MML Hospitality will present its revival of Austin history The Driskill Grill and Bar today (Monday, May 18), with a deep focus on Texas beef alongside the culinary sensibilities of chef April Bloomfield.
“It always comes back to what’s in Austin, what’s the market,” MML founder Larry McGuire tells the Observer. “It seems like the capital of Texas should have an independent, big, badass steakhouse. It’s never had that. We’ve wanted to do that for a long time.”
“Getting Texas beef was the No. 1 priority,” Bloomfield told the Observer.
So in a restaurant that started in 1930, inside a hotel that started in 1886, the Driskill Grill serves. Dean & Peeler beef raised, finished and dry-aged in Texas while Bloomfield nods to everything from New York steakhouses to its British culinary roots to a recent trip to Egypt.
“It’s really about taking a chef-driven approach to it, where you just take the way we think about menus and seasonality and produce it and apply it to the steakhouse model,” McGuire said. “I think April is the right person to do that because she’s known for cooking meat, but she’s also amazing with vegetables and unexpected flavors.”
For Bloomfield’s version of steakhouse bacon, he rubs the cured bacon with dried Mexican chiles, sugar and salt, before smoking it and heating it up.
“You get a kiss of char, a sweet caramelization,” Bloomfield tells the Observer. Then, to complement the sweet, smoky, salty bacon, “We did a charred green tomato cake with lots of pickled onions,” adds Bloomfield.
Like New York’s Keens, McGuire’s favorite steakhouse, Driskill Grill serves its steak with roasted red peppers. The prime rib, on the other hand, is carved at the table and comes with Yorkshire pudding.
“You go to a restaurant because you want to feel good,” says Bloomfield, who joined MML Hospitality as executive chef in 2025 to put his stamp on more restaurants. “There’s nothing better than having someone come over to cut a 14-ounce piece of prime rib.”
Bloomfield and Driskill Grill and Bar executive chef Nick Erven collaborated on a menu where side dishes are as chef-driven as main courses.
“Being from England, I love potatoes,” Bloomfield said. “And we have three kinds of potatoes.”
There are house fries, twice-baked potatoes with cacio e pepe crumbles and mashed potatoes that are baked together with hot milk, cream and butter, then slathered in chive butter.
Besides potatoes, side dishes include mashed peas and mint poblano pesto. An okra stew with tomatoes sounds like a Southern classic, but it was inspired by a trip Bloomfield took to Egypt, where he “was blown away by the okra they made there.” The okra-and-tomato dish at Driskill Grill is a stew of slow-cooked onions, lemon zest, lime juice, garlic, cumin, coriander and chiles.
“It’s tense and bitter,” Bloomfield said. “It’s nice to have something simple next to beef.”
Driskill Grill’s creamed spinach is made with plenty of Taleggio cream, along with Parmesan, basil, braised lemon zest, garlic, thyme and black peppercorns, and is finished with lemon juice for extra brightness.
“We’ve definitely made a menu that’s familiar but slightly updated,” said Bloomfield.
Guests who visit The Driskill Bar can order from the entire steakhouse menu, and Bloomfield serves burgers and other bar snacks.
“There’s nothing better than sitting at a bar, drinking a cocktail and eating a big fat steak or a good burger,” says Bloomfield. “I think that’s a good thing to do.”
Along with 24-ounce strips and 16-eye Akaushi wagyu on the menu, there’s elegance everywhere at the Driskill Grill, with old photos, Texas art, taxidermy and a history of A-list guests.
“The theory is that LBJ and Lady Bird had their first date at the Grill,” McGuire said. “There’s all this amazing photography and all these events that have happened in the space. I’ve wanted to do a steakhouse interior for a long time. We completely tricked out the interior with leather and beautiful materials and big, comfortable booths. It’s like a fever dream of what we would like the steakhouse to be. We have a bar room with a big new bar, and we ended up cutting out like wood glass and a lot of decorative elements. a top-of-the-line panel We were able to do certain layers.
McGuire remembers the Driskill Grill from his youth, when it was a fine traditional restaurant. He is excited about reimagining the space for the next generation, in the first restaurant where he has an in-house dry aging system, while continuing to be inspired by the past.
“I was always spending time in New York and eating at Peter Luger and Keens, and I was like, ‘Why isn’t this 100-year-old steakhouse in Austin?'” McGuire said. “Now we’re going to do it.”
The Driskill Grill & Bar is located at 117 E. 7th St., Austin, Texas 78701. The Driskill Grill will be open for dinner seven days a week from 4:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. and for lunch Thursday-Sunday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. 11 am to 1 am
