Austin Bar the Cavalier Is Opening a New South Austin Bar and Restaurant

East Austin bar the Cavalier’s expanding into South Austin with a new combination bar, restaurant, and deli coming next year. Second Rodeo will open in the Bouldin Creek neighborhood at 915 West Mary Street starting sometime in February 2025.

Second Rodeo will serve this means sandwiches, kolaches, sausages, and vegetarian dishes. The deli portion will sell to-go meats, breads, sauces, wine bottles, and Austin-roasted coffee.

Ahead of the early winter 2025 opening date, Second Rodeo has been running pop-ups since early 2024 to test out dishes. Previous dishes have included crawfish boils; fried fish sandwiches; fried catfish plates; house-made sausages such as andouille and smoked boudin sandwiches like hot Texan links with chow chow/spicy brown mustard and smash burgers made with brisket.

Second Rodeo’s kitchen will be run by chefs Russell Dougherty and Ryan Wilson. Previously, Dougherty worked at shuttered South Congress restaurant Little Brown and Barrel, far south Austin bar Little Darlin’, and Dripping Springs restaurant/bar Proof and Cooper. Wilson grew up and worked at his family’s now-closed meat market and Cajun restaurant in Houston, Burt’s. After that, he made sausages at barbecue restaurant Stiles Switch BBQ and ran his own Texas crawfish pop-up Willie’s Hot Tejun Crawfish.

Second Rodeo

Behind Second Rodeo are co-operating partners and Cavalier co-owners and couple Fox and Chadwick Leger (who will oversee the cocktails and drinks), with Cavalier co-partner Adam Morehead (who has . The three had been looking for a location for this restaurant, and when there was a chance to work with Wilson (who is a friend) and his culinary partner Dougherty, everything gelled together.

The team liked opening something in South Austin because the area “offers a communal sense of spirit, houses creative and artistic minds,” Fox writes over email, “and is a great blend of old Austin and new Austin — characteristics that vibe with our concept.” They chose the name Second Rodeo since it’s not their first food/drink business.

The Cavalier opened in 2018, serving Southern-ish food, cocktails, and beers. It had expanded with walk-up window restaurant Wicky’s in 2021 within the same Webberville space, but eventually, it closed in 2022.

Before Cavalier, Fox worked at Austin restaurants such as Backspace, Parkside, and Vespaio Enoteca. Leger had been the general manager of Austin bar Shangri-La. Moorhead is an entrepreneur who had been a manager partner of downtown bar Dirty Bill’s, and had created and/or managed other bars like Javelina.

Second Rodeo’s restaurant and bar neighbors off South Fifth Street include Thai Fresh and Mattie’s at Green Pastures.

Future Second Rodeo pop-ups are taking place on Friday, August 16 at South Lamar bar the Golden Goose at 6:30 p.m.; Saturday, August 31 at East Austin bar Kitty Cohen’s at 4 p.m.; and Friday, August 13 at the Golden Goose again at 6:30 p.m.

Second Rodeo

Update, 3:47 p.m.: This article, originally published at 1:39 p.m., has been updated to remove the previous New Orleans-ish description of Second Rodeo because it was inaccurate.