Foo-Detour - Cattleman's Steakhouse

LAX  --> OKC is what my FB status message read on a recent Monday morning (and stayed up until Thursday afternoon since I often forget to change my status). So what brings me to Oklahoma City you ask? As previously mentioned, I work in television. Picture it – Hollywood, 2006….a young, fresh-faced whippersnapper just off the obligatory cross-country drive along Route 66 (I insisted we referred to it exclusively as the Mother Road) arrives in Los Angeles, the ‘Entertainment Capital of the World’ according to KEARTH 101.1. I was filled all the hopes and dreams of glitz and glamour.

Fast-forward four years and here we are I’m a PRODUCER…..of reality-tv. Now before you scoff, many unscripted television shows (the snootier way to say it) get more viewers than most of the NCIS:LACSI:NYL&O:SVU’s out there. Just because we don’t have half the craft services spreads the scripted kids do, doesn’t mean we don’t contribute to the American television landscape. Need I say, fist pump?

My current producing gig is on a pretty big primetime network show…let’s call it The Largest Person Who Comes in Last Place... My producer duties on this episode include a field shoot in Moore, Oklahoma, just outside of OKC.

Things you need to know about Moore - Walmart:Oklahoma::Donut Shops:Los Angeles, there are more Wal-Marts in a 5 mile radius of my hotel than schools…priorities people. Also, Moore is home to Toby Keith.

Apparently I am supposed to know who this Toby Keith is, but I don’t listen to much hip-hop music. Finally, in Oklahoma the corn is not as high as the elephant’s eye, I’d say it goes up to about his trunk. After checking into my hotel, which by the way looked like a cross between Ikea meets a West Hollywood nightclub that threw up turquoise…

I decided to venture off and rub elbows with some Oklahomians (?) at dinner. I moseyed (cause that’s what you do in OKC) on over this classic must-eat-at haunt called Cattleman’s Steakhouse.

The dimly lit restaurant looks like any other classic American steakhouse complete with dark-wood panels, leather vinyl booths and heavily trodden floral carpets. Adorning the walls were portraits of various cowboys and sheriff looking men. I probably should have recognized one of these heartland heroes, but to me they all looked like Wilford Brimley.

I was seated in the Non-Smoking section of the dining room (Smoking Section…really? I had a flashback to my local NJ Sizzler circa 1998). Billy Jack (Confirmed: real name) clad in a bowtie welcomed me and presented the menu. I settled on the Filet wrapped in bacon (natch) and gladly took up the offer to add-on the side of sautéed mushrooms.

With the order placed, I took off my hat (isn’t that customary in the heartland?) and spent some time taking in the atmosphere. I looked around the room and noticed the various sun-kissed couples donning cowboy hats idly chit-chatting about business on the ranch. How simple…how serene…how did this blog just turn into a Nicholas Sparks novel?

The food arrived and not soon enough, I was starting to get worried the four 300+ pound men in cutoff denim shirts and cowboy hats were getting uncomfortable with the guy dressed in American Apparel writing notes in the margin of his Details magazine about the experience.

Filet Wrapped in Bacon – Billy Jack had me cut into the meat to make sure ‘it was to my likin’. The pinkish-red center looked perfect and just the thought of taking that first bite sends a tingle to my taste buds as I write this. The only disappointment on the meat was the bacon (gasp!). The fatty slice just kind of flopped around the side and I actually ended up pulling it off and pushing it off to the side (double gasp! – I don’t even know who I am anymore).

The Fixin’s – Along with supper, steaks come with a side salad and I also got the sautéed mushrooms to boot, cowboy boot that is. The mushrooms were drenched in some sort of onion au-jous that could have almost doubled as a French onion soup. The mushrooms were so good, in retrospect I should have just poured them over the meat to create a harmony of Oklahoma flavors.  

OH – and then there was a bread roll…and tell me this bread roll isn’t the spitting image of Toad from Mario Brothers 3 on Super Nintendo.

By the time Billy Jack dropped off the check I was more stuffed than the bison head that hung over the bathroom door. After recapping the meal through email with Kelly and John, apparently I missed the must-see of the menu…lamb fries. So, the next time I’m in OKC I promise I’ll give you a full report on what lamb fries at Cattleman’s Steakhouse taste like. For now, you can find me at Wal-Mart picking up the latest album from Toby Keith…or is it Keith Urban?

Cattleman’s Steakhouse

1309 S. Agnew

Oklahoma City, OK 73108