Red Hook Tavern – Peter Luger's ghost on Van Brunt Street

Red Hook Tavern stands on Van Brunt Street, a few blocks from the piers that gave this Brooklyn waterfront village its name, in a room that feels borrowed from an older, smokier New York. It is the second restaurant from Billy Durney, the self-taught pitmaster who made his name at Hometown Bar-B-Que before turning, after years of planning, to the tavern culture of his own childhood. Pressed-tin ceilings, exposed brick and a handmade oak bar set the tone for a menu built around one unapologetic idea: a dry-aged burger worthy of the old-guard steakhouses Durney grew up idolising. It holds a Selected distinction in the MICHELIN Guide, the kind of recognition that rewards precision rather than spectacle, and it suits a place where the cooking is classic, the portions generous and the room usually full by the time the doors open at five.

01The room and the setting

The space Durney found on Van Brunt Street had been a liquor store for years before he got hold of it, and the restaurant still hangs the old neighbourhood liquor sign above its entrance. Inside, the look is turn-of-the-century New York rather than reclaimed-industrial Brooklyn: dark floral wallpaper, frosted-glass light fixtures and closely packed tables with a narrow ledge built for votive candles and wine bottles between diners. The oak bar was built by local artists Martina Crivella and Dallas Owens, and the antique glass fixtures overhead, including a set of 1890s lamps that once hung in the Manhattan steakhouse Prime Meats, give the dining room the patina of a place that has been here far longer than it has.

Guests arrive at an expansive bar with a brass footrest before being shown to tables, and the restaurant keeps a terrace for warmer months, along with counter seating for anyone happy to eat where the kitchen can see them.

02The chef and the owner

Billy Durney opened Hometown Bar-B-Que in Red Hook in 2013, the barbecue joint that made his reputation and earned him a James Beard nomination for Best Chef: NYC in 2019. Red Hook Tavern followed that same year, on 18 July, as his deliberate step away from smoke and into the register of the classic New York tavern — Peter Luger, Corner Bistro, McSorley's — that shaped his own idea of a great night out.

Insider tip

Open seven days; reservations release two weeks ahead, walk-ins welcome at the bar and counter.

The kitchen today is run by executive chef Bun Cheam, who has spent years shaping the menu around Durney's founding obsession: the burger. Cheam has described it bluntly as the engine of the whole restaurant, reckoning it accounts for the large majority of the kitchen's food sales on any given night.

03The cooking

The Dry-Aged Red Hook Tavern Burger is the dish people queue for, and Durney spent eight months developing the meat blend before settling on a Pat LaFrieda mix of dry-aged strip and chuck, built as a tribute to the burger he grew up eating at Peter Luger. A thick slice of white onion sits under the patty rather than over it, so the meat's heat softens the onion while keeping the bottom bun from going soggy, and the whole thing is finished simply with melted American cheese on a sesame bun.

Beyond the burger, the tavern menu runs through French Onion Soup under a dark, bubbling crust of Austrian Gruyère, a Romaine Wedge Salad with bleu cheese and applewood-smoked bacon, Country Ham Croquettes with aged white cheddar, and a 45-Day Dry-Aged Bone-In New York Strip for anyone after a full steakhouse detour. Seafood runs to PEI Mussels in a spicy 'nduja broth and a whole grilled branzino with salsa verde, while the pasta list stays short and handmade, from gnudi with English peas and morel to cavatelli with oxtail ragù.

04Wine and drinks

Durney's interest in natural wine runs deep: he and his team tasted around 600 bottles to arrive at the roughly 160-bottle list now on offer, with about fifteen available by the glass, leaning toward small European producers. The cocktail list keeps the tavern's homage theme going with drinks like the Dukes Martini, served freezer cold with amalfi lemon oil, and a Dirty Negroni built on olive leaf and salted plum, alongside a short, well-chosen beer list that runs from a tribute ale styled on McSorley's to Brooklyn-brewed pilsner.

05The neighbourhood

Red Hook itself remains one of the more isolated corners of Brooklyn, a former shipping district of cobblestones and warehouses that the subway doesn't quite reach, which only adds to the tavern's sense of being a destination rather than a passing-through spot. Durney's first restaurant, Hometown Bar-B-Que, is a short walk away on the same stretch, and the area around Van Brunt Street has filled in recent years with the kind of small, chef-driven openings that tend to follow a genuine draw.

06When to go and booking

In October 2026 the tavern is open seven days a week: dinner runs five to half past nine every night, with lunch added on Thursday through Sunday from noon to a quarter to three. Reservations are accepted for parties of up to eight, released two weeks ahead, while walk-ins are welcomed on a first-come, first-served basis — useful to know, since tables for the burger alone can be hard to come by on short notice.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.