Hotel Restaurant Drama

Chef drama: Power couple suddenly released from downtown hotel restaurant

Bryan Caswell Oxbow 7 construction Jennifer Caswell

Bryan and Jennifer Caswell are no longer affiliated with the Le Meridien hotel.

Courtesy photo

What happened at Oxbow 7? The question has been buzzing around Houston’s restaurant community since Friday’s news that Jennifer and Bryan Caswell had been “released” from their contract to manage the food and beverage operations at the Le Meridien hotel.

The revelation came as a huge surprise. Oxbow 7 had received rave reviews from a number of local publications. Many cited the high quality of the food that resulted from Bryan Caswell’s personal connection to the restaurant’s “elevated bayou cuisine” that reflected influences of his lifetime spent living and exploring the Gulf Coast.

Oxbow 7 served as a reminder of the acclaim Caswell earned when he opened Reef in 2007, including a Food & Wine Best New Chef award and James Beard Award nominations. It also seemed poised to change the way Houstonians think about hotel restaurants.

“This town has never really been a hotel restaurant town,” Bryan Caswell tells CultureMap. “Seeing Xochi and having it right down the street and having that location, we loved the location and we loved the building. We were really excited.”

Gary Prosterman, president and CEO of DSG, Inc, the company that owns the hotel, told the Chronicle that the Caswells wanted to focus on rebuilding Reef, which has been closed since suffering extensive water damage during Hurricane Harvey, but the couple disputes that claim.

“No, that’s not why,” Bryan Caswell tells CultureMap. “I mean obviously Reef is our focus. That’s always been our focus. Nothing changed from the beginning. We’re rebuilding it, but it doesn’t keep us from doing that job as well.”

Prosterman also suggested that changes needed to be made to speed up service. Again, Caswell says he was aware that, for example, eggs ordered for room service arrived cold. Having served as the chef at Bank by Jean-Georges at the Hotel Icon prior to Reef, Caswell says he knew that getting all of the pieces of the food and beverage operation to run smoothly would take some time, but things were improving.

“We raised things to them, and they raised things to us,” Caswell says. “Speed of service is always an issue. They raised it, and we make changes.”

Diners aren’t likely to notice any immediate changes to Oxbow 7’s menu, at least in the short term. Chef de cuisine Michael Hoffman, sous chef Sarah Schnitzer, and general manager Lauren Fernandez all remain in place.

So what really happened? DSG declined CultureMap’s request for additional comment, but Caswell notes that when DSG opened another Le Meridien in Tampa, Florida that it split with the restaurant group that operated the hotel’s restaurant within five months of opening. Both parties described that decision as amicable, but this separation clearly isn’t.

In both Tampa and Houston, DSG utilized an affiliated company named Maximum Hospitality to operate the hotel. The Caswells aren’t ready to speak on the record about any conflicts with Maximum, but Jennifer stated plainly that it’s her opinion that DSG is “in breach of the agreement” it signed with them.

Does that mean they’re considering filing a lawsuit?

“We are currently exploring that with our general counsel,” Bryan Caswell says.

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New York Times critic awards Houston restaurant 2 stars in glowing review

Courtesy of ChòpnBlọk

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Let’s just call 2025 the year of ChòpnBlọk. In a review published Tuesday, December 16, the New York Times has awarded the Houston restaurant two stars (“very good”).

Written by chief restaurant critic Tejal Rao, the review touts many of the same qualities that the Times already praised when it included ChòpnBlọk on its list of America’s 50 best restaurants.

Rao writes that she usually avoids restaurants that serve food in bowls, but she’s impressed by the way that chef-owner Ope Amosu has put a West African spin on the concept.

“For inspiration, Ope Amosu looked to the kind of chain restaurants that were built to scale, where flavors are often subdued to appeal to the broadest possible audience, focus-grouped to death. But the delight of ChòpnBlok is in its sure sense of self, its lively, multidimensional cooking and clear, delicious vision for modern food from the Black diaspora,” Rao writes.

She singles out specific dishes, including the Nigerian red stew with short rib, the Black Star bowl with shrimp, and the signature Motherland, made with chicken, greens, and plantains. “It’s utterly simple, but draws you in for more with the mouthwatering twang of not-too-much MSG — an international shortcut to building umami that tends to be used carefully, and layered with other forms,” she writes.

The review also touches on the way Amosu switched the restaurant from counter service to full service — described as “warm, informal, and quick with the jokes” — and his time working at Chipotle to learn the basics of the restaurant operations.

A two-star review is only the latest instance of ChòpnBlọk receiving national attention. In addition to the Times 50 best list, Esquire recently named it one of America’s best new restaurants. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Bib Gourmand designation for 2025. Amosu earned a semifinalist nomination for Best Chef: Texas in the 2025 James Beard Awards.

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