Email
PrintMcDermott's Grille is the RiverWalk's newest restaurant
McDermott’s Grille offers a one-stop shop for evening entertainment.
“When you walk in, you won’t forget what you see.”
So says Craig Boilla, co-owner of McDermott’s Grille, the newest addition to the RiverWalk development in Jenks.
Boilla says McDermott’s Grille is not the average local upscale restaurant. In fact, it will be one of the largest restaurants in Tulsa to feature live music and entertainment in a sports-themed setting. The 13,500-square-foot facility is expected to open in early February.
Through 40 years of owning and managing music and restaurant venues, Jim McDermott has learned what goes into creating a dining and entertainment venue that provides customers with everything they need to have a good time.
Jerry Gordon, of Enterprise Construction, developer of RiverWalk Crossing, had become aware of the success McDermott and his wife, Laura, achieved with their business ventures. So two years ago, Gordon recruited the couple to start a new venue in Phase II of the RiverWalk. Jim McDermott soon approached Boilla and his wife, Kathy, and together the four friends became owners of McDermott Grille.
Although the restaurant’s opening was delayed a year, Boilla says the extra time allowed for more research and planning so the team could “make so many better decisions.” They reconsidered everything from the design of the kitchen and lighting fixtures to how guests will be served indoors and outdoors, he says.
Additionally, much planning is necessary to create an atmosphere that is equally appealing to a mature crowd during the day as to the late-night-loving younger crowd.
Inside the restaurant, tables will be available to serve 350 guests, and the facility will also include all LED lighting, a revolving door, two jumbo 300-inch plasma screens and 30 flat-screen televisions tuned to sports or news stations. Guests can also lounge in one of three seating areas, complete with overstuffed chairs, sofas and drop-down lighting. An upstairs VIP area, dance floor, stage and two champion shuffleboards will be featured as well, Boilla says.
McDermott’s Grille’s comfort-food-oriented menu will include three steak entrées, hot wings, fajitas, ribs, hamburgers and more. The restaurant will also include a conversational, or two-sided, bar seating 35 people and featuring some of the best drinks in town, McDermott says.
Outside, McDermott’s Grille will include seating for 200 guests, as well as an outdoor stage hosting local and regional performers, such as Wanda Watson and bands Bopcats, Alex Cartwright Group, Another Alibi and 3 Hour Tour.
In an effort to provide entertainment for a variety of audiences, Boilla says McDermott’s Grille will feature bands catering to an older clientele in the early evenings and to the younger crowd until the venue closes.
As an added perk, visiting bands will receive their own dressing rooms, and Boilla says a production company designed all of the venue’s lighting and speakers so bands will not have to bring as much equipment as for a typical show.
“They can just plug in,” he says.
Other outdoor amenities include three sombrillas (umbrellas) sitting alongside a 22-foot round, Polynesian-style palapa seating 30 people and offering specialty alcoholic drinks.
While customers once had to drive all over town to find a one-stop source for nighttime entertainment, Boilla says he is excited to offer so many amenities in one venue.
“We want to allow people to come to our place, have dinner, listen to a band, maybe play some shuffleboard or darts and not have to drive four different places to do that,” he says.
