This Ohio Steakhouse Still Looks Like the 1950s, Right Down to Its Piano Bar and Dark Wood Dining Room

Dark wood, soft lamplight, and leather booths worn smooth by decades of elbows surrounded me the moment the door closed, and I had driven past that low brick building for years without a second thought. A friend talked me into dinner there, and the whole century seemed to slide backward about seventy years.

A piano played somewhere just out of sight, and the room held the kind of quiet that only comes from a place that has never needed to chase a trend. The restaurant opened in April of 1955, and the wild part is how little it has changed since.

I have eaten at plenty of spots that try to fake this kind of charm, but this one never had to try. The menu still leans on classics, the service still moves at its own pace, and the regulars still claim the same booths they have claimed for decades.

Ohio has plenty of restaurants, but few carry this much history in their walls without ever making a fuss about it.

A Dining Room Frozen in 1955

My first thought after being seated was that somebody had kept a secret from me for years. The dining room at The Top is dim in the best possible way, with dark wood paneling, plush leather booths, and crisp white linens catching the glow of low lamps.

Nothing about it feels staged. The room has looked more or less like this since the doors opened in April of 1955, which means the atmosphere wasn’t designed by a consultant.

It simply survived.

Mirrors and chrome bounce the light around, softening everything and making the space feel bigger than it is. Seating sits fairly close together, so you catch snippets of celebrations happening two tables over, birthdays, anniversaries, out of town guests being shown off.

If you’re sensitive to dark rooms, bring a phone flashlight for the menu. Regulars seem to consider the low lighting part of the appeal, and honestly, so do I.

Here’s a small detail worth knowing: the building once housed a drive-in movie theater before it became a supper club. Sitting in that room, surrounded by decades of accumulated warmth, you feel connected to a Columbus, Ohio that mostly exists in photographs now.

Live Piano That Has Played Almost Every Night Since 1965

The piano is the heartbeat of the place, and I mean that literally. Music drifts through the rooms all evening, classic standards played live rather than piped through speakers, and it changes how the whole meal feels.

One pianist, Sonia Modes, has been performing here almost nightly since 1965. Read that again.

That’s six decades at the same keyboard, in the same room, for generations of the same families.

The piano bar is original to the restaurant, tucked so the sound carries without drowning out conversation. You can talk normally, laugh, order dessert, and still catch a tune you half recognize from an old movie.

Guests mention the piano player more than almost anything else about the restaurant, which tells you plenty. It’s the detail people carry home.

My advice? Ask for a table within earshot of the piano rather than in a far corner, then arrive early enough to settle in before the room fills.

Sitting there with music floating over the clink of silverware, I understood why people have been returning to this exact experience for seventy years without getting bored of it.

Seventy Years of Columbus History in One Building

Some restaurants have a story. The Top has a whole family tree.

It was founded by Lee Henry and Bill Sapp, two Columbus restaurateurs who also gave the city the legendary Kahiki. Their supper club opened in 1955 and quickly earned a reputation as the place to be seen in town.

In seventy years, ownership has changed hands only three times, which is remarkable in the restaurant world. A Bexley family took it over in 2006, and today it’s family owned and operated by Joyce and Craig Hoover, Emily and Matt Schoedinger, and Regina and Denver Adkins, with Denver Adkins running the kitchen as chef.

My favorite piece of trivia involves the tables. The original owners installed phone jacks at every single one so the politicians who dined here could take calls without leaving their seats.

Picture that for a second. Deals being made over dinner, receivers passed across the tablecloth, all in this same dark room.

Knowing the history genuinely improves the meal. You’re not just eating steak, you’re sitting inside a piece of the city that refused to be modernized away.

Charbroiled Steaks and Classics Worth the Drive

Let’s talk about the food, because a steakhouse living on nostalgia alone wouldn’t last seven decades. Steaks here come charbroiled, and the cut list reads like a greatest hits album: New York Strip center cut, filet mignon, ribeye, and porterhouse.

Prime rib of beef holds a permanent spot on the menu, and it’s one of the most talked about orders in the building. Jumbo lobster tails and a rotating handful of seafood options round things out, with sea bass and salmon earning steady praise.

Dinners traditionally arrive with salad and potatoes included, which is such a wonderfully old-school touch. Nobody here is charging you separately for the basics.

Portions run generous enough that leftovers are a real possibility, so pace yourself if you plan on dessert.

For anyone not in the mood for beef, pork chops, chicken, and a full rack of ribs are all available. The kitchen makes most sauces and seasonings in house, and the steaks come from Allen Brothers.

Order medium rare, let the meat rest a minute, and enjoy the fact that some recipes simply don’t need updating.

Starters and Sides That Belong in a Supper Club

Half the fun of a place this old is ordering things you rarely see anymore. Jumbo shrimp cocktail, deviled eggs with caviar and curry, escargot, and French onion soup all live on the appetizer list, and they haven’t been reinvented for modern tastes.

Oysters Rockefeller gets mentioned constantly by guests, and the onion rings have a bit of a local following. They arrive enormous, with a crisp shell and a soft, sweet onion inside.

Sides are where I’d spend a little extra. Top Mac and Cheese, truffle mac and cheese, roasted asparagus with hollandaise, twice-baked potatoes, and creamed spinach all show up on tables around the room.

Warm bread and butter come out early, which is dangerous when you’ve ordered a full steak dinner.

One charming ritual worth watching for: if you order the baked potato, a server may appear with a handheld setup of butter and sour cream and dress it right at the table.

For dessert, cheesecake and creme brulee are the classic picks. Both are rich, so consider splitting one across the table.

The Broiler Has Been Working Since Opening Day

The oldest thing doing its job here might not be the piano or even one of those leather booths. Head toward the kitchen and another piece of 1955 is still earning its keep.

The restaurant has continued cooking steaks on the same broiler used when The Top opened. That means generations of ribeyes, filets, and strip steaks have passed through the same piece of kitchen equipment while almost everything else in the restaurant industry changed around it.

I love details like this because they are easy to miss. Plenty of old restaurants preserve photographs, signs, or furniture, but keeping a piece of working kitchen equipment for decades is a different commitment to continuity.

The menu has followed a similar path. The restaurant’s own history emphasizes how deliberately it has held onto the classic supper club experience rather than constantly rebuilding itself around whatever happens to be fashionable.

That approach apparently still works. The Top continues to collect local recognition decades after opening, including being voted Best Steakhouse in Columbus in the 2024 ColumBest poll.

In 2026, it took the top spot in that category again.

So the restaurant is not simply surviving on memories. Seventy years after opening, people are still showing up for essentially the same idea, a dark room, live music, and steaks coming out of a remarkably well-seasoned piece of history.

The Modern Patio Hiding Out Back

Just when you think the whole property is stuck in the past, you find the patio. Added in 2021, it’s bright, shaded, and unmistakably current, which makes it a fun contrast to the wood-paneled rooms inside.

There’s a bar out here too, so the building actually holds three distinct drinking and dining areas. Guests wander through all of them on the way to their table, which feels a bit like touring different decades.

On a mild Columbus evening, the patio is where I’d want to be. Comfortable furniture, plenty of shade, and a relaxed energy that suits long dinners with friends.

Practical notes: the restaurant opens at 4 PM daily, staying open until 9 PM most nights and 10 PM on Fridays and Saturdays. Reservations are strongly recommended, especially on weekends, because the dining room fills fast after 7 PM.

If there’s a wait, the bar seats are a perfectly good place to start the evening.

Whether you choose the vintage interior or the breezy patio, you’re getting one of the most beloved dining experiences in the city.

Address: 2891 East Main Street, Columbus, Ohio