Heading back home from Nashville late last year, I decided to stop off in St. Louis and spend the night. I was staying over near the Central West End of the city and started to look for a place to have dinner that night. I consulted my list of "Restaurants to Visit" in the St. Louis area and found one that had been on my list for quite some time, but I had never been to yet. I took off to go have dinner over at Dressel's Public House.
Jon Dressel was an English professor at Webster College - now Webster University - in the St. Louis suburb of Webster Groves. Dressel was of German and Welsh heritage and wanted to open a restaurant that reflected his roots. In 1975, he and partner Jack Brangle opened Llewellyn's Pub in the Central West End neighborhood of St. Louis. While the pub was satisfying for Brangle, Dressel was looking for something a little more high-brow, a place where university types could sit and quaff a pint and have intellectuals carry on conversations about classic writers and poetry - something that Jon Dressel was renown for in international circles.
Dressel sold his shares in Llewellyn's in the late 70's and he found a space for his new bar just down the street from the original Llewellyn's. In 1980, Jon and Barbara Dressel opened Dressel's Public House, a pub that was more of a Welsh influenced setting with a bit of Germany mixed in. Jon had collected busts of classical composers and had them on display above the bar. Framed portraits of classical writers, poets and musicians were hung on the wall in the pub - many of those pictures hang in the present day Dressel's Pub.
Ben Dressel was just 15 years old when his parents started Dressel's Pub. He followed his father's footsteps as an artistic-type and after studying at the University of Missouri, he studied at two schools in the United Kingdom. A free spirit, Ben Dressel was both a surfer and a mountain climber before he decided to go home and help out his parents at the family pub.
Pictured right - Ben Dressel
Not expecting to stay for very long, his parents were looking to retire. They made Ben an offer that he really couldn't refuse to buy the public house and carry on the family name. Ben Dressel officially took over ownership of the pub in 2004 at the age of 39.
Business was up and down for Dressel's Pub under Ben's ownership. He expanded the dining room and cleaned up the bar area. In 2012, he brought in some kitchen consultants who revamped the menu and started a farm-to-fork/gastropub theme for the restaurant.
Things started to turn around for Dressel - and then Guy Fieri showed up to film a segment on his Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives program on The Food Network. Suddenly, he had lines around the block trying to get into his restaurant. It was a welcome - and somewhat unwelcome - change of fortune for Dressel's Public House. People who were coming in looking for a burger or Shepherd's pie were suddenly seeing a menu that contained five different types of pork dishes. While the food critics in St. Louis loved the change, their longtime clientele did not. And Dressel could see it in the dwindling number of people coming through the door.
The food consultants - who became chefs for Dressel during the gastropub period - ended up leaving and the sous chef took over the menu. They were slowly going back to the pub favorites that made them famous.
And then COVID hit...
Like many restaurants, Dressel's Public House was forced to shut down during the early days of the pandemic. This gave Dressel a chance to do even more renovations to his business. He wanted to open up the bar area, making it more open. And he wanted to do something completely different with the restaurant.
While on a climbing trip in Colorado, Dressel happened upon a brewpub in the small town of Ridgway in the southwest part of the state. He talked with the owner who have him an idea of what it was like to run a small barrel brewery. Dressel had been tinkering with the idea of adding a brewery to Dressel's Public House and the inspiration from the small Colorado mountain brewery owner gave him the impetus to follow through with that thought.
In addition to adding a brewery to the lower level, the renovations to the main floor dining and bar areas were taking longer than expected. Supply chain shortages forced Dressel to use repurposed items to finish the renovations. Plus he also had to take an extended course in how to brew beer that was held by the small brewpub owner in Ridgway.
The changeover took three-and-a-half years before Dressel was ready to open the doors in September of 2023. But the brewery operation was not up and running just yet. While Dressel wasn't going to change the name of the pub that his parents started over 40 years earlier, he did need to come up with a name for the brewery. He called it Rock & Horse Brewing - after his love for climbing mountains and his family's love of riding horses. The first Rock & Horse beer was brewed in collaboration with a small South St. Louis brewery in the fall of 2023. And by the spring of 2024, Rock & Horse Brewery was operational in the lower level of Dressel's.
It was about a 10 minute drive to Dressel's Public House located on N. Euclid in the heart of the Central West End. (see map) When I pulled up in front of the brick building (I believe I read somewhere that the building was built 110 years ago), I was a bit confused as there was a temporary sign above the front door. Something was going on in the neighborhood that evening and there wasn't any parking to be had on the street in front of or around Dressel's Pub. There was, however, a pay lot to the north of Dressel's that I was able to get into. It cost $6 bucks and the parking attendant was a great guy.
Dressel's Pub has a cozy dining room with a large community table and a number of four-seater tables. It was somewhat busy in the dining room when I got into the place. It turned out that there was something going on in the neighborhood that evening and people were coming in early before the event to get something to eat.
Just below the dining area and past a wire-framed half-wall was the Rock & Horse Brewing facility. In fact, Ben Dressel was working in the brewery that evening. It was sort of interesting that the brew works was open to the main floor of the restaurant. But it didn't smell like most microbreweries that I've been to - that sort of stale beer smell that permeates the air that causes most craft breweries to close off their brewing room. But that wasn't the case at Dressel's Pub.
I asked the hostess if I could sit at the bar. The bartender that evening was a large guy by the name of Marcus. He had a ruddy face and seemed to have a nice demeanor toward a number of regulars that were in the place. But he seemed to snub me for whatever reason. It took him a long time to get me a menu. He didn't seem to care if I was ready to order anything, and later after he wordlessly placed my dinner in front of me, he never came back to check on me. I did finally get his attention to order a beer about 10 minutes after I sat down. They had about 12 beers on tap - 8 from the Rock & Horse private collection and 4 more beers that were from other small craft breweries in the St. Louis area. I tried the Saddle Sore IPA and it wasn't that bad. Not the greatest IPA, but certainly not bad at all.
The menu at Dressel's was pretty small - appetizers, sandwiches, burgers, soups and salads. The reuben sandwich featured house-brined corned beef brisket, and the Slagel Farms double cheese burger sounded good, too. They had grilled fish tacos, but they coated the haddock in panko crumbs.
I wasn't really knowing what to get and after Marcus finally got me a second beer and I told him I had a few question about the menu. They had a chicken, sausage and rice soup that Marcus explained that it was "like gumbo, only it's not."
When my wife is in a quandary as what to order in a restaurant she's not familiar with, she always asks what the place is known for. So that's what I did with Marcus. He said that Dressel's signature sandwich was the Porcetta Louie. So, that's what I got.
The sandwich consists of locally-raised pork that is slow-roasted in fresh herbs and citrus juice. After it's shredded, the seasoned pork is placed on a toasted hoagie bun and topped with a blend of provel and mozzarella cheese, roasted kale, and pepperoncini rings. I got a side of fries to go with the sandwich.
The sandwich was good, nothing outstanding in my book, but still good. I could see why some people felt this was a sandwich to die for, but it was all right. It was a bit dry and I went through my second pint pretty quickly while I was trying to get through the sandwich. I kept trying to get Marcus' attention, even putting the empty glass far away from my plate to try to give him the universal bar signal that I needed another beer. But the snubs continued from Marcus up to the point that he wordlessly handed me my bill well before I was finished with my meal. I don't know, maybe my cheery face that was salivating for a cold beer when I first sat down pissed him off. But he was sure friendly to the regulars. He seemed to develop a blind spot to my place at the bar.
The experience with Marcus sort of soured me on my initial visit to Dressel's Public House. The food was just all right, as was their privately brewed beer. It was a nice atmosphere and I'm sure that the regulars love the place. But I sort of felt like the odd guy-out during my visit. And for that reason, I probably won't go back to Dressel's if I have the chance to in the future.