Gwen LA Review: Ten Years on Sunset, a 36-Ounce Porterhouse and a Night With Chef Marcell Hatten

Gwen sits at 6600 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90028, inside a 1926 building in the heart of Hollywood, steps from the Hollywood Farmers Market. Walking in is half the meal. You come through the butcher shop first, past the cases and the glass-walled dry-age rooms, past charcuterie hanging to cure, and then the dining room opens up around a roaring asador where your dinner is already over the fire. Curtis Stone and his brother Luke opened it in July 2016, and it turned ten this summer. We spent an evening there with Chef Marcell Hatten, talked shop, ate our way through the kitchen, and left convinced this is one of the great meat rooms in Los Angeles. We hung out with the team at Gwen LA and loved it!

Gwen earned its first Michelin star in December 2022 and held it through four straight editions of the California guide. This year Gwen also landed at No. 41 on the World's 101 Best Steak Restaurants list, one of very few Los Angeles rooms on it. We feel the service and quality were second to none!

Curtis, Luke and a Farm Outside Melbourne

The restaurant is named for the brothers' maternal grandmother, Gwen, who lived on a farm outside of Melbourne. That farm is where Curtis and Luke were first around livestock, and where they picked up the respect for raising animals for food that runs through everything on Sunset. Both brothers started their careers in a butcher shop. Curtis went on to cook in Michelin-starred kitchens, beginning at the Savoy Hotel in Melbourne at 18 before heading to London. Luke went into business, owning and running a corporate florist company in Australia.

Gwen was a decade-long dream for the two of them before it opened. It followed Maude, Curtis' Beverly Hills tasting menu room, which earned its own Michelin star in 2019 and closed in 2024 to become The Pie Room. That makes Gwen the brothers' flagship, and you can feel it. This is the place they built to show how an animal gets from the pasture to the plate.

The Chef: Marcell Hatten

Stone's name is on the door, but the man at the fire the night we visited was Chef Marcell Hatten, and he is the reason the evening felt like a conversation instead of a service. We sat down with him to talk about the kitchen, the dry-age program and the way the butcher shop feeds the dining room, and then he cooked for us. You can find our video coverage on Instagram about Gwen LA . The menu he sent out moved from the butcher case to the curing room to the fire and back again, and every plate answered to the same idea: buy the whole animal, waste none of it, and let the wood do the talking.

Hatten cooks on a kitchen built around an asador, a Josper charcoal oven and those glass-enclosed aging rooms, and he uses all of it. Here is what came out.

Bone Marrow Custard, Veal Truffle Jus, House Potato Chips

The opener tells you exactly where the night is going. Bone marrow is set into a silky custard, finished with a veal truffle jus and served with house potato chips for scooping. It is beef fat dressed for black tie, and it is the most Gwen thing on the menu: a butcher shop byproduct turned into the most luxurious bite of the evening. Scoop, crunch, repeat.

Lamb Ribs, Pomegranate Molasses, Pomegranate Crème Fraîche, Crispy Grains

Lamb ribs are the kind of cut that only shows up when a kitchen uses the whole animal, and Gwen makes them a reason to come. We tried them and they were are favorite dish hands down. An absolute must try! They are glazed in pomegranate molasses, sweet and tart against the richness of the lamb, with a cool pomegranate crème fraîche alongside and crispy grains for crunch. Sticky, rich and bright all at once. Use your hands. Be prepared for a lamb rib addiction!

House Charcuterie

Every piece on this board is made in house, from the curing program you walked past on the way in: leek ash and porcini salami, Wagyu pepperone, duck speck, 'nduja, country pâté, chicken liver parfait and house pickles. It runs the full range of the craft, from a spreadable 'nduja and a smooth parfait to whole-muscle duck speck and long-cured salami, and it is the clearest proof that Gwen is a butcher shop first. If one of them becomes your favorite, the charcuterie store sells them to take home. Chef Hatten prepared the entire dish with his own hands and we dug in!

Kale Busiate, House Italian Sausage, Burrata, Basil

Busiate is the twisted Sicilian pasta shape, wound tight so every coil holds onto the sauce. Gwen tosses it with Italian sausage made in its own butcher shop, kale and basil, then crowns it with burrata that melts down into everything once you start twirling. It is a pasta course that still answers to the butcher counter.

21-Day Dry-Aged Creekstone Porterhouse, 36 Ounces

The main event. A 36-ounce Creekstone porterhouse, dry-aged 21 days in those glass rooms, then cooked over the wood fire. A porterhouse is two steaks on one bone, the strip on one side and the tenderloin on the other, so it is built to share. It came with a veal jus, cipollini onions roasted in the Josper until sweet and soft, and a finish of beef fat powder, rendered beef fat turned into a fine dust that melts back into pure beef flavor the moment it lands on hot meat. This is what the whole building is designed to produce, and it delivers.

Duck Fat Potatoes, Chicken Salt, Malt Vinegar

Chicken salt is an Australian classic, the seasoning that goes on hot chips back home, and here it is a nod straight back to the brothers' roots. Potatoes are cooked in duck fat until crisp and golden, seasoned with chicken salt and finished with malt vinegar to cut through all that richness. Order them with the porterhouse. If there are four of you, order two.

The Room

Gwen was designed by Home Studios of Greenpoint, Brooklyn, as an homage to the building's history, and it reads like old Hollywood with a butcher's apron on. Rich leather banquettes, crystal chandeliers, dramatic lighting, copper accents and pink marble frame the room, while the asador throws firelight across all of it. A seat at the chef's counter puts you right in front of the kitchen.

Upstairs on the mezzanine, the Wine Room seats 30 surrounded by Gwen's wine collection, kept behind custom art deco glass cabinets. It works as a quieter spot for dinner and as a private dining room for events. Back downstairs, the bar runs a cocktail program built on spins of the classics, often with a nod to the butcher program and the seasonal menu, whether you are starting the night there or closing it out.

The Butcher Shop

The butcher shop is the heart of the restaurant. It drives the dining room menu, and it also serves home cooks with a premium selection and hands-on advice from chef-minded butchers who will walk you from choosing the cut to prepping it to putting it on the plate. The team works directly with ranchers and purveyors, everything is hormone-free and ethically raised, and the cases run from California beef to Blackmore Wagyu from Australia. Browse the Butcher Selects online or call ahead to order for pickup. If you love what Gwen is doing, you will also want to read our night at Chi Spacca, another Los Angeles room built around butchery and fire.

What to Know Before You Go

Reservations. Book on OpenTable. Reservations are recommended, and walk-ins are welcomed.

Pre-theatre menu. With the Pantages, the Fonda and the rest of Hollywood's venues close by, Gwen offers a pre-theatre menu for a quicker dinner before a show.

Parking. Valet is available behind the restaurant off Seward Street.

Large parties. Groups larger than six should email info@curtisstoneevents.com. The Wine Room handles private dinners and events.

Menus. The current dining room menu, wine list and cocktail list are posted on Gwen's website, and gift cards are available there too.

Hours and Location

Gwen, 6600 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90028. (323) 946-7500. Dinner is closed Monday. Tuesday through Thursday, first reservations at 5:00 pm and last at 9:00 pm. Friday and Saturday, first at 5:00 pm and last at 9:30 pm. Sunday, first at 4:30 pm and last at 8:30 pm. The butcher shop is open Wednesday through Sunday, noon to 8:00 pm.

Michelin will come back around next June the way it always does. Gwen does not need to wait for it. Ten years in, on a stretch of Hollywood that has seen plenty of restaurants come and go, the Stone brothers' butcher shop is still the most theatrical dining room on Sunset, and with Chef Marcell Hatten at the fire it is cooking like it means it. Looking for more? Start with our guide to the best food in Los Angeles.

Please let me know if you end up going!! And if you do, I hope you are hungry!

Matthew Tropp | FJM