The Best Tableside Service In Houston, Ranked - Houston - The Infatuation (2025)

Tableside service has always been a thing in Houston. But lately, elaborate restaurant showmanship is everywhere. From old-school Italian restaurants to lazy Susan Chinatown spots, Houston restaurants love to get experiential. But not all of those are worth the extra price tag. We ranked these tableside services from the most impressive to the least necessary so you know where to go when you want to be a little extra.

THE SPOTS

Dish: Salt-Baked Shrimp

There is no other dish in Houston like the salt-baked shrimp from Fung’s Kitchen. It features so much pomp and circumstance, like a massive guerdon cart with two big burners that get parked tableside. The intoxicating smell of roasting rock salt makes everyone in the restaurant stop and stare as if they will soon levitate after the wafting scent like a cartoon character. And, of course, the delicate transfer of thick, coral-red spot prawns into the scorching hot wok and the spooning of rock salt, like feeding a sauna. The delicate, sweet result combined with the charred salt and pepper scent tastes singular, as if dreamed up by Fung’s for you alone.

Dish: Tableside Boulevardiers

Tony’s Restaurant is known for its at-the-table service. Like a salt-baked snapper flambeed with a Vegas magician’s flair, or the basketball-sized souffle neatly trimmed for each diner on a nearby cart. Tony’s wants you to feel seen, and the special boulevardier service is the best way to be the center of attention. Wheeled out on a golden trolley complete with a golden ice bucket and spoon, the resulting cocktail serves two. It’s stirred together as a server recounts the aging process of Russel Reserve 13-year bourbon or the original cochineal insect dye in Campari until a masterful (and boozy) cocktail appears.

Dish: Caesar Salad

As an over-the-top steakhouse, the lifeblood of Turner’s Cut in River Oaks is tableside service. The pinnacle of which is the caesar salad. Your server makes it tableside in a wide wooden bowl that looks like it was handed down from the originator of caesar salad himself. Golden olive oil and smashed garlic combine into a tart salad dressing from what feels like thin air. It’s then split with the care of transferring sweating dynamite into cold bowls for everyone at the table. It’s excellent, so much so that we would pay for seven servings just to experience it over and over again. This should be the one thing you get at Turner’s Cut.

Dish: Queso Flameado

Most places serve queso flameado with a side of tortillas you can dip and cheese-pull yourself. Not Ninfa’s On Navigation. They take the spectacle of hot cheese even further. First, a server folds in peppers, mushrooms, and chorizo in front of you, then, in a stroke of Tex-Mex genius, the bubbling hot queso is divided, rolled into fresh flour tortillas, and plated before you can even blink. The entire presentation is so fast that by the time you grab one of the magma-hot tortillas, the cheese still oozes out. It’s excessive and wholly unnecessary, but it tastes so good you’ll probably order it again.

Dish: Bananas Foster

The bananas foster dessert is one of this nearly 60-year-old restaurant’s quintessential dishes. It’s part of what makes Brennan’s, Brennan’s. And while it’s tasty, heavy on the rum, and served with a mound of ice cream, the entire presentation feels rote. At any point, you will see three of these fiery desserts being made. You will also see an equally bored, if not downright annoyed, staff member making it, as if the last thing they want to do is see, make, or even hear the words bananas foster ever again. We don’t blame them. It’s delicious, and you should order it, but don’t expect anyone to thank you.

Dish: Sundae Service

The Marigold Club looks like a whimsical crystal-green candy dish full of wallpaper and more matching upholstery than your grandmother’s living room. And while the food tastes good, the sundae service is disappointing. First, it’s not a sundae cart, it’s a toppings cart. Then, the ice cream is scooped in the kitchen, not in front of you. It’s like the climax of a movie where all the action takes place off-screen. So when the cart arrives, it’s deflating. And while toppings are fun, it takes so long and feels awkward watching someone spoon out three little marshmallows on pre-scooped ice cream. For $22, we’d rather get another cocktail.

Dish: Truffle Pasta

You don’t need this. Yeah, it’s fun when Bari’s big parmesan wheel gets carted over. And, wow, yes, the hot pasta melts the cheese. But the bottom line is that this pasta doesn’t taste that good. It exists primarily as social media fodder and not as a great dish worth the money or time. Especially after waiting as the server somewhat unskillfully rotates pasta around a giant cheese wheel. Nothing about this being tableside makes it better. We say pass.