Fort Worth’s best restaurants if you’re visiting for the 2026 Stock Show & Rodeo
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- West Seventh restaurants with decades of service cater to Stock Show crowds.
- Chefs adapt menus and hours, offering steaks, fajitas and event-driven specials.
- Hotels and onsite eateries expand service; patrons choose fine dining or quick meals.
More than 20 years ago, chef Lanny Lancarte II bought a former 1930s duplex on West Seventh Street for a fine-dining restaurant.
“I heard all this growth was coming,” he said the other day.
“Twenty years later, it’s finally here.”
Another Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo, from Jan. 16 to Feb. 7, will fill flashy hotel rooms at the Michelin-ranked Bowie House or the Conde Nast best-in-Texas Crescent, as well as pricey restaurant tables at The Chumley House or Don Artemio. With the arrival of luxury boutique Forty Five Ten in Museum Place, the Cultural District is beginning to look like a small Uptown Dallas.
“They come for the new restaurants — then they find out about us,” said chef Mark Hitri of Paris 7th Restaurant Français, keeping the 40-year French dining legacy of two restaurants on “upper West Seventh.”
As a bass player in the popular 1990s Deep Ellum band Pop Poppins, Hitri learned that the more people talked about local music, the better it was for all musicians.
“It’s that way here,” he said. “The more restaurants that open, the more people talk about all of us.”
Chef Michael Thomson of Michaels Cuisine, the city’s oldest Southwestern restaurant, sees the same regulars every rodeo and horse show.
They want the same T-bone or quail, he said, “and they want to get in and get out.”
Lancarte, Hitri and Thomson have a combined 60 years of experience on West Seventh Street. They’ve served everyone from Dickies Arena rodeo cowboys to art museum patrons and sports fans, along with anyone else who might find the quiet end of West Seventh Street.
Michaels Cuisine
Thomson is in his 34th year serving beef tenderloin in ancho-bourbon sauce, pecan-smoked prime rib and orange-jalapeno quail.
His menu’s history goes back even farther.
The “Mac’s” salad is an updated version of a 1970s Fort Worth favorite. One Stock Show special is a 1-pound “M & M Steakhouse” T-bone griddled and topped with roasted garlic-herb oil, the way it was served for 60 years at a now-gone Stockyards dive.
Rodeo crowds pile in by 5 p.m. They race out in time for the 7:30 p.m. rodeo grand entry. But, he said, the regulars “aren’t in that big a hurry.”
“It’s a strange sight,” he said. “We get a completely full restaurant, then they go to the rodeo and it’s completely empty.”
Michaels is an insiders’ neighborhood steakhouse. Besides his Stock Show specials and a first-rate chicken-fried steak, Thomson always serves a $25 prime rib special all day Tuesdays, a generous $24 Cajun fried chicken platter Wednesdays and a $24 “backyard barbecue” charbroiled chipotle chicken platter Thursdays.
The restaurant draws a crowd for lunch and dinner Tuesdays through Fridays, including guests from the Bowie House who come looking for another Western restaurant besides the hotel’s Bricks & Horses.
Michaels opens at noon Tuesdays through Fridays and at 4 p.m. Saturdays. It stays open until mid-evening; 3413 W. Seventh St., 817-877-3413, michaelscuisine.com, reserve on tock.com.
Eat Fajitas/Righteous Foods
Lancarte is the gourmet chef in the Joe T. Garcia’s restaurant family. He opened a high-end “alta cocina” interior Mexico restaurant 20 years ago and eventually changed it to an organic-natural cafe and bar, Righteous Foods.
But he also runs a premium delivery kitchen, Eat Fajitas.
Now, the top-quality fajitas and margaritas share the Righteous dining room at night.
For the first time, Eat Fajitas will be served at dinner all through the Stock Show.
The fajitas have “high standards — all-natural chicken [priced for two, $38], shrimp [$42] and beef sirloin [$48], tenderized, with black beans cooked the healthful way,” Lancarte said.
The bar drinks include Himalayan sea-salt margaritas with organic tequila and agave nectar.
The dinner business is now about 40% fajitas, Lancarte said. By day, Righteous Foods serves a health-conscious menu of breakfasts, sandwiches and salads.
“We’re so close, we end up getting decent business from the Stock Show,” he said. Country singer Michael Martin Murphey comes in for the healthy menu, he said.
Righteous Foods is open weekdays at 8 a.m. and weekends at 9 a.m., and it remains open through dinner. Eat Fajitas serves at night Mondays through Saturdays; 3405 W. Seventh St., 817-850-9996, eatfajitas.com.
Paris 7th Restaurant Français
Hitri’s history on West Seventh Street goes back to 2010, but it’s complicated.
In 2018, founder Bernard Tronche moved the menu and dishes from his original restaurant, Saint-Émilion, three blocks east to a more elegant new restaurant, Paris 7th Restaurant Français. Tronche eventually retired and sold both restaurants. Hitri had been the chef at Saint-Émilion and came back to take over Paris 7th for a familiar crowd.
“We don’t get as many rodeo fans,” he said. “But we do get the horse owners and the people showing horses.
“They’re steak eaters. So, I need to make sure I have a lot of tenderloin Bordelaise.”
Paris 7th is known for beef bourguignon, Dover sole meunière, Hokkaido scallops and roasted duck. The chalkboard specials change nightly.
Paris 7th is open for dinner Wednesdays through Sundays but will close Jan. 17-22 for a break; 3324 W. Seventh St., 817-489-5300, paris7th.com, reserve on opentable.com.
Inside the Stock Show: Reata
Reata has two restaurants inside the Stock Show grounds, one in the exhibit hall and one in Will Rogers Coliseum.
● Reata at the Rodeo, 3400 Burnett Tandy Drive inside the Amon G. Carter Jr. Exhibits Hall, is a full-service restaurant open for lunch and dinner most days (check first) and for lunch Sundays.
The menu features steaks, chicken and lunch burgers along with Reata’s signature tenderloin tamales; 817-336-5766, reata.net/fwssr.
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● Reata at the Backstage Club, a former private club above the horse show arena in the old coliseum, is open for dinner Wednesdays through Fridays and lunch and dinner most Fridays and Saturdays, with changing hours on a few days. It serves steaks, chicken, brisket tacos and tenderloin tamales.
● The Pulido’s restaurants operate a Tex-Mex cafe, Pulido’s Rodeo Kitchen, in the Moncrief Building at the corner of Burnett Tandy Drive and Rip Johnson Drive. It serves enchilada dinners, tacos, quesadillas and margaritas.
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Eatzi’s Market & Bakery
Eatzi’s Market & Bakery, 1540 S. University Drive, is a grill, grab-and-go restaurant and cake bakery with wines and coffees.
It will celebrate its 30th anniversary Jan. 20, offering cake tastings and events.
Daily grill specials include steak or pork chops Mondays, brisket or salmon Tuesdays, chicken-fried steak or trout Wednesdays, burgers or pork loin Thursdays, catfish or tri-tip Fridays, brisket tacos Saturdays and meat loaf or fried chicken Sundays.
Eatzi’s is open for breakfast through dinner daily, with some food marked down to buy-one-get-one from 8:15 p.m. to the 8:30 closing; 817-945-9095, eatzis.com.
Rodeo specials
● Don Artemio Mexican Heritage, 3268 W. Seventh St., is offering a $69 three-course rodeo special featuring a choice of three entrees: salmon in green mole sauce, a filet or a chile hojaldrado (in pastry) with deconstructed tres leches cake; 817-470-1439, donartemio.us.
● Dos Mares, 3260 W. Seventh St., is offering a $59 rodeo special featuring a choice of fish Veracruz or skirt steak with deconstructed Key lime pie; 682-480-2143, dosmares.us.
● Bricks & Horses, 3700 Camp Bowie Blvd. inside the Bowie House hotel, will serve its regular breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner menus but will stay open later, seating diners until 10 p.m. nightly and offering the bar menu until midnight; 682-786-6688, bricksandhorses.com.
Nearby
● The Secret Garden Restaurant, 2601 Montgomery St. inside the Montgomery Street Antique Mall, is a lunch cafe and tea room with $9-$11 combos and sandwiches, plus salads and desserts.
Open for lunch daily, it’s popular among Stock Show families; 817-763-9787, montgomerystreetantiquemall.com/secretgardenrestaurant.html.
● Cafe Modern, 3200 Darnell St. inside the Modern Art Museum, has a new seasonal menu, It serves lunch and dinner Fridays, lunch Tuesdays through Thursdays, and lunch or brunch Saturdays and Sundays; 817-840-2157, themodern.org.
● Rodeo Goat, 2836 Bledsoe St., serves a wide variety of custom burgers, fries and sides; 817-877-4628, rodeogoat.com.
● Rex’s Bar & Grill, 1501 S. University Drive, is a new sports grill and bar with a happy hour all afternoon, chicken-fried steaks with jalapeño gravy, burgers, salads and a weekend brunch; 817-968-7397, rexsftw.com.
● For breakfasts, plate lunches or chicken-fried steak in an old-time Texas cafe seen on “Landman,” go to the 1949-vintage Montgomery Street Cafe, 2000 Montgomery St.
It’s open breakfast through lunch weekdays and breakfast on Saturdays; 817-731-8033, facebook.com/MontgomeryStreetCafe.
This story was originally published January 15, 2026 at 4:42 AM.
