About Birch & Harbour
Eight tables, one dining room, since 2019
The room opened with six tables in 2019; today eight run live hold'em and Omaha beside a 32-seat dining room.
Eight tables of live hold'em and Omaha beside a 32-seat dining room.
Why the host desk comes before the dining room
The room is arranged around a sequence: the host desk, the chalkboard list, the table, then a plate. The 2019 opening had six tables on the second floor of a converted building; the 2022 expansion added two more and put a low half-wall between play and dining. That wall is the clearest statement of how the place works — the kitchen is close enough to send food to the tables between hands, but no plate is ever set on the felt.
The kitchen pass arrived in 2021, and the 32-seat dining room in 2024 replaced counter service. The menu runs six plates and two desserts, including a rotisserie chicken for two, a barley-and-mushroom plate and a smoked-trout salad. A runner carries food from the kitchen to the tables between hands; the dining room keeps 32 seats on birch plywood banquettes for anyone who wants to sit away from the rail.
The aim is not a restaurant with cards in the back. It is a poker room where dinner does not interrupt the night: eight tables under charcoal cloth, each with a single birch-green betting line, and a kitchen close enough to matter. The house rules card is reprinted whenever a rule changes, and the date of the last revision sits in the corner.
From six tables to eight, 2019 to 2025
Each date below changed something a visitor can still see in the room.
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2019
Six tables on the second floor
The room opened with six tables in a converted building, after nine years running the floor of a billiards hall.
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2020
Eleven weeks closed, tables re-felted
The shutdown was used to re-cover the tables and build the birch host desk that is still in use.
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2021
A kitchen pass at the back
A small pass was added at the back of the room and a restaurant cook took over it.
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2022
The adjoining unit, and two more tables
The room grew from six tables to eight, and a low half-wall went up between play and dining.
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2023
The Tuesday stack settles at 20,000
The hold'em tournament began as a single table and settled at the current 20,000-chip starting stack with 20-minute levels.
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2024
Thirty-two seats replace counter service
The dining room opened with 32 seats, and a six-plate kitchen menu replaced the sandwich board.
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2025
Rules card rewritten, lockers fitted
The house rules card was rewritten, the locker corridor was fitted out, and monthly Learn the Table sessions began on first Mondays.