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The original Strip House began life as a posh Euro-themed steakhouse in the Village, in a space once occupied by Asti, a beloved red-sauce joint known for its singing waiters and portraits of opera stars plastered on the walls. Then Steve Hanson’s mammoth BR Guest Hospitality Group (Ruby Foo’s, Dos Caminos, Blue Water Grill, etc.) purchased the restaurant and its Las Vegas branch out of bankruptcy last year. Strip House Midtown, on 44th and Fifth Avenue, is the latest addition to this empire, and it has the same lush, scarlet, Belle Epoque color scheme as the original restaurant, and the same Asti-era black-and-white photos decorating the walls. There are numerous dining rooms and bars in this multiplex version of the original chophouse, however, and on noisy evenings, you may feel like you’re dining less in an actual restaurant than in a rowdy beef-eater theme park.

But if there’s an art to populist, theme-park dining, then Steve Hanson mastered it long ago. This new Strip House menu is priced for the midtown expense account (no hunk of beef costs less than $40), but many of the signature dishes (roasted bacon, the bone-in rib eye, potatoes crisped in goose fat) retain a touch of their old magic. The porterhouse for two ($48 per person) was tender and expertly charred, the rib eye was well marbled, and the rack of lamb was crusted with a nice mustard-flavored scrim of bread crumbs. You can enjoy this red meat with the usual avalanche of heart-stopping sides (the creamed corn with pancetta being the most potentially lethal), but avoid the desserts, several of which (the baked Alaska, a caveman-sized slab of the signature, 24-layer house chocolate cake) taste like they’ve recently been exhumed from the depths of BR Guest’s giant, corporate refrigerator. — Adam Platt

The new luncheon menu at this Strip House outlet features a ten-ounce bacon cheeseburger, and a classic Maine lobster roll. 

Roasted bacon, rib eye or porterhouse for two, goose-fat potatoes.

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