Four doors down from the Creole café that made the family’s name, the Dubuclets put USDA Prime beef on white tablecloths.
Chef Tanya Dubuclet owns and operates Neyow’s XL at 3336 Bienville Street, next to Neyow’s Creole Cafe at 3332. The café came first, grown out of the suppers she cooked for neighbors after Hurricane Katrina using her grandmother’s recipes. The steakhouse arrived later as the formal counterpart, aimed at the occasions that call for a reservation and a jacket.
The steak list stays short and serious. Every cut is USDA Prime certified. Filet mignon runs $50 for an eight-ounce petite and $60 for the eleven-ounce, served with bearnaise or au poivre. A sixteen-ounce ribeye also goes for $60 with maître d’ butter. The Chateaubriand center cut, built for two, lands at $99, and a 32-ounce tomahawk tops the board at $120. A rack of lamb cut into chops comes with a Creole mustard and garlic parmesan crust.
Seafood gets equal footing, which makes sense in this city. Red snapper, surf and turf, and seared salmon fill the center of the menu. The XL Over the Top Extravaganza piles fried red snapper, shrimp, oysters, and a jumbo lump crab cake onto one plate for $110. Starters cover chargrilled oysters, fried lobster tail, jumbo crab cake, hot crab dip, pork belly bites, and a Creole filé gumbo garnished with hot sausage, smoked sausage, shrimp, and crab.
The sides are where Tanya’s hand shows most clearly. She oversees them, and the sweet potato soufflé has drawn the loudest praise, described by one writer as grandmother cooking executed with professional technique and a crumb topping worth eating on its own. Seafood cornbread, crawfish mac and cheese, Yukon gold mashed potatoes, asparagus, and pommes fritters round out the list at $11 to $12 each.
Sunday brunch is its own menu. Steak and eggs, crab cakes and eggs, a seafood omelet with shrimp, crab, and crawfish tails under Creole sauce, bananas Foster French toast, sweet potato pancakes, and shrimp and grits all appear, most in the mid-twenties.
The bar leans theatrical. Standard pours include a Neyow’s 75 and Tanya’s Sweet Tea Lemon Drop in the low teens. Above those sit oversized shareable versions built for a table, with an XL Lemon Drop at $60, an XL Mimosa at $80, and an XL French 75 at $125. A house Hurricane arrives carrying seven shots of cane rum. The cocktail list also includes a Neapolitan Mule, which nods to the dog breed that reportedly gave the family business its name.
Hours run short and late. The dining room opens Thursday from 5 to 9 p.m., Friday and Saturday from 5 to 11 p.m., and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. It closes Monday through Wednesday. The phone is (504) 503-1081.
Four nights a week is a narrow window for a steakhouse, so anyone hoping to compare the soufflé against the hype should plan around a Thursday through Sunday trip.
