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If you count steak and wine as a few of your favorite things, add Bern’s to your bucket list. There will be slabs of beef cut from the short loin and tenderloin, potatoes in myriad guises, and outlandish desserts for which no one saves room. Eating at a chophouse is America’s most universal ritual for indulgence. We go to broker deals or to celebrate and live large, even if we wince at the credit card receipt the next morning.
All reservations require a credit card to hold the reservation at the time of booking
It even features sushi– not as a gimmick, but another way to showcase this restaurant’s fine seafood and tenderloin. There is a staggering array of dessert wines, fortified wines and rare whiskies by the glass, with many tasting flight options. And it is like two different superb dining out experiences wrapped into one great meal, and again, something you just cannot do at other top steakhouses. A signature part of what makes Bern’s Bern’s is the dessert course, and some locals come just for it. After dinner, guests are treated to a tour of the kitchen, the wine cellar and an optional table at the Harry Waugh dessert room upstairs.
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If your requested date or time is not available, you are welcome to check back periodically either online or by phone, however due to the volume of requests, we do not have a call back/waiting list. TheCoolist recently visited Bern’s Steak House in Tampa, Florida to experience it for ourselves, and to see if this culinary institution can live up to its lofty acclaim. An auto accident forced Bern to retire in 1993 (he died in 2002); Bern and Gert’s son, David, took over the business. David, proving his own entrepreneurial know-how, expanded on the brand by opening a second and more casual restaurant, Sidebern’s, in 1996. It was recently remodeled and renamed Haven, focusing on small plates and a extensive cheese program. And in 2013 he opened the Epicurean hotel — with a cooking classroom and an eclectic American restaurant called Elevage — right across the street from Bern’s.
For Retro Decadence, Bern’s Steak House in Tampa Still Delivers
And by dessert time, after sighing over macadamia ice cream made from a recipe perfected decades ago, it’s clear that customers keep filling these baroque rooms nightly for reasons beyond nostalgia or habit. It is still family owned (Bern and Gert’s son), and clearly a passion project. I will absolutely eat there any time I go to Tampa, I may go back to Tampa sooner just to eat there.
Somehow I managed my glass of 1977 D’Oliveiras Bual Madeira much more successfully. All the ordering may sound tedious, but an elegant, ceremonious rhythm governs the dining rooms. A Delmonico (aka ribeye) afforded the classic marbled pleasure, but I slightly preferred the porterhouse, which includes both filet and New York strip sections. The aging sharpened the meat’s individual qualities; the filet was taut rather than flabby and the strip, while not quite reaching blue-cheese funkiness, expressed fathoms of mineral tang.
Bern’s Restaurant In Tampa Is One Of The World’s Best Steakhouses
The menu provides a helpful guide to the different cuts of steak, the sizes available and options for preparation. We opted for a 2″ thick Special Chateaubriand, dry-aged for seven weeks and prepared medium rare. If this cut is new to you, think of the Chateaubriand as a larger Filet Mignon, cooked on its side.
The dessert room was added in 1985, featuring 48 private dining booths built into large redwood wine casks. Three pages of desserts and an extra page of coffee options joins a 39 pages of wine and spirits. This includes ice wines, ports, cognacs, cordials and more, all set to pair up with handmade chocolate treats and other desserts of a wide variety. But the heart of the meal starts with USDA Prime steaks, dry-aged at least 45-days (which is extra generous in the industry) and cut in house, something only a handful of the best steakhouses do. But what almost no other top steakhouses do is offer you anything with your steak. These places are typically expensive and very much a la carte.
For Retro Decadence, Bern’s Steak House in Tampa Still Delivers
The staff, who train for months before manning the floor, stayed doting and engaged no matter who was drinking what. In addition to the Prime standards, they offer Japanese wagyu and grass fed beef from specialty ranches as well as the now trendy ultra-aged option, 100-days. Besides steak there is lamb, quail, chicken and plenty of seafood. Dessert is a very special thing at Bern's, which also offers an incredible array of dessert wines, ...
Our favorite was the 1975 Chateau Du Pape from the Rhone region of France. It was a full-bodied, spicy red with visible sediment that gave it an orange rim, almost bloody in color. The surprise is that a wine like this can be affordable at Bern’s. A five ounce pour of the 1975 Chateau Du Pape would run $14.95 on today’s menu. As noted above, however, even the most expensive taste can be satisfied from a wine menu like this. It boasts a collection of wine larger than any other restaurant in the world, currently housing nearly 600,000 bottles in its cellar.
Bern's Restaurant In Tampa Is One Of The World's Best Steakhouses - Forbes
Bern's Restaurant In Tampa Is One Of The World's Best Steakhouses.
Posted: Tue, 21 Mar 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
All the city’s essential spots for seafood platters, steaks, Cubans, and more. There are a handful of eateries so notable I feel like when I travel to the cities they are in I absolutely have to eat there or it’s a wasted culinary trip. Other major holiday hours vary; please call Bern’s for more information. We recommend making reservations well in advance of your visit and we accept reservations only for the current month and the subsequent two months.
While our steak was prepared, we enjoyed the Bern’s Spicy Seared Tuna appetizer, which includes shiitake scallion “firecrackers”, green papaya salad and a spicy mango coulis. This was followed by Bern’s soup trio, including a French Onion soup which had been cooking for over 24 hours, a rich Lobster Bisque and a cool Vichyssoise. Bern’s real beauty — meticulously cooked steaks, debonair service, and, best of all, the deepest restaurant wine cellar in the U.S. — reveals itself soon after you’re ushered to a table in slightly more demure surroundings.
All are grilled over natural hardwood charcoal, and for those who prefer rare or medium rare, the menu suggests two people splitting one thicker steak will work out better than two thinner ones totaling the same weight. You could not ask for more information and it is very useful and may well lead you to make a great decision you might have overlooked. Bern Laxer was a World War II vet and passionate gardener who visited his aunt in Tampa with his new bride, Gert, and never left. While gardening and producing a gardening newsletter he and his wife opened a small luncheonette which served juice, coffee and cold sandwiches. It was a hit and soon they eventually added hot breakfast and lunch. All of this was in the early Fifties, long before anyone had coined the terms “farm to table” or “localvore,” but from the beginning, Bern and Gert emphasized the best ingredients possible including fresh veggies and fruit from his own gardens.
Bern was a shrewd tinkerer who nurtured obsessions and found ways to incorporate his fixations into the steakhouse — particularly when it came to wine. He purchased so many cases that he eventually bought warehouse space in the neighborhood for storage. Bern’s exists in its own west Florida dimension, an icon of eccentricity and excellence.
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