Cretia’s. The weird clubby place. Acme F&B. Now Henry’s Majestic.

The owners of Bread Winners Cafe & Bakery have taken over to try their luck with the space at the corner of McKinney and Monticello.  I’ll just say this: since their opening on October 21, Henry’s Majestic has some serious promise.

Their menu has something for everyone — oysters with pancetta to chocolate stout pudding.  The bf and I settled in for what I was told would be an awesome meal … and they weren’t lying.  We started with drinks (because … duh) and I opted to start out with an Old Fashioned (rye, orange oils, bitters, chile spiked maple).  It was strong and well balanced with just enough bite from the chile spiked maple to give it a bit of an edge.

After a few bites of their delicious food, I went for the Headless Manhattan (pumpkin infused whiskey, sweet vermouth, amaro, bitters, toasted pumpkin seed rim) and it was a nice surprise.  The pumpkin was incredibly subtle and the pumpkin seed rim was a fun touch.  (Who doesn’t love pumpkin and whiskey together, though!??!?!)

The last drink I went for was the suggestion of the bartender, the Dusk Till Dawn (mescal, banana, lemon, cilantro pineapple vanilla syrup, egg white).  It wasn’t for the faint of palate thanks to the mescal which gave it a serious kick of smokiness which is mellowed out by the fruit.  Thanks to the egg white, the texture is light to offset  the robust flavors.

The drink menu offers a selection of seasonal cocktails–both custom and on tap–by Alex Fletcher, formerly of Victor Tangos.  The beer list offers a nice mix between locals and some of the usuals on their 24 taps and a few bottles and cans.  The wine list is well thought out and apparently put together by the owners who are “winos” according to our waitress.  They’ll be changing out their drink menu each season, including their beer selections.

The rest of the evening we enjoyed some delicious food items from Chef Roe DiLeo (who you may see on Season 13 of ”Hell’s Kitchen”), including:

• Housemade Onion Dip | I actually wrote it my notes “holy f**k, I could bathe in this.”  While that’s probably not recommended, dipping their fresh cut potato chips in it totally is.
• Oysters Majestic | The bf and I were split on these.  I’m weird about textures, so that was probably my weirdness here.
• Maple Bourbon Meatballs | Yes … yes … yes.  You better get two orders, because these are kind of like crack.  The bourbon isn’t a shrinking violet in this dish … it’ll smack you in the face (in the best way possible) and it compliments the maple beautifully.
• Roasted Mushroom Arancini | These were delicious, but you have to make sure to utilize the vermouth cream that it comes with … it’s pivotal.
• Crystal Creek Rotisserie Half Chicken | This was the bf’s choice, and he chose well.  It was juice and tender, but had bones so it’s not a passive entree.
• Henry’s Morrow Spiked Burger | This burger … smells.like.heaven.  It’s juicy and flavorful and the bacon on it is perfectly crispy balancing out the texture and commanding attention that bacon sometimes loses on a pile of meat and toppings.
• Chocolate Stout Pudding with bourbon whipped cream | this may or may not have caused a little squabble between me and the bf over one of us getting carried away and eating more than our half.  (I won’t say which of us was going to town.  We’ll call it Stout Pudding Anonymous.)  The texture was velvety but substantial.