BY MEG VAN HUYGEN for WEEKLY VOLCANO | 7/24/2026
Here’s another story about how I was wrong! And also gluttony …
It’s not that bad this time. Just a little confession that, like many others, I’ve had a sticky little idea in my head for years that beautiful Asado, at Sixth and Pine, is strictly a place to celebrate. Maybe that’s because I’m not usually in the market for a casual weeknight New York strip (although perhaps I need to examine my priorities, now that I read that), but in my mind, it’s where birthdays are toasted, anniversaries are commemorated, and out-of-town guests are taken for a splashy, meaty dinner. With that cinematic wood-fired Argentine grill and sleek, upmarket menu, it’s kinda hard to see it as a spot for a light after-work cocktail and snack.
Wrong. That’s dumb. I was gratefully disabused of this notion by pure accident last week, thanks to Weekly Volcano, in fact. After a coworking sesh with the team at our downtown office, I popped over to the excellent Not Bad Sandwiches in Court House Square and was chatting with chef/owner Dave Cooper over a stunning Citadine sando at the outdoor bar, when he put me on hold to attend to the line. After he rang up a metalhead-looking gentleman in a trucker hat, he introduced me. “This is Roger Weatherhead from Asado.”
Tacoma’s not a very big town, if you’ve noticed, and I already followed Asado’s longtime chef on the socials. Delighted. We chatted for a minute, and Weatherhead let me know they have “a cheap steak right now” and some solid choices on the happy hour menu, and I should come check it.
“Huh, right,” I said in slow motion, channeling Homer Simpson. “I can just . . . come in . . . and sit at the bar. It doesn’t have to be a big thing.”
On Friday night, my boyfriend and I took that HH menu for a spin. Regular old date night at Asado still felt a little fantabulous, but whatever, it was payday. I deserve a steak, by God. We can share it.
Happy hour was all about wine and margs, with a $15 burger that’s normally $23 and discounts on a pasta dish and a prawn-and-steak combo. I’m not usually a tequila lady (more than one cocktail and I turn into Butt-Head, huh huh), but the Wellness Margarita (lmao) sounded absurdly refreshing. Don Julio Blanco Tequila, banana liqueur, coconut, lime, agave syrup, and coconut water. I imagined myself sipping it in a trendy Mexico City neighborhood, in some bistro’s tropical garden. Done.
I wasn’t immediately sure which steak was supposed to be the cheap one, but we decided to split the 12-ounce New York striploin special for $45, served with chimichurri, salsa criolla, and “your choice of one starch.” Had to go for the polenta. My guy also had eyes for the cucumber salad from the specials list (cukes, lemon, olive oil, roasted red pepper, feta, parsley), and we both had a preemptive crush on the roasted carrots served on labneh with ras el hanout, chives, and dill.
The marg was a total KO. As refreshing as a dang Doublemint commercial. It took about two minutes to pour the whole thing into my face and request another. We were both correct on our carrot prophecy too and couldn’t stop exclaiming over them. They showed up crowned with a ton of fresh dill and a little scatter of puffed rice for texture; the tangy labneh was the exact perfect accent for the sweet, turmericky, slightly caramelized carrots. Not one drop of that yogurty sauce remained when we were done with this dish.
The steak was a vision, everything I’d imagined after running into the chef a couple days earlier. The specials list wasn’t clear on the sourcing, but I spotted St. Helens Beef and Oregon Country cited for other cuts on the menu, both of which are PNW suppliers of high-quality, pasture-fed products. The New York striploin’s served on a plateau of olive-oily polenta and topped with a few branches of fresh dill, parsley, and various other green herbs, along with the salsa criolla, which is more of a relish than a sauce: diced tomatoes, onions, garlic, chili peppers, bell peppers, olive oil, and more herbs. My guy and I did the thing where we kept cutting the last bite in half so we wouldn’t be the greedy monster who took the last bite away from the other. That’s how we know we both loved it. It means we both wanted to eat that whole bite for ourselves, BUT WE DIDN’T.
As time wore on, we decided we also needed to try the broccolini, which was the seasonal veggie side du jour. It arrived on a bed of Marcona almond butter, which was not unlike Thai peanut sauce aesthetically, and was hella tender, flavorful, and fire-speckled all over. A glorious scene to behold too.
We were bursting at the seams by then, but I got another cocktail anyway and my boyfriend got another beer, just to finish reveling in the spectacular meal we had no idea we’d been in for. We needed to sit some more. I realized that Future Us will want more of those carrots, so we put in another order to go. We got upsold into trying the key lime pie ice cream, which I’m pretty sure was topped with a drizzle of olive oil. And I got a glass of tawny port at the end too.
Oh yeah, and we added a steak sandwich to go too, which we very unsoberly co-devoured around 1 a.m. later that night. Along with the extra carrots. Yes, we ended up spending $180 on drinks and to-go orders, but look. It was all too good. We did right by ourselves. Know thyself, as someone at some point in history (Socrates?) once said.
We originally went to this place to share a cheap steak, man, I swear.
After sitting there for an hour, my boyfriend realized he was sitting next to an old coworker, whose spectacular-looking food I had been staring at all night, so we shot the breeze with him. And he says he comes here solo just to sit at the bar and eat steak by himself. Hell yeah. Nice.
See? If that guy can do it, you can too. Or you can actually stop in to share a steak with your sweetie for date night, or celebrate a big event, or cosplay celebrating an event and drop a couple bills because you and your partner can’t stop eating the delicious food, as we accidentally did. The point is that you don’t have to wait for a milestone to go to Asado. It’s adaptable. It sees you and it conforms to your needs.
Great restaurants shouldn’t only be enjoyed a few times a year, anyhow, and we’re wasting one of Tacoma’s greatest if we’re not thinking of it as a place where we can hide in the bar and eat a private, personal steak by ourselves every once in a while. Damn, that guy knows how to live.
Asado Tacoma, 2810 6th Ave, Tacoma, WA.
AsadoTacoma.com
