Billy Crews Dining Room
Grand Award royalty on the Texas-New Mexico border
Santa Teresa · Santa Teresa · American, Steakhouse · Visit Website ↗
Reviewed April 5, 2026
Wingman Metrics
First Impression
A wine list of 800-plus selections at a steakhouse on the New Mexico-Texas border is not what you expect when you pull off Country Club Road — but Billy Crews has been holding a Wine Spectator Grand Award since 1986, which means this program has been serious longer than most of its customers have been drinking. The room feels like the list: deliberate, grown-up, not in a hurry to impress you with flash.
Selection Deep Dive
California and Bordeaux are the twin engines here, and they run deep — Screaming Eagle, Harlan Estate, and Opus One anchor the California cult side while Chateau Margaux and Chateau Latour represent Bordeaux at its most canonical. Italy shows up with genuine muscle in Sassicaia and Tignanello, and Penfolds Grange makes sure Australia doesn't get left out of the conversation. The list skews toward collector-friendly names rather than discovery-focused producers, which is exactly right for this crowd and this room.
By the Glass
Twenty to forty pours by the glass is a legitimate program, not a token gesture, with pricing running $15 on the approachable end up to $50 for the bigger names. Jordan Cabernet Sauvignon and Silver Oak are likely workhorses on the glass list — recognizable, food-friendly, and appropriate for a table that came in for prime rib. Rotation cadence isn't confirmed, but a list this size usually means the glass program gets real attention.
Jordan Cabernet Sauvignon — $15-$20 by the glass
Jordan is the kind of wine that looks unpretentious on a list full of cult bottles, but it's consistently well-made Alexander Valley Cab that holds up against a serious steak. In a room where the glass pours can run $50, this is where you get the most wine for your dollar.
Tignanello
Everyone at this table is ordering Napa Cab. The Tignanello — Sangiovese and Cabernet Sauvignon from Antinori, one of the wines that rewrote Italian wine history — is sitting right there and most people walk past it. It's a more interesting bottle than half the California names on this list and it works beautifully against a charred, fatty piece of prime rib.
Screaming Eagle
Look, the bottle exists and Bernie Rocha will sell it to you with a straight face. But Screaming Eagle at a restaurant is a four-figure exercise in paying double what you'd pay at auction for the privilege of drinking it here. If you have to ask the price, spend that money on two exceptional Bordeaux instead.
Beringer Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon + Prime rib
Beringer Private Reserve is Napa Cab at its most classically structured — dark fruit, firm tannins, enough weight to stand up to a thick cut of prime rib without steamrolling the beef. It's the kind of pairing that makes you wonder why anyone orders anything else.
🔥 The Bottom Line
Billy Crews is the real thing — a decades-deep wine program in an unlikely zip code that takes California and Bordeaux as seriously as anywhere in the country. The markups are what they are at this tier, but sommelier Bernie Rocha and a list that's been Grand Award-caliber since Reagan's first term make this worth the drive from El Paso.
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