Wolfgang’s Steakhouse opens its fourth branch in the Philippines, and its 32nd in the world, at City of Dreams Manila. In addition to premium steak dishes, it’s now serving grilled items like lomo saltado and grilled barbecue short ribs, among others, in a more casual and laidback setting. Expect two more Wolfgang’s with the same concept to open soon.
By Alex Y. Vergara
Wolfgang’s Steakhouse opened its fourth restaurant in the Philippines — its 32nd in the world — recently at City of Dreams (COD) Manila. This time though, the concept is a tad different from its first three branches, as it also aims to highlight a number of grilled items.
Thus, in lieu of just Wolfgang’s Steakhouse, the newly opened outlet at COD calls itself Wolfgang’s Steakhouse Grill. Gracing the event were owner Wolfgang Zwiener himself, his wife and their son Peter Zwiener. Their Philippine partners, led by leading restaurateur Raymund Magdaluyo, were also on hand to welcome them as well as the event’s special guests.
“It’s the first Wolfgang’s Steakhouse Grill in the Philippines, and the third of its kind in the world,” said Peter, a former banker who left his career in the early 2000s to join his dad in managing the now-global family enterprise. “Our very first steakhouse grill opened in [New] Jersey. We also started doing some grill concepts in 2008 in California.”
But he assured loyal patrons that the steakhouse chain’s very essence or, as he put it, “soul of the brand” remains in Wolfgang’s latest iteration. After all, Peter said, “part of being successful is being consistent. If you start changing too much, you lose that consistency. Once we decided that we’re going to add more stuff to the menu, we were a little bit concerned that the soul of the concept would change too much. At the end of the day, we don’t want to become just another restaurant. We want to stay as a steakhouse.”
By adding the word grill to its signage, Wolfgang’s aims is to open up the restaurant by offering a slightly wider variety of comfort food without dropping its signature steaks and prime cuts in the menu. The move is reflected in the newest branch’s interiors, which remains dimly lit and chic but with a more evident casual vibe in keeping with its market consisting mostly of gamers and hotel guests who want to venture outside their respective hotels and try out something different.
In a food court-ish style setting, as Peter described the newest Wolfgang’s, the casual ambiance has a purpose: to draw in more diners as well as stand out from competing restaurants vying for people’s attention.
“Although we also serve a few grilled items in our premier-type steakhouses, we put more focus on serving porterhouse, strip and ribeye,” Peter added. “In a grill-type steakhouse like this one, in addition, we are going to serve such items like lomo saltado, which is flank. We’re also serving short rib, which we don’t in the other three steakhouses.”
For his part, Raymund said that Wolfgang’s grill concept is around “10 percent” different from their older, more formal concept at their Resort’s World, Podium and BGC outlets. Majority of their offerings, around 90 percent, are still made up of premium parts of the cow such as short loin, porter house and rib eye.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean that these different cuts are best served grilled,” he clarified. “Grilling simply means cooking through direct fire. We went for a grill concept because it’s a bit more casual.”
He also revealed that two more Wolfgang’s Steakhouse outlets with the grill concept are poised to open later this year and early next year.
To better serve diners in northern areas of Metro Manila, particularly Quezon City and further beyond, he and his collaborators, including actor-restaurateur Marvin Agustin, are opening Wolfgang’s Steakhouse Grill within the Araneta Coliseum complex in Cubao, right beside the Big Dome’s red gate drop-off. The 40-seater branch is scheduled to open in October.
“It will have a sports grill angle, again, in keeping with the place and the market,” he said. The core dishes people have come to expect from a Wolfgang’s will still be there.
By early next year, Raymund and partners will venture beyond Luzon, opening their first Wolfgang’s outlet in the Visayas at Boracay New Coast, just outside Belmont Hotel and fronting the sea.
“This time, it will be a beach grill concept,” he said. “Again, in addition to Wolfgang’s premium offerings, we will be adding a few grilled items in the menu. It’s nowhere as big as this, but we expect to serve at least 50 customers a day.”
Their decision to open in Boracay is a reflection of Wolfgang’s global thrust of building more outlets in tropical and ski vacation destinations. The ambiance in both its Araneta and Boracay branches will be decidedly casual, from the interiors down to the dress code. Those in shorts and resort wear, for instance, need not change into something more formal once Wolfgang’s Boracay opens, Raymund assured.
