Wolfgang Puck and his son, Byron, continue to keep their restaurant on the cutting edge. (photo courtesy of CUT)

Twenty years ago, 11-year-old Byron Puck walked into CUT Beverly Hills, the restaurant opened in 2006 by his father, world-renowned chef Wolfgang Puck. The elder Puck was about to reinvent the American steakhouse.

“I remember being completely awestruck walking in this dining room. It felt like you’re walking into a museum,” Byron said during an interview in late August, seated next to his father at a corner table overlooking the gallery-like room he described.

The father-son duo reflected on 20 years of the Beverly Hills restaurant ahead of its anniversary dinner, which brought together chefs from all seven CUT locations worldwide. Byron, now the president of Wolfgang Puck Fine Dining Group, said he could tell from the moment he entered the restaurant as a child that there was something different about CUT.

“It didn’t feel like a normal dining room,” Byron said. “It was that beauty that gave me this notion that restaurants are orchestral … Walking into CUT at that age, I was like, ‘this isn’t a restaurant. This feels like the ballet. This feels like truly something otherworldly.’”

By 2006, Wolfgang Puck had already conquered fine dining. Spago was an L.A. institution, his restaurant empire stretched well beyond Beverly Hills and his name had become synonymous with California cuisine. But there was one unmistakably American slice of fine dining he had yet to tackle – the steakhouse.

“I said I would open one, but it has to be not a place where you get iceberg wedges, tomato and onions in the winter time or whatever, or creamed spinach which sits in a steam table and it’s all gray already,” Wolfgang recalled. “It has to be something special.”

The American steakhouse, Wolfgang Puck thought, was mired in tradition. Dim lighting, wood-paneled walls, leather booths, enormous slabs of beef. The formula worked for so many businesses, but Wolfgang wanted to break it.

First, CUT had to look nothing like a traditional American steakhouse. Instead of rustic and dark, Puck went minimal and bright, commissioning Richard Meier, the architect behind the Getty Center, to design the interior. Meier created a sleek dining room with an understated, geometric design brilliantly illuminated by natural light and accented by vibrant splashes of modern art. Adjacent to the lobby of the historic Beverly Wilshire Hotel – an elegant Italian Renaissance Revival-style building which Wolfgang described as “the grande dame” of Beverly Hills – CUT purposefully stood apart in its architecture. It had to be more than just a “hotel restaurant,” Wolfgang said, with its own unique identity.

Then came the food.

“It has to be more than steak,” Wolfgang said.

A wood-and-charcoal fire gave the steaks a deep smoky flavor, while an open kitchen put the grill within viewing distance of the dining room. The beef was sourced from around the world, from prime American beef to Japanese Wagyu, giving diners the opportunity to compare different breeds, cuts and styles. Wolfgang’s creativity extended across the menu – look no further than CUT’s signature bone marrow flan, a decadent, savory custard that transformed one of the humblest parts of the animal into an expression of Beverly Hills luxury. The Lobster and Crab Louie – a modern twist on a classic West Coast salad – was served over horseradish panna cotta and drizzled with a spicy tomato marmalade. Desserts ranged from banana cream pie to chocolate soufflé and baked Alaska. Many of those original dishes are now favorites of longtime customers.

CUT celebrated 20 years with executive chefs from every CUT location coming together in Beverly Hills. (photo courtesy of CUT)

“CUT really propelled this idea of what a steak-focused restaurant could be into modernity, took a piece of Americana and really turned it on its head in a lot of ways,” Byron said.

The restaurant made an immediate impression. Esquire named CUT its 2006 Restaurant of the Year while the Los Angeles Times awarded it three stars and an “excellent” rating. The following year, the James Beard Foundation nominated CUT for Best New Restaurant, and it earned its first Michelin star.

“I don’t think L.A. changed CUT. I think CUT changed L.A.,” Wolfgang said.

After 20 years, the restaurant that was founded on breaking tradition has developed many traditions of its own. Wolfgang said the key to CUT’s success has been finding a balance between what works and what needs constant reinvention.

“If it’s in a marriage or if it’s in your business, if you stay the same, it gets stale, it gets boring,” Wolfgang said. “So you always have to renew yourself, and you always have to look – what’s next.”

Today, CUT still serves the famous steaks and sumptuous bone marrow flan that established its reputation, but the restaurant continues to evolve. Dry-aged duck became a crowd favorite. Cocktails earned a greater emphasis as a younger generation skips the wine list for shaken and stirred libations. The very idea of luxury dining shifted from coat-and-tie formalities toward comfort and experience.

“Have something new and something old mixed together,” Wolfgang said. “You know, tradition and innovation.”

Wolfgang remembers a time when fine dining restaurants often required jackets and ties. Today, both Pucks agree that luxury is less about enforcing formality than making diners feel exceptionally comfortable.

“For me, luxury is feeling like the best version of yourself,” Byron said. “This market is very much so the market of ‘come as you are,’ and be treated exceptionally well.”

Luxury, Wolfgang pointed out, doesn’t always mean expensive.

“For me, luxury is getting Mara des Bois strawberries from Harry’s Berries. You can smell them,” Wolfgang said. “That’s luxury, just as much as good caviar. But I prefer great strawberries to OK caviar.”

Perhaps the biggest change at CUT, however, is sitting beside Wolfgang.

“A young person has a different outlook,” Wolfgang said. “They grew up differently. They eat or go out differently.”

Byron began working for his father at age 12, washing dishes at Spago Beverly Hills. He studied hospitality at Cornell University before training at some of the world’s most acclaimed restaurants – Alinea in Chicago, Le Bernardin in New York and El Celler de Can Roca in Spain, just to name a few. He worked his way through several of his father’s kitchens and eventually into restaurant operations. In 2025, he was named president of Wolfgang Puck Fine Dining Group, helping to lead not just CUT, but the empire his father began building more than four decades ago.

Now 31, Byron views his role as a balancing act between preserving the lessons instilled by his father and developing creative ideas of his own. He summed up his approach to the restaurant business with a quote commonly attributed to Pablo Picasso: “Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.”

“We are only here because we stand on the shoulders of the giants that came before us,” Byron said. “That tradition, that technique, that founding nature that we all stand upon that makes great hospitality what it is will never leave, but we should try our utmost to try and evolve, to try and break those rules every once in a while.”

For all the culinary techniques Byron has picked up from Wolfgang over the years, he said his father’s most important lesson has been one of leadership.

“What I’ve really only truly been able to pick up from him is this level of benevolent positivity that he brings to everything that he does,” Byron said. “He truly understands, in his heart of hearts, that a restaurant is only as good as the team that exists within it.”

Byron said that philosophy of care ultimately flows down to the diner – treat the people working in the restaurant well, and they will extend that same care to the guests.

“This business can be difficult sometimes. It can be hard,” Byron said. “But to ride through that with a smile on your face is this notion of leadership that I implore so heavily and try to as much as I can, because people truly feed off of it.”

Wolfgang said the lessons between him and his son have been reciprocal.

“I learn as much from Byron as he learns from me, probably,” Wolfgang said. “I really believe older people have to be open to new things, to innovation, and to learn and have enough curiosity and accept that you cannot say just because you’re 60 years old you know better. Sometimes a 30-year-old knows better, and that’s just the fact of life.”

Wolfgang said that means giving his son the freedom to do things differently, even when he might not agree with the approach.

“He might not do it the way I do it. It’s fine,” Wolfgang said. “But I think he has to find his own voice. He has to find his own way of doing. If he just continues what we did for the last 20 years, it’s not enough. Then the restaurant will get stale.”

For Byron, CUT’s 20th anniversary is a celebration of what the restaurant has achieved, but also an opportunity to ask, “what’s next?”

“We can’t rest on our laurels, and we can’t sit back and look at the past,” Byron said. “We still have to look towards the future.”

Two decades after Byron walked into CUT and found himself awestruck by his father’s creation, Wolfgang appears ready to see where his son will take it next.

“For me, to lift up young people makes me stronger,” Wolfgang said. “I don’t want to be alone in the sun.”