This is quite a story about the 2 year road back for Bryan Caswell and REEF... Can't wait to try it out this weekend!
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/entertainment/restaurants-bars/article/Bryan-Caswell-reef-reopen-seafood-14096191.phpBryan Caswell's long, rocky road to reopening ReefThe reopening of Bryan Caswell's Reef could be described as a triumphant return to the dining scene by one of Houston's most celebrated chefs after his restaurant was damaged from Hurricane Harvey. If only it were that simple.
Why it took so long for Reef to get back in business is a question that doesn't have an easy answer, Caswell said. "A man with a good sense of humor would have called it a comedy of errors," he said.
It has been nearly two years "a year and three quarters," Caswell is quick to clarify since he has cooked at Reef. The Gulf-seafood restaurant he opened in June 2007 and that brought national acclaim to Houston shuttered in the aftermath of Harvey when water entered the Midtown restaurant through the roof.
Although Caswell's long absence from the dining arena was broken by a brief and rocky stint at downtown's Le Meridien hotel, among his setbacks while Reef languished, he was counting the days until he could get back into his own kitchen.
For one who was an early champion of Gulf bycatch and a poster boy for the golden new age of Houston dining, the wait was agonizing, he said.
Now the restaurant at 2600 Travis has been open for more than a month, first serving lunch out of its adjacent 3rd Bar lounge. The dining room a handsome reimagining of the original, light-filled space with its minimal but chic design is now open for lunch and dinner. Reef is back in play.
And there's a sense of immediacy in the Reef kitchen these days. The oysters, both from Galveston Bay as well as Canada and New York's Long Island Sound, are iced and ready. A new menu boasts creative dishes such as snapper carpaccio with grilled watermelon; grilled octopus with house-made chorizo and sour orange relish; and soft-shell blue crab tempura with a raw slaw of butternut squash dressed in "Viet-Tex" flavors. One of Caswell's new signatures a dish called Crab Fat & Dough, inspired by a fishing trip off Andros Island in the Bahamas is already a social-media star.
One could say the "old Bryan" is back. For Reef fans, it's that direct. For those in the Houston restaurant community who have followed the chef's career, it's more complicated.
Early daysCaswell's story is one of a Houston boy who made good. His road to chefdom was circuitous, but once he got into the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, N.Y. (he's a 1999 graduate), there was no stopping him.
He landed an internship at a Michelin-rated restaurant in Barcelona, Spain, followed by apprenticeships with New York greats: Charlie Palmer at Aureole, Alfred Portale at Gotham Bar and Grill, Wayne Nish at March. And then a long association with superchef Jean-Georges Vongerichten who, after grooming Caswell at his flagship restaurant in New York, sent him to open Jean-Georges outposts in Bangkok, Hong Kong and the Bahamas.
He also tapped Caswell for Bank in the Hotel Icon, which opened just before the Super Bowl in 2004. It was the hometown son's introduction to the Houston dining scene and the place where he met Bank manager and hospitality veteran Bill Floyd. After a few years at Bank, they left to open their own restaurant focused on Gulf Coast catch flavored with Houston's multicultural sensibilities.
Reef was a hit from the start, resonating with foodies canvasing Houston's newly hip restaurant scene. National attention came quickly. Bon Appetit named Reef Best Seafood Restaurant in 2009, the same year that Food & Wine included Caswell in the class of America's Best New Chefs. The next year Caswell was a featured contestant on Season 3 of Food Network's "The Next Iron Chef." In 2010, Caswell was nominated as Best Chef Southwest for the James Beard Awards, considered the Oscars of the food world. He repeated a nomination again in 2011.
The Caswell-Floyd partnership eventually yielded additional fruit: Little Bigs, El Real Tex-Mex Caf and Jackson Street BBQ.
The duo also was set to co-star in one of 2017's big openings: two side-by-side restaurants owned by Astros owner Jim Crane in the 500 Crawford apartment building across the street from Minute Maid Park. But before the restaurants opened, Caswell was out of the picture: He parted ways with Crane and Floyd by mutual agreement. Then Floyd opened the high-profile Potente and Osso & Kristalla in early 2017, where he remains partner/general manager.
Only months later, Hurricane Harvey struck. The next month, Caswell made the decision to close Little Bigs.
"When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it--always."
Mahatma Gandhi
