1,000 Places to See Before You Die

Where Beef Reigns - Cattlemen's Steakhouse

The Cattlemen's sits smack dab in the middle of the Oklahoma National Stockyards, the largest livestock trading center on earth, full of saddleries and Western-wear clothing stores. This is red meat country, and Cattlemen's is the consummate Western steakhouse, unpretentious but luxuriously delicious, lauded as paradise for lovers of good red meat (and with just as excellent fish dished, though most patrons never discover them).

Slowly aged and quickly broiled over hot charcoals, the corn-fed sirloin steak is so tender you can cut it with a butter knife – filet mignon will seem lackluster by comparison, as will the accompanying unremarkable salad and baked potato and bread, which come with a perfunctory pat of margarine.

If you want to go local with the spur-wearing cowboys, dig into a plate of lamb fries – sliced and fried testicles of young lambs, a dish that makes most out-of-towners shudder. Content with your ultimate hedonistic meal, sit back and enjoy the 1910 decor, full of murals, cattle-branding irons, and other Old West paraphernalia.

(adapted from "1,000 Places to See Before You Die" by Patricia Schultz)