locals who could order blindfolded, and out-of-towners bedazzled by cowboy culture. It has survived culinary trends, urban reinvention, a pandemic, and the slash-and-burn mentality that claims so many of our city\u2019s historic dining rooms. That alone makes its survival \u2014 and revival \u2014 worth celebrating.<\/p>\n The reno, we observed, doesn\u2019t erase the past so much as it frames it. Photographs of Stock Show cattle champions line the walls. Iron chandeliers hang overhead. Polished wood gleams. Booths upholstered in tooled leather beg for long meals of steaks and beer and rowdy conversations. Classy but approachable, with both out-of-towners and locals in mind, this is not a theme park version of Fort Worth, as I feared it might be; this is just Fort Worth all polished up like an old pair of boots that have many, many more miles to go.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cattlemen\u2019s second wind comes courtesy of Sheridan \u2014 writer, director, rancher, and now restaurateur \u2014 and partners Dan Schryer and David Glasser, who work under the SGS Holdings banner. Thanks to their room-by-room makeover, it looks better than it ever has, but it still feels unmistakably like Cattlemen\u2019s.<\/p>\n To your left as you walk in is the massive new patio, outfitted with a stage for live music, its own bar and plenty of seating. It will soon be accompanied by its own mini-restaurant, a smokehouse that\u2019ll serve sliders, barbecue, and other light bites. That\u2019ll open in the next month or so, I\u2019m told, when spring\/summer start to roll in. A year ago, this patio was a parking lot.\u00a0<\/p>\n Below us is the already-famous, soon-to-open private club, Cattlemen\u2019s Club, another new addition. It\u2019s in the basement of the restaurant, out of sight, except for the stanchion-blocked entrance visible in the lobby with an illuminated \u201cC\u201d above it. Did you see the third episode of Season 2 of\u00a0\u201cLandman,\u201d <\/a>the one where Billy Bob Thornton\u2019s character socked that lawyer on the head with a beer bottle? Filmed right here.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The kitchen, though, is where Cattlemen\u2019s rebirth is truly evident.\u00a0<\/p>\n On our first visit back, we ordered the 14-ounce New York strip sourced from the Four Sixes Ranch in Guthrie \u2014 now one of Sheridan\u2019s homes. Cooked over an open charcoal fire at one of two dining room grill stations, inches away from diners, the steak arrived with a deep, blackened crust, simple seasoning, and a clean, beefy flavor that made me forget the last steak I had here<\/a>, all those years ago. Not that I remember it anyway.<\/p>\n That leap in quality is thanks to newly hired executive chef Theodore Tom<\/a>, formerly of the known SW Steakhouse at the Wynn Las Vegas. Tom had previously collaborated with the 6666 Ranch on events in Vegas, and as word spread that Cattlemen\u2019s Steakhouse was undergoing a major renovation under new ownership, he put two and two together. \u201cWhen I learned that Taylor Sheridan and David Glasser were behind the project, my interest was immediately piqued,\u201d Tom says. \u201cThe more I heard about their vision for a refined, elevated steakhouse in the Stockyards, the more I felt drawn to it.\u201d<\/p>\n Tom\u2019s path to Fort Worth \u2014 and to this kitchen \u2014 wasn\u2019t exactly linear.<\/p>\n \u201cEven though I loved cooking from a young age, I didn\u2019t immediately pursue a culinary path,\u201d says Tom, who grew up in Denver. \u201cMy first career was in the music industry, a world that taught me discipline, artistry, and the power of storytelling.\u201d<\/p>\n That early detour, he says, shaped the way he approaches food now. \u201cAfter several years, I felt a pull toward something more hands-on and expressive,\u201d he says. \u201cThat shift led me into the kitchen, where I began my culinary journey as a line cook.\u201d Through what he describes as \u201chard work, determination, and a genuine love for the process,\u201d Tom worked his way up in one of the most demanding culinary environments in the country: Vegas.\u00a0<\/p>\n After more than 15 years at the Wynn, Tom and his wife felt it was time for something new. \u201cWynn had been a defining part of my career, but I felt ready for a fresh challenge, something that would allow me to grow and help shape a restaurant from the ground up,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n Tom\u2019s first visit to Fort Worth came in April 2025, and it sealed the deal, he says. \u201cI had never been to the city before, and from the moment I arrived, I was struck by the strong sense of community and the genuine character of the people,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n Taking the reins of a kitchen with nearly eight decades of history hasn\u2019t been lost on him. \u201cStepping into a kitchen that means so much to so many people isn\u2019t something I take lightly,\u201d he says. \u201cRather than feeling pressure, I see the scrutiny as a responsibility. I\u2019m honored to take the reins of such an iconic establishment, and my goal has been to create a menu that feels contemporary and elevated while still honoring [Cattlemen\u2019s] classics.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n To achieve that goal, he made several updates and edits to what was once a fairly sprawling menu. Now, the menu is tight and focused, with, obviously, a major emphasis on the steaks.<\/p>\n On our second visit, a media dinner, we tried the 32-ounce dry-aged tomahawk chop, beautifully cooked medium rare, presented sliced on a carving board. A pronounced sear and well-formed crust gave way to evenly cooked meat with simple salt and pepper seasoning, the kind of execution that allows the quality of the beef to shine. On the side came pods of fresh garlic and a ramekin of housemade whiskey shoyu sauce, the latter of which was appreciated but hardly needed; as good as the sauce was, the steak was fantastic on its own.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cattlemen\u2019s revamped steak lineup also includes a 20-ounce cowboy bone-in rib-eye from Bosque Ranch in Texas, joined by a 14-ounce New York strip from the 6666 Ranch, the same place from which the tomahawk hails. Additional Texas offerings include the Trail Boss Favorite 14-ounce rib-eye from Bosque Ranch and a 10-ounce American Wagyu skirt steak from Rosewood Ranch.\u00a0<\/p>\n The menu also features several Black Angus cuts, such as the 32-ounce Cattlemen\u2019s porterhouse, a 20-ounce Ranch Boss T-bone, and a 16-ounce bone-in New York strip, all sourced from Dodge City, Kansas. Center-cut filet mignon, offered in 7- and 10-ounce portions, comes from West River Ranch in South Dakota, while a 10-ounce Stockman\u2019s sirloin from Lime Springs, Iowa, rounds out the lineup.<\/p>\n