all cowboys go to heaven

Meow Wolf Houston's dive bar will serve 'Hot Slop,' 'Hooch,' and more

Here's a first look inside Cowboix Hevvven.

Photo by Arturo Olmos

Surely one of the more intriguing aspects of Houston's new Meow Wolf installation is Cowboix Hevvven, the venue’s honky tonk-inspired dive bar.

Part of what makes Cowboix Hevvven so intriguing is that it’s the first time Meow Wolf has integrated its food and beverage offering into the venue’s overall aesthetic. Visitors will find characters, a pool table, and a jukebox of songs recorded for Meow Wolf as well as a full menu of dive bar-style dishes that fit the exhibit's theme of a radio station from the '70s.

Cole Wilson, the lead artist for Cowboix Hevvven, tells CultureMap he sees the bar as a sort of interdimensional purgatory. The bar’s characters are the same sort of figures someone might encounter before ascending to heaven.

“What is more parallel to purgatory than a dive,” Wilson tells CultureMap. “It kind of hit me at once. I was in a hot tub in Vegas when the universe struck me with lighting and I knew what I wanted to do next.”

Of course, it wouldn’t be a dive bar without a little food. Options include a fried bologna sandwich called the “Fried Malarky Sandwich,” Frito pie that’s called “Hot Slop;” and its vegan version called “Healthy Hot Slop.” Three hot dogs will be available: The Pickle Puppy (mustard, pickle spear, fried onions), The Greyhound, and The Dirty Dog, which is topped with chili and cheese.

“I love the idea of bringing some levity to the names of things,” Wilson says. “We’ve got a fried bologna sandwich. What’s another name for baloney, ‘malarkey,’ which is also a colloquialism in Texas.”

Beverage options include classic cocktails — listed on the menu “Hooch” — like a whiskey and cola (named Wiskey Cola), a “Vodka Soduh,” a gin and tonic, and a ranch water. Non-alcoholic, “Not Hooch” options include “Lemnade,” “Red Punch,” sodas, and iced tea (sweetened and unsweetened). In keeping with the dive bar theme, the bar will serve Lone Star, Miller High Life in pony bottles, and Saint Arnold’s Art Car IPA.

“The success to this menu is collaborative,” explains Justin Rink, Meow Wolf’s national director for food and beverage. “Same as art. Art is a collaboration in expression. When you’re planning the wedding of the century, you have a board with all these visions on there. We made a board of what makes a dive bar a dive bar. From that point, we talked through each specific thing. What could fit, what could work for the operational team.”

Cowboix Hevvven Meow Wolf jukebox Cowboix Hevvven has a jukebox stocked with songs written by lead artist Cole Wilson. Photo by Kate Russell

Wilson also collaborated with Texas musicians to stock Cowboix Hevvven’s jukebox. In addition to songs by both national and regional artists, Wilson wrote 30 originals that are inspired by a number of eras and genres. Working with a team of musicians, he wrote songs in the style of Hank Williams, 80s legends like Dolly Parton, and event alt-country favorites like Wilco.

“The vivacious, levity-loving dude that I am, I just cannot help but write stuff that’s total sad bastard music,” Wilson says. “I love Townes Van Zandt and John Prine, real songwriters’ songwriters. It was fun to go through the exercise of trying to write something through that filter.”

As Meow Wolf revealed last month, the Houston installation will be called Radio Tave — a riff on “radio wave.” Described in press materials as a radio station that’s been transported to another dimension, Meow Wolf visitors will be able to explore dozens of rooms filled with interactive elements such as hidden doors, paths, and portals.

Ahead of its opening on October 31, Meow Wolf released a preview commercial starring Houston hip hop artist Fat Tony. For tickets and more information, visit the Meow Wolf website.

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Chris Cusack explains

Houston bar owner speaks out about surprise arrest for health code violations

Photo by Sergio Trevino

Chris Cusack owns two locations of Betelgeuse Betelgeuse.

Certainly one of the most unusual interactions between a restaurant and City of Houston officials took place on Wednesday, May 6 when Betelgeuse Betelgeuse owner Chris Cusack was arrested for health code violations at his location on Washington Avenue.

News of the arrest spread quickly across social media over the weekend. Now, Cusack is ready to tell his side of the story.

Cusack, whose time operating restaurants in Houston goes back more than 15 years to Down House and its affiliated restaurants such as Hunky Dory and D&T Drive Inn, tells CultureMap the problem began on Monday, May 4 when a health department inspector came to Betelgeuse Betelgeuse and asked to see the restaurant’s grease trap.

The only problem is that location has never had a grease trap. Prior to becoming Betelgeuse Betelgeuse, it was Liberty Station, a pioneering bar in Houston’s craft beer and craft cocktail scenes. In the early days, Betelgeuse served food from a food truck. More recently, it prepares its food next door at The Bell and Crane. Cusack acknowledges he didn’t share this information with the inspector.

“Usually I’m a charmer with the health department, but I was a little defensive. She kept asking me. I said, ‘ma’am, we don’t make food here,’” he explains. “The tone wasn’t my finest moment, but there was no name calling or anything like that. She said, ‘where does the food come from?’ I said, ‘it doesn’t matter where it comes from. It’s produced in a commercial kitchen.’”

Cusack says he knew there would be a follow up, but he was shocked when the inspector returned two days later with more colleagues from the health department, TABC inspectors, and Houston Police Department officers.

“I got somewhere between 21 and 25 citations,” Cusack says about the return visit. He got dinged for everything from graffiti in the bathroom to a missing Harris County tax stamp on the photo booth he leases from a vendor (it has both State of Texas and City of Houston stamps, Cusack says).

One inspector told Cusack he needed a food dealer’s permit. He showed the inspector that a food dealer’s permit had been issued for the restaurant's address under the former food truck’s LLC but not to the LLC that operates Betelgeuse Betelgeuse. Cusack says he had renewed the food truck’s permit in March, but that wasn’t good enough for the inspector. In Cusack’s telling, he was arrested for not having the permit, since it was also flagged as missing in an inspection from October 2025. He's the only person he knows who has ever been arrested for a misdemeanor violation of the health code.

Cusack says he spent 21 hours in the Harris County Jail. When he got out, he says he was contacted by a more senior official within the Health Department. Once Cusack confirmed he owned both LLCs, he was told he could reopen. Both locations of Betelgeuse Betelgeuse have been operating normally since Friday, May 8.

Cusack maintains he never knew about the October 2025 inspection, which is why he renewed the food dealer’s permit for the food truck’s LLC rather than applying for one under Betelgeuse Betelgeuse’s LLC. “There’s no paper trail that shows I was given this information,” he says. “I did not get the email [from the Health Department].”

As for why things got so out of hand, Cusack theorizes he was a victim of Houston Mayor John Whitemire’s crack down on “reckless behavior” on Washington Avenue and stepped up enforcement on bars generally that led to the temporary closure of near northside cocktail bar Rabbit’s Got the Gun.

Cusack says he’s a “huge supporter” of efforts to reduce crimes like street racing, drug dealing, and sex trafficking along Washington and in its surrounding neighborhoods. Still, he feels targeting by the city for being impolite to a health inspector.

He plans to fight both the arrest and the citations in court. “I want the charges dropped, and I want it expunged completely from my record. That’s the first thing, and I’m going to try very hard to do it,” he says.

“That’s going to end up costing thousands of dollars just to deal with the sheer volume,” he adds.

CultureMap contacted Mayor Whitmire’s office. A representative said the mayor was not aware of the situation and has no comment on an open investigation.

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