Road Tips

Iron Barley - St. Louis

A place in the greater St. Louis area that has been on my radar for quite some time - Iron Barley - has gained a measure of national notoriety over the past couple three years after it was featured on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives on the Food Network, and Man vs. Food on the Travel Channel.  I had first discovered Iron Barley in an article in (I believe it was) Gourmet magazine a number of years ago, but I had never gotten around to go have a meal there.  I had a meeting with a potential dealer on the south side of St. Louis recently and found out that Iron Barley was located just off of Interstate 55.  I made it a point to stop for lunch when I was down that way.

Iron Barley began in 2001 when longtime chef Tom Coghill decided to trade in his corporate chef's hat for a bandana and offer a down-home, Southern style of food fare in a unpretentious setting.  Coghill had been a chef at the Hyatt which was formerly at Union Station, then at the old Adam's Mark hotel in St. Louis.  He then went to Frazer's, an eclectic restaurant in the Benton Park area of St. Louis, just across Interstate 55 from the Anheuser-Busch brewery.  While at Frazer's, Coghill began to experiment with cooking food in an iron skillet using his co-workers as "guinea pigs".  Most of the concoctions that he came up with were done by the seat of his pants, but some of the better ideas he came up with showed up on the menu when he opened in May of 2003.  The name Iron Barley comes from Coghill's pairing of iron skillet-made food with his love for the finest in locally and Midwestern micro-brews that he offers at his place.

Pictured at right - Tom Coghill  (Picture courtesy Riverfront Times)

Coghill struggled for quite some time getting his little place the exposure that it needed.  He was having to cut hours and staff when Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives showed up in the fall of 2007 to film a segment on his funky little place.  Between the time the piece was filmed and when it was aired in March of 2008, Coghill was contemplating closing his doors.  But after it was shown on The Food Network, and the subsequent showing of his place on Man vs. Food, business has been brisk.  Coghill was quoted in an article in the Riverfront Times that his appearance on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives "saved me".  

Coghill smokes his meats with oak wood giving it a backyard type of flavor with his chicken, seafood, beef and pork.  The "Sammiches" feature old style comfort food favorites such as a hot beef sandwich to the more bizarre Ballistic Elvis - strawberry jam with crunchy peanut butter, grilled bananas, and topped with American cheese and hot pepper flakes on Texas toast.  (For a couple bucks more, you can have it topped with bacon.)   And the Iron Barley is famous for their hot dogs, most significantly the Monte Cristo - 2 1/2 grilled hot dogs topped with strawberry jam and Swiss cheese.  I understand their chili dogs - also 2 1/2 grilled hot dogs with a liberal amount of homemade chili on top - are pretty damn good.

It was just before noon when I pulled up in front of the Iron Barley on E. Virginia Ave., just off Exit 203 on Interstate 55. (see map)  The neighborhood looks a little mixed and signs in front of the place warned people to not leave valuables in plain sight in your car.  I walked through the front door and it puts you in the bar area with the dining room off to the left.  The first thing that sort of took me aback was that it wasn't that large of a place. The dining room featured brick walls with barn board molding along the top.  The tables and chairs are nothing fancy - it's truly a bar that has food.  

The bar area at Iron Barley features a few tables and chairs along the wall with a seven seat bar on the opposite side.  The kitchen is in the back with a pick up window that allows you to see inside.  The decor at Iron Barley is probably best categorized as "funky chic".  I immediately liked it.  

I ended up sitting at the bar and picked up a menu that was sitting in a holder at the bar.  It was a basic menu printed on paper, nothing fancy, just like Iron Barley.  But the food is a different story.  Other than the aforementioned smoked meats, "sammiches" and hot dogs, Iron Barley has some soup and salads, lunch "sammiches" that are served up to 4:00 p.m. (Those include a strip steak sandwich topped with chili mayo, and a fried egg sandwich with two eggs topped with lettuce, tomato, bacon, American and provel cheeses with Russian dressing on toasted rye bread.)   The entrees at Iron Barley are an interesting mix of American and International foods such as Oak roasted pork chops, schnitzel and spaetzle, and a Spanish seafood stew called Zarzuela that has shrimp, mussels, clams, squid and pieces of whitefish in a tomato saffron sauce with wagon wheel pasta.  

My bartender/server came over to greet me and she told me of three specials they had that day - a homemade lasagna, chili mac and cheese (Iron Barley's homemade chili mixed with elbow macaroni and topped with cheese), and a barbecue brisket sandwich.  A homemade pasta salad came with the brisket sandwich along with their homemade caraway cole slaw.  I had looked through the menu before she came over and when she said "Barbecue brisket sandwich", I sort of forgot about everything else.  When I stepped out of my car, I could smell the pungent oak wood smoke in the air.  I took the brisket sandwich special.  Or wait - I mean, "SAMMICH"!

Not long after I ordered, my sandwich with sides was set down in front of me.  The sandwich was served open face on a toasted hoagie bun which was covered with a liberal amount of sliced brisket.  The sauce was cooked in with the sliced meat.   

From the first bite, I was hooked.  Now, I really wish that I could discern spices in food better than I do, but the taste of the sauce with the meat was very different from most other barbecue sauces that I had.  I could tell there was some chili powder in the barbecue sauce as it gave the taste of the meat a little kick.  But there were some other spices in the sauce that confounded me.  All I knew is that I liked it.  The brisket was thin and tender and I ate the beef off the bread to be able to experience the whole flavor.  

The caraway cole slaw had a sort of pinkish color to it, but it had a fine flavor with a hint of caraway.  But the  pasta salad was a big hit - large chunks of tomatoes and artichoke hearts with wagon wheel pasta in a creamy Italian dressing.  It had a great taste and went well with the smoky, spicy taste of the barbecue beef sandwich.   

Iron Barley also has a once a month Beer Club of tastings of local and Midwestern craft beers on their patio in the back.  The beers they have on tap, as well as in bottles, is an interesting mix.  I understand that their beer tasting - usually featuring five or six different beers - is a popular event. 

Iron Barley was everything that I hoped it would be.  Interesting food, eclectic beers, and a fun and funky sort of personality to the place.  I'm not certain I'm going to be able to sign up the dealer in South St. Louis, but I can see me coming back to the Iron Barley to try something else at some point.  I was extremely happy with my sandwich - whoops!  SAMMICH!  And the sides were very good, as well.  A trip to Iron Barley has been a long time coming for me and the wait was well worth it.

Westport Flea Market - Kansas City, MO

I want to give a shout out to Tricia T. who sent me a note telling me that she thought Westport Flea Market in the Westport Entertainment and Shopping area of Kansas City, MO had the best burgers in that area.  I wasn't familiar with Westport Flea Market, so on a recent trip to K.C. I decided to have lunch there one day.  I had trouble finding it, driving by it once.  But when I figured out where it was, I was almost embarrassed that I didn't know about this place before.

From the street, the Westport Flea Market is pretty non-descript.  For the uninitiated - like me - it sort of does look like a building that houses a decrepit flea market.  And that's probably what I thought as I know I've driven past the place on Westport Road (see map) many times in the past.  In fact, there's a Sonic Drive-In just across the street that I've eaten at a couple times in the past.  Had I known a good burger joint was just across the street, I would have gladly ditched the Sonic burger in favor of a good ol' bar and grill burger.  

Actually, the Westport Flea Market and Bar and Grill - in its present state - has been around since 1981.  It truly is a flea market/bar and grill.  There are a handful of booths run by vendors (hours vary).  Looking into some of the fenced in spaces, it looked like an eclectic mix of kitsch and nostalgia.  

The background story of Westport Flea Market goes back even further than their opening in 1981.  Prior to World War II, the building housed the Calhoun Mantle and Tile Company - a business that made mantles for fire places and sold ceramic tiles for floors.  Due to a downturn in home building during World War II, the company went out of business and the building sat vacant for a handful of years.  In 1950, the building was bought by the old Kitty Clover potato chip company out of Omaha and served as their Kansas City-area factory until 1963.  

The building was transformed into a restaurant in the mid-60's called The Place in Westport.  It was primarily a bar and grill that sold burgers and beer - similar to the present day Westport Flea Market.  It was sort of a bohemian type of place that featured dancing and also sold artwork from local artists.  It was in business for just a few years before closing around 1973.   

In the mid-70's, the building was transformed into a retail market space called Things Unlimited, the precursor to what became the Westport Flea Market.  With the downturn in the economy in the late 70's, the flea market went into bankruptcy.  A Kansas City area investor, Mel Kleb, bought the Westport Flea Market and reopened it as a bar/grill/flea market.  

The Westport Flea Market thrived for years, very much known for their big juicy burgers and their variety of beers they had on tap.  But in 2005, Hooters came calling, wanting to put in a Hooters restaurant in the Westport area of Kansas City.  Kleb, being the consummate businessman, took their offer and began the process of selling the business.  

Then two things happened.  The first involved a young entrepreneur by the name of Joe Zwillenberg who found out that Kleb was selling the business.  Long a fan of the Westport Flea Market, Joe contacted Kleb and wanted to buy the Westport Flea Market from him.  Kleb told him that the deal was already consummated with Hooters.  Undeterred, Zwillenberg, who ran a burger joint styled after the Westport Flea Market, finally sat down with Kleb and offered him a downpayment of $25,000 and showed him a line of credit from his bank to finance the remaining part of the purchase.  Kleb still resisted, saying the deal with Hooters was done.  However, Kleb told the young Zwillenberg that if the deal fell through, it was his to have.  Zwillenberg was determined to have the Hooters deal fall through.  

The second thing that happened was when the Westport Neighborhood Association found out that the Hooters corporation was going to demolish the existing building to put up a new restaurant, they put up a fight to stop the demolition.  While the fight was going on to stop Hooters from building a new restaurant, Kleb was getting checks from Hooters on a monthly basis to purchase the building and business.  However, due to an accounting oversight Kleb didn't receive a check one month.  Kleb immediately called it a breach of contract and told Hooters that the deal was over.  He sold the business to Joe Zwillenberg.

Two months later on March 1, 2006, Kleb and Zwillenberg consummated their deal with the "passing of the burger" - a five-pound ceremonial burger that was made for the occasion. (Picture at right courtesy KC Confidential.com)  Zwillenberg brought his "Joe's Burgers" concept over to the Westport Flea Market and the rest, as they say, is history.  

Zwillenberg is no stranger to the food service industry.  He has a long history of working in various capacities in a number of restaurants in the Kansas City area.  He was a singing waiter at the age of 17, he was a bartender at an upscale bar/restaurant at the age of 20 - both jobs he got by lying about his age.  

After graduating with a degree in hotel and restaurant management from the University of Missouri, Zwillenberg started to work for the Gilbert/Robinson restaurant corporation, owners of the Houlihan's restaurant chain and J. Gilbert's Wood Fired Steaks in suburban Overland Park.  He managed a couple Houlihan's in the Kansas City area before he decided he wanted to get into business for himself in the mid-90's.  

After a short experience as a partner in a restaurant that soured him on ever having a partner again, Zwillenberg started Joe Joe's Italian Eatery, an Italian-style bistro in Kansas City's mid city area.  Joe Joe's is said to be the first place to serve panini sandwiches in the Kansas City area.  

There was a Hardee's just across the street from Joe Joe's and it closed up a couple years after Zwillenberg opened his Italian bistro.  Zwillenberg had been looking at wanting to do a catering company and he ended up buying the old Hardee's and opening his catering business - Joe Joe's Catering.  It continues to be one of the top catering businesses in Kansas City today.

Having a large love for the Westport Flea Market concept, Zwillenberg lifted a menu from the business on one visit and used it for his blue print for his own burger joint, Joe's Burgers.  It wasn't long after he opened his burger joint that he found out that the Westport Flea Market was up for sale.  It was then he contacted Mel Kleb and that's the beginning of their relationship which eventually led to Zwillenberg taking over the Westport Flea Market, saving the building and sparing the Westport area from the mediocre food served at a Hooters.   

It was around 1:30 when I got into the Westport Flea Market.  I took a quick look around and decided to have a seat at the L-shaped bar.  I looked behind the bar and saw their very impressive line up of draft beers that they have on tap.  I wasn't certain I wanted a beer, but looking at all those tappers sort of made me thirsty. 

I took a menu and began to look through it to see what they had to offer at Westport Flea Market.  Actually, there's a lot more than just burgers on the menu at Westport Flea Market.  They have a number of sandwiches, including Joe Zwillenberg's famous grilled chicken panini that he brought over from his days running his Italian bistro.   The menu features a large array of appetizers, a handful of salads, daily specials and a special kids menu.  In fact, their burger menu is only three items long - the Flea Market burger, the smaller Mini Market burger, and a patty melt that features the Mini Market burger on a toasted rye bread with grilled onions and Swiss cheese.  

The burgers have been named "Best in Kansas City" by a number of polls consistently over the past 20+ years.  Westport Flea Market gets their beef from McGonigle's Meat Market, a famous Kansas City butcher shop that is nationally known for their steaks and other cuts of meat.  It's been awhile since I've done an entry on a butcher shop.  The next time I go to Kansas City, I need to take a large cooler with me and get some beef from McGonigle's and do a Road Tips entry on the place.

A waitress/bartender came over and greeted me after a bit.  She asked if I wanted something to drink and I asked back, "Do you have Boulevard Pale Ale on tap?"  Actually, that was a pretty stupid question - any beer bar worth their salt in Kansas City has Boulevard Pale Ale on tap.  She said that they did and wondered if I was ready to order some food.  I had noticed in the short time that I was there that a guy was calling out people's names over an in-house P.A. system and they would go to a window and pick up their food orders.  I said, "Do I order food from you?"

She said, "Yep!  We'll call out your name and you pick up your food at the window over there."  She pointed at a small dining area just beside the bar area.  "There's a small condiment bar down there and you dress your food with lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, whatever."

I said, "Well, I understand your burgers are pretty good."

"The best in town," she quickly shot back.  

I ordered up a burger, medium.  She asked, "You want cheese on it?  Cheddar, Swiss, pepperjack..."  I stopped her at pepperjack.  

She then asked, "You want any grilled mushrooms, bacon ?"  I said mushrooms sounded great.   And I got a choice of sides with the burger, as well.  Curly fries, cole slaw or cottage cheese were my choices, but for an upcharge I could get onion rings.  I wasn't certain I wanted fries, but cottage cheese sure sounded good to me.  

After about 15 minutes, I heard my name called over the P.A. and I went over to the pick up window to get my burger.  The condiment bar featured onions, pickles, lettuce, tomatoes and some other things.  I got some onions, pickles and the tomato slices, though small, looked very fresh for the time of year.  

Sitting down with the burger, well...  You ever have food sat down in front of you and the smell of it is so good that you KNOW that it will be good?  That's what the Flea Market burger smelled like.  There were a gob of fresh grilled mushrooms on and around the burger that was covered with a thick blanket of pepperjack cheese.

My first bite - it was ecstasy.  Oh, my God!  I immediately said, "Ummmmm...." as I chewed my first bite.  The burger was juicy and overly flavorful.  It had that old time flat grill seasoned taste to it.  The juices just flowed out of the burger.  The sesame-seeded lightly toasted bun was thick, but still pretty light to chew.  It went well with the burger meat.  About the only quibble I had with the burger was that it was probably more medium-rare than medium.  I know that if my wife would have ordered a burger medium and it came out like this she would have sent it back.  But I was fine with it.  I'll just have to remember to order it medium-well the next time.  

With the great tasting grilled mushrooms, the fresh and forward tasting onions and the tangy pickles, this burger was a winner.  I immediately realized had to put it in the Top Ten of my Best Burger List.  I'll have to figure out where I'll put it when I finally do my updated Best Burger List 2012 sometime in the coming weeks.  I could easily see why it's been named the best burger in Kansas City for so many years.  And I was also a little embarrassed that I hadn't had one of these burgers before this visit.   As many times that I've been in Kansas City in the past, I should have known about Westport Flea Market before this.

As I got finished, my waitress/bartender came over and asked how the burger was.  "Killer," I replied enthusiastically.  And it was.  

She handed me my bill and I got out my credit card to hand to her.  She said, "Uh, normally we don't take credit cards..."

I said, "Oh!  OK!  No problem!"  I got a $20 bill out of my pocket and handed it to her.  She gave me $4.65 in change and I left $3 bucks for her tip.  OK, so rookie mistake and something to remember for next time - Westport Flea Market only takes cash.  They have an ATM in their billiards area for those who are caught short on cash for their food.

Before I left, I took a look around the place.  Toward the street side of Westport Flea Market there's a dining room with a number of vintage beer cans that line the walls on shelves.  This room was actually closed off for diners at this time, but they have two other dining areas - the one pictured above near where the pick-up window is located, and a dining area up near the bar.   

So, thanks to Tricia for turning me onto Westport Flea Market for a great burger.  I was overly impressed with the place, the food, the service and and the history behind the business.  Once again, I'm somewhat embarrassed by the fact that I had no idea that a great burger place like this existed in a city that I've been traveling to for over 25 years.  I highly recommend going to Westport Flea Market if you're in K.C. and want to go to a fun and interesting place with a world-class burger.     

J K O'Donnell's - Fort Wayne, IN

During a trip to Fort Wayne to do a presentation for the staff at Sweetwater, one of the largest dealers of products for professional and amateur musicians in the nation, my colleague Simon set up a get-together for some of the sales staff at an Irish bar called J K O'Donnell's.  He'd taken some of the staff there before and they were sequestered in a partyroom where they had a fixed menu of appetizers and entrees.  Oh, and unlimited beer.  Simon got it set up for another night of food and beer when we were there just before Christmas last December.

Downtown Fort Wayne is not unlike many mid-sized Midwestern communities that has suffered from an economic downturn over the past 10 to 20 years.  With an urban flight of both people and businesses, store fronts have closed up, people are living away from the center of cities, and downtown areas have become ghost towns after 5 p.m.  A number of business people saw the need for a revitalization of the downtown area and one of those men was Scott Glaze, the owner of a company that made medical grade wiring in Fort Wayne.  Glaze traveled often for his job, both across the United States and to foreign countries.  He was struck at how some similar sized cities had a downtown area with shops and restaurants that he didn't find in Fort Wayne.  He wanted to begin a renaissance of the downtown area, but knew he couldn't do it alone.  

Glaze got a group of what he called "crazy entrepreneurs" on board for his vision of a downtown revitalization in Fort Wayne.  He knew it wouldn't happen overnight, but he had to help get the ball rolling in regard to bringing the downtown back to a vibrant destination.  Along with his wife, Melissa, Glaze wasn't certain if he wanted to open a retail shop or a restaurant for their part of the revitalization project.  They just knew they wanted to do something. 

It was during one of his trips to Castlebar, Ireland to a facility that worked with his company, Glaze found himself in a quaint Irish bar that he fell deeply in love with.   The Irish pub gave him the inspiration to open an authentic Irish pub in Fort Wayne.  Along with partners Dennis and Jeremy Rohrs, and managing partner Kim Jacobs, the Glaze's opened J K O'Donnell's in August of 2007.  Two years later, they expanded into a building beside the business and made that an overflow/party room with extra restrooms.   

The main dining room consists of a quaint three-sided bar with a highback bar area that goes from ceiling to floor centered in the middle of the room.  Regular tables and high tables like you'd find in an Irish pub were throughout the room.  You have to walk through the dining area to get to the party room in the back corner of the restaurant.  

Simon had invited about 25 of the top Focal Pro loudspeaker salesmen to the little soiree that snowy evening.  Like before, he settled on a number of appetizers and a fixed menu for dinner.  As many of the Sweetwater people made it into the room, the appetizers were brought in and a waiter went around taking drink orders.  

The beer list at J K O'Donnell's is pretty extensive with a mix of domestic and imported beers.  They had a number of very good Midwestern microbreweries to choose from including the Three Floyds brewery out of Munster, IN.  (Click here to read about my visit to the Three Floyds brewpub.)   For my first beer of the evening, I went with a Three Floyds Alpha King pale ale, a very forward and hoppy pale ale that I like to drink from time to time.  

The appetizers were set on a table and they consisted of chicken wings, an artichoke dip served with toasted bread slices, homemade potato chips (that were way over-cooked) and Simon's favorite - fried pickles.  Here's a picture of Simon taking a bite into the fried pickles at J K O'Donnell's.  Quite actually, the fried pickles were the highlight of the appetizer spread with the artichoke dip a close second.  The fried pickles weren't dill spears like you normally will see with that type of appetizer, but rather dill chips covered in a beer batter that was very tasty.   

I had finished my Three Floyds Alpha King and decided that while I was in an Irish pub, I'd better get an Irish beer.  I ordered up a Smithwick's the second time around.  But when the waiter brought it to me I found it to be very flat.  So much so that I didn't even finish it.  I got the waiter's attention and told him that I wanted something else.  I ordered up a Bell's Two Hearted pale ale and stuck with that the rest of the evening.  

The fixed menu we had that evening had a number of items off of J K O'Donnell's regular menu including fish and chips, Irish stew, an authentic corned beef and slaw sandwich, as well as a corned beef and cabbage entree, and bangers and mash.  Actually, Simon had talked up the Shepherd's Pie before we got there and I was disappointed to not see it on the fixed menu.  Even though both the corned beef and cabbage and the corned beef and slaw sandwich sounded good, I ended up ordering the Irish stew which was the closest thing to Shepherd's Pie without the mashed potatoes on top.  (A late arriving Sweetwater person actually ordered the Shepherd's Pie.  Had I known I could have done that, I would have.)

Our meals began to show up and a couple people at the table I was seated at got the fish and chips (below left).  The fish looked a little dark and both people said that it was a little overcooked.  Like the homemade potato chips, the fish was darned near burnt from the fryer on the outside.  It was like the oil in the fryer was too hot and they should have taken the fish out a minute earlier.  The fish was a little rubbery, it was reported to me by those who had it, probably from the overcooking.  

My Irish stew was actually pretty good.  It was thick and hearty with a very robust taste.  It had large chunks of all-natural beef along with a potpourri of vegetables in a dense gravy/broth.  A side house salad came with the Irish stew that went well with the meal.  A guy at a table next to me got the corned beef and cabbage.  And while it did look very good, I was overly happy with my Irish stew.  It was a good "stick-to-your-ribs" meal on a cold winter evening in Fort Wayne.  

Many of the Sweetwater gang began to filter out before 9 a.m. as they had a 7 a.m. sales meeting the next morning.  I settled up the bill with the waiter and it was actually pretty reasonable for the amount of food and drinks that we had.  I'd have to say J K O'Donnell's did a fine job in capturing the essence of an authentic Irish pub with the food, the extensive beer list and the decor throughout the place.  The wait staff was quick and efficient, and it was a pleasant evening all around.  Simon does these little parties from time to time when he comes out to Fort Wayne to deal with Sweetwater.  Now that I've been indoctrinated into the Sweetwater culture I'm sure I'll be back to J K O'Donnell's at some point quaffing a few beers and hopefully getting the Shepherd's Pie.   

DMK Burger Bar - Lombard, IL

When Cindy and I were in Chicago last summer for our little mini-vacation, we had lunch at Uncle Julio's in Lombard (click here to see that entry). We parked in the lot near the restaurant, but another place caught my eye. It was DMK Burger Bar. I'd read about DMK Burger Bar in Bon Appetit and in the Chicago Tribune and had always wanted to visit their Chicago location (see map). I went there once, but parking is at a premium and I couldn't find a spot that was close. It turns out they had just opened their second location in Lombard just a day or two before. While I was intrigued by DMK Burger Bar, we wanted to stick to our rule of not visiting a restaurant during its first three months of existence, just to allow them to get the kinks out. We had lunch at Uncle Julio's that day, but I was in Chicago recently and was able to stop into DMK Burger Bar for a burger.

The DMK Burger Bar in Lombard is located in the Fountain Square shopping and entertainment area of Lombard, in between Oakbrook Center Mall and Yorktown Center Mall (see map). It is the second location opened by partners Michael Kornick and David Morton, who also are involved with Fish Bar, next to the Sheffield Ave. DMK Burger Bar location.

If the name Morton sounds familiar, it's because David Morton is the son of Arnie Morton, the legendary restaurateur who founded the Morton's steakhouse chain, as well as the founder of the Playboy Clubs and Resorts. Some of Morton's children have dabbled in the restaurant business, as well. Peter Morton founded the Hard Rock Cafe chain, Miichael Morton is the owner of the contemporary N9NE steakhouses in Chicago, Las Vegas and Dallas, and David Morton founded the Pompei Italian Restaurants with four locations in the greater Chicago area.

Michael Kornick has his own legacy as the executive chef at the long defunct Gordon restaurant (a place that I ate at a couple times years ago and it was absolutely fabulous), as well as working on various projects with Richard Melman of the Lettuce Entertain You restaurants. Kornick was also the executive chef at the Four Seasons Hotel in Boston for a spell.

Kornick (pictured right) became involved with two partners to work on and open two restaurants - Marché and Red Light - but the partnership quickly dissolved. With the help of his wife, Lisa, Kornick opened mk, a highly popular eclectic restaurant in the River North area of Chicago. Kornick started his relationship with the Morton family when he was hired as a consultant/chef/partner for N9NE, then partnered with David Morton to open DMK (a combination of David Morton's and Michael Kornick's initials) Burger Bar in 2009. Kornick is also a multiple James Beard Foundation nominee for best chef in the Midwest.

The menu at DMK Burger Bar consists of nine grass-fed beef burgers that all cost $8.00 each (with the exception of the Big DMK, the bison burger, and the guacamole burger). For the more health conscious, DMK Burger Bar also has turkey burgers, lamb burgers, and salmon burgers, as well as a veggie burger and a portobello mushroom burger. They also feature sides of salads, onion straws, fried okra and dill pickles, and a number of delectable French fries - called Chicago fries - that include sweet potato fries served with a lemon Tabasco aioli sauce, salt and pepper fries with homemade ketchup, parmesan cheese fries with truffle cream, and Amish bleu cheese fries with bacon.

Since it was during the noon hour when I got to DMK Burger Bar, I had a hell of a time trying to find a parking spot in the lot in front of the business. With Uncle Julio's across the way and a Starbuck's next door, parking is at a premium during the rush hours. I was able to find a spot behind the restaurant and went in. I took a seat at the bar and the very friendly bartender greeted me with a menu. Not only does DMK Burger Bar have a number of eclectic burgers to choose from, they have a very good beer list. They had eight beers on tap and another nearly three dozen beers available in bottles. I ended up getting a Great Lakes Dortmunder Gold lager beer they had on tap.

While the bar area is bright and open with white tiled walls behind the bar, the dining area is a mix of brick, contemporary lighting and a wall lined with banquette seating. Not only was the bartender overly friendly and chatty, but so was the wait staff and the manager. They certainly were doing their best to make you feel welcome.

Picking a burger was going to be tough. At new places, I usually like to go with the basic cheeseburger, with possibly bacon and mushrooms on it, to get the feel and taste of the burger. But the were so many mouthwatering burgers being described on the menu that I was having trouble figuring out that I wanted. The Number 8 (you order by the number) was a basic cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato, mayo, onions and pickles. The Number 2 was topped with chili rubbed onion-strings, Amish bleu cheese and a spicy chipotle ketchup. The Number 1 had aged cheddar, barbecue sauce, smoked bacon and charred balsamic red onions. You can see what I was up against.

But what really jumped out at me was the Number 4 - real roasted green chiles (not the stuff you get from cans), smoked bacon, Somoma jack cheese and a sunny-side-up farm fresh fried egg on top. I couldn't pass that one up, so I ordered that with a small side of the salt and pepper fries with the homemade ketchup. (I've since learned the sweet potato fries with the lemon Tabasco aioli sauce is to die for. Next time...)

About 15 minutes after I ordered the burger, one of the waitresses brought it out to me. The presentation was nice - the sunny-side-up egg was prominent on top with the bacon off to the side on the light and flaky homemade bun. It was time to dig in.

From the first bite, it was exquisite. The green chiles gave the burger a great peppery taste, but it wasn't spicy in the least. The grass-fed beef was cooked to a pink middle - exactly as I like it. Although I'd rather have a hard fried egg on my burger, the sunny-side-up egg wasn't all that messy. Along with the jack cheese and the smoked bacon, it was a superb burger.

The salt and pepper fries were absolutely great, as well. I normally don't like to get fries all that much, but these were fabulous. They were crispy on the outside, but moist on the inside. The homemade ketchup was tangy and somewhat tart. Overall, it was an outstanding meal.

I like to stay out in the western suburbs of Chicago when I'm in town for more than a couple days, mainly because it's centrally located for the dealers I call on in the area. DMK Burger Bar is about a five mile drive from where I like to stay and I'm sure that there will be more visits to this particular restaurant in the future. It was a burger worth of mention when my updated Best Burger list comes out in 2012. As I said, it was an outstanding burger.

 

JL Beers - Fargo

After our dinner at Green Market Kitchen when I was in Fargo earlier this past fall, my dealer, Rod, suggested that we go to a place down the street from the restaurant - JL Beers - to get a couple nightcap beers.  As we were walking there, Rod's wife, Ellen, said that JL Beers has pretty good burgers.  "They have this machine that cooks them on both sides and they come out to you pretty fast," Ellen said.  "And they have the most amazing homemade potato chips!"  We had a few beers that night, but before leaving Fargo the next day to head west, I stopped in at the West Fargo location of JL Beers to see what the deal was.

The JL Beers in downtown Fargo was the original of what is now four locations of the beer bar/burger joint.  In addition to the one in downtown Fargo and the one I visited in West Fargo, there's a JL Beers that opened up in 2011 up the road in Grand Forks.  They were also scheduled to open a JL Beers across the Red River from Fargo in Moorhead, MN sometime before the end of the year.  Each location features at least 32 beers on tap and another 25 to 30 beers available in bottles.  The food menu at JL Beers is pretty basic - they feature nine burgers and you can add on toppings such as cheese, onions (raw or fried), an egg, bacon, lettuce, tomato, or grilled peppers for an upcharge.  In addition to the great homemade chips Ellen was raving about, they also have fries and something called "Buffalo Blu" chips.  The fries and the homemade chips are available seasoned in either sea salt, barbecue spices or Cajun spices.  

Warren Ackley and Randy Thorson (pictured right - photo courtesy of the Fargo-Moorhead Forum) are the two owners behind JL Beers.  Thorson's and Ackley's company - Global Investments - is the owner of the Old Broadway, a downtown saloon/eatery that I've eaten at a couple times in the distant past, as well as Borrowed Bucks Roadhouse (also with locations in Sioux Falls, SD, Grand Forks, ND and Bismarck, ND) and the WOW 94.7 Radio Bar, billed as the world's first radio station that also serves beer.  

The name JL Beers pays homage to an old friend of theirs - Jim Lauerman - who owned Jim Lauerman's Chili, Sandwiches and Beer, a popular hangout for the locals.  After Jim's death, Ackley and Thorson bought the building that housed Lauerman's chili joint hoping to put a restaurant in it.  However, they didn't do anything with that building and ended up selling it.  Instead, they bought the building on 1st Ave. North in downtown Fargo that also housed a sandwich shop called 1st and Deli.  They opened the first JL Beers in November of 2009.  

The concept was pretty basic - burgers and beers.  And because of the small, narrow size of the space for JL Beers, they initially had seating at the bar - 24 seats.  In fact, their motto was "Seating for 1000 - 24 at a time."  The did put in three high top tables that seated four each at the downtown Fargo location.  The West Fargo location is a little bigger - their motto is "Seating for 25,000 - 49 at a time."  

While the JL Beers in downtown Fargo is located within a building, the other JL Beers locations are free standing buildings that are constructed to look like it's an old building in which the buildings on each side were torn down.  It's a pretty clever design and a pretty neat concept.  When restaurants are looking to expand and have seating for up to 100 or more people, JL Beers wants to keep it simple.  

I got into the JL Beers in West Fargo (see map) around 11:30 a.m. and there was already a good sized crowd in the house.  I took a seat at the bar and took a look at the menu.  As I said, JL Beers only features nine different burgers, but with the add-ons you can literally call your own shot as to what you want on your burger.  

The burgers are cooked on a flat grill with a heated press that comes down and smashes the burgers, cooking them in less than five minutes and giving them sort of a crusty edge.  I'd never seen a flat grill with a heated press like this before.  Once again, another unique concept to the place.  

The burgers they have on the menu range from the Original Burger with just pickles and a special sauce on a single patty, to the Buffalo Ranch burger that has Buffalo wing sauce, ranch dressing, tomato, lettuce and a seasoning on the burger.  Three burgers that caught my eye were the Humpty-Dumpty that featured a burger with cheese and a fried egg on top, the BLT Blu with bacon, lettuce, tomato and bleu cheese on top, and the Rajun' Cajun with pepperjack cheese, JL Beers homemade chili lime sauce and grilled onions.  

And, of course, they have beer at JL Beers.  The West Fargo location has 40 beers on tap as well as a number of imported and domestic beers in bottles.  JL Beers also slums with the best of them by offering over a dozen domestic beers in cans from the likes of Schlitz, Old Milwaukee, Pabst Blue Ribbon and Grain Belt Premium.  The previous night, I was introduced to a beer from a new local brewery called Fargo Brewing.  They have a Wood Chipper India pale ale (the wood chipper is a nod to the somewhat gory scene in the movie "Fargo") that was pretty darn good.  For now, the beer is brewed in Wisconsin, but the group that owns Fargo Brewing hope to have a local brewery up and running sometime within the next year or so.  I had a Wood Chipper IPA brought to me while I looked through the menu.

One thing I thought to be somewhat odd at JL Beers was the fact that you couldn't get mushrooms or jalapenos on a burger.  I was hoping to do a bacon, mushroom, Swiss cheese burger, but I couldn't do that.  I ended up going with the Great American cheeseburger topped with ketchup, mustard and pickles and a slice of American cheese.  For extra measure, I got some bacon on top.  I also ordered some of the homemade chips with the sea salt seasoning and I got a side of their chili lime sauce.  

It certainly didn't take more than three or four minutes before my meal showed up in front of me.  There was a pile of homemade chips surrounding the burger with a toasted homemade bun.  The chips were warm and very tasty.  And the chili lime sauce had a little zip to the taste and went along great with the chips.  But there were so many of the chips and a healthy side of the sauce that I knew I wouldn't be able to eat all of them.  Two people could easily share the order of chips at JL Beers. 

The burger, itself, was, well, just OK.   The bun tasted good - nice and fluffy, but not chewy.  The burger wasn't all that large to begin with and had sort of a crunchiness to the outside of it.  But it wasn't all that flavorful.  It seriously tasted like a fast food burger.  As I said, it was OK, but it wasn't spectacular at all.

It was a pretty expensive lunch, too.  With a beer the bill came to $14 bucks before the tip.  You get dinged pretty good for the burger, then when you add on the chips and the chili lime sauce, it adds up pretty quickly.  Actually, the highlight of the meal was the chips.  Well, and the beer.  The Wood Chipper IPA is a very good beer.  

My impression of JL Beers is that you go there for the beer and if you're hungry you can get an average burger.  Or get the chips if you're looking for something salty in taste to go along with the beers.  While I do like the concept of JL Beers, I'm not overly impressed with the burgers.  Go for the beer, but there's better burgers elsewhere in Fargo, I'm sure.    

McBob's Pub and Grill - Milwaukee

One of my dealers in Milwaukee, Ultra Fidelis, moved out to Wauwatosa on North Avenue a little over a year ago. North Avenue is sort of a mish-mash of funky stores, little restaurants and blue-collar bars. One of the guys at Ultra Fidelis was telling me that there was this great little neighborhood bar on North Avenue a couple miles away from their store - McBob's Pub and Grill - that had one of the best corned beef sandwiches in Milwaukee. "Maybe even the world," he exclaimed. "It's a great sandwich." One evening with nothing to do in Milwaukee, I decided to seek out McBob's and give their sandwich a try.

McBob's is one of those old time neighborhood taps that permeate the Beer City. It has more of an Irish theme to the place, one a number of Irish pubs in Milwaukee. (For a city that is heavy in German heritage, they have an awful lot of Irish-style pubs in Milwaukee.) Of course, St. Patrick's Day is huge at McBob's with corned beef and cabbage, Guinness and bag pipes all mixed in.

McBob's is the nickname for the McRoberts family who started McBob's a number of years ago. However, for the 20 or so years, the place was run by Bob Rubner (pictured right, courtesy of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel), and his wife, Christine McRoberts (the daughter of the previous owner). In 1995, Brian Hunter came to work for Rubner and McRoberts and later became a partner in the place.

This is where the back story about McBob's turns a little strange.

In 1988, Bob Rubner was living in Vienna, Austria and he happened to come back to a family gathering at McBob's. There, he "re-met" his first cousin, Christine McRoberts, who was seven years younger than Rubner. According to McRoberts, it was love at first sight and two years later they were married in California - a state where it is legal for first cousins to marry. They came back to work at McBob's, eventually taking it over.

Rubner was instrumental in turning the place into a nearly authentic Irish/Scottish pub. He began to cook and came up with their famous corned beef sandwich. He also came up with a number of soups and the McBob's Chili which, I understand, is some of the best in the city of Milwaukee. Rubner also started making Irish breakfasts at McBob's. His "McRobert's Plaid" entree is pretty unique for breakfast - it's 3 eggs topped with peppers and onions, then topped with Swiss and American cheese in sort of a plaid pattern.

Rubner had a great sense of humor and told many stories about a mischievous fictional character "Seamus". Nearly every day, Rubner would come up with a new story regarding the exploits of Seamus. And he was a treasure trove of jokes that he would share with his customers.

Unfortunately, Bob Rubner was also an alcoholic which led to many physical issues. In March of this year, just before his beloved St. Patrick's Day, Rubner couldn't take it any longer and committed suicide. He was 58 years old. McRoberts and Hunter continue to run McBob's, but it's apparent that Bob Rubner is missed by all.

I found a parking space just across the street on busy North Ave. (see map) Like the neighborhood surrounding McBob's, the clientele is a diversified group of ethnic and socio-culture individuals. Young families, older families, young guys and girls with piercings and tattoos, yuppie couples enjoying a beer - McBob's was a literal melting pot of people from all walks of life. I immediately liked the place.

Like most Irish-style pubs I've been to, McBob's has a plethora of signage - both lighted and unlighted - and other paraphernalia on the walls. The lighting is subdued, but still good enough to allow me to read a copy of the Journal-Sentinel in the dining area. The bar took up the east wall of McBob's and it was evident that a number of the regulars were holding those places that evening.

Taking a table along the back wall of the place, a waiter came over to drop off a menu and to take my drink order. I ordered up a Smithwick's and looked over the menu. McBob's is also somewhat famous for their homemade tacos - made with beef or chicken in a 10" soft flour shell, then topped with cheese, onion, sour cream, lettuce, tomato and your choice of three different temperatures of salsa. It sounded tempting, as did the hot roast beef sandwich - comfort food on a chilly and rainy Milwaukee evening.

But I decided to get what I went there for - the corned beef sandwich. Actually, McBob's reuben sandwich isn't much different as they add Swiss cheese and sauerkraut to the corned beef. I had my choice of either marble rye or light rye bread. I took the marble rye. And since it was a Wednesday night, I could get a "deluxe" corned beef sandwich. That meant that I could get a side of french fries with a pickle spear, and a cup of soup. (They have their "deluxe" sandwiches on Monday, Wednesday and Friday's at McBob's.) The featured soup that evening, in addition to their chili, was a creamy chicken and rice - one of the soups that Bob Rubner came up with years ago. While I decided against getting fries, I did order up a cup of the soup.

The soup came out first and it was very good. It had large chunks of chicken and the creamy broth was very tasty. It was a nice start up to the meal.

Not long after I finished my soup, my waiter came out with my sandwich and fries. A generous amount of horseradish mustard was on top of the corned beef which was slow roasted, overly moist and literally falling apart on my sandwich.

The marble rye bread was a little dried out and it didn't take long for the juices from the corned beef to get sopped up in the bread. Because of that, the sandwich suddenly became a mess of soggy bread that was falling apart, large chunks of corned beef that dropped into the basket on top of the chips, and horseradish mustard oozing onto my fingers. I looked for my waiter to get a fork, but he sort of forgot about me. I did my best to not look like a medieval barbarian as I picked up chunk after chunk of corned beef by my fingers and put it in my mouth. By the time I was finished, the waiter finally came around. He asked if I needed anything else and I said, "Yeah! Napkins!"

But the corned beef was simply out of this world. I like a good corned beef sandwich from time to time and this was one of the best I had, exploding bread notwithstanding. The beef was succulent and flavorful. What ever they do to their corned beef at McBob's, I wish I could do with corned beef at home.

With a couple beers, tax and tip, my meal came to just over $22 bucks at McBob's that evening. The corned beef was as good as advertised, the soup was delicious, and while the service (I thought) was a little sub par, it was fully understandable as the waiter was a busy guy with a lot of people coming into McBob's to get food. As a place to hang out and have a beer with friends, McBob's would be a great place to do so. But the food is what makes the place unique. And even though he is no longer with us, the spirit of Bob Rubner lives on at McBob's.

Yard House - Glenview, IL

Nearly four years ago, along with my wife and some friends, we stumbled in to the Yard House in Glenview, IL.  (Click here to see that entry on Road Tips.)    Yard House is a national chain of upscale beer bar/restaurants that features over 100 different types of beer on tap at any one of their locations.  We had a couple beers in there that night after an awesome Mexican feast across the street at El Jardin Norte and I always wanted to go back and have a meal at the Yard House.  Earlier this summer, I had the chance to do so.

 

The Yard House in Glenview (pictured right) is located within the Glen Town Center shopping and entertainment complex on what was the former Glenview Naval Air Station.  After the naval base was closed in the mid-90's, it was developed into a number of shops, restaurants, movie theaters, and residential complexes.  The Yard House is located in the heart of the Glen along Tower Drive (see map). 

 While Yard House could be classified as a national chain (they have over 30 locations in nine states with locations in Virginia and New York opening later this year), nearly every Yard House is located within an upscale shopping/entertainment complex.  Not only do they feature a large and eclectic mix of national, regional, local and imported beers (click here to see the beer menu for Glenview), but their food menu features a wide array of foods from appetizers, salads, sandwiches, pizza, and entrees with steaks, seafood, pasta, and barbecued ribs. 

 To understand how the Yard House gets it's name, you have to go back to 17th century Britain where carriage drivers would have beer poured in yard long glasses while they drove dignitaries around the villages.  A British yard glass held 1.14 litres, which is the same as about three plus bottles of beer.  The Yard House features a number of yard glasses, but you have to pay a deposit on the glass in case you break one when you drink it.  I've drank out of yard glasses in the past and while I am a quick drinker, I find the beer to get warm too quickly and the glasses rather unwieldy.     

The original Yard House began in 1996 when former Denver resident Steele Platt (pictured at left) and a couple partners opened the first location in Long Beach, CA.  Platt had earlier run a number of restaurants and clubs around the Denver area.  In 1987, Platt closed the Boiler Room - a Denver dance club that specialized in serving a number of different brands of beer - after a rent dispute with the landlord and with local officials who had cited the club for excessive noise from dance music in the past.  Platt had run the clubs and restaurants for about 15 years before pulling up stakes and moving west.        

Financial hassles followed Platt to his new home in California.  He bummed around Southern California, working at a car dealership and as a bartender before he came up with an idea to have 200 different types of beer on tap which incubated from his days owning the Boiler Room.  At that time, Platt was emerging from bankruptcy, primarily from debts still owed on a house in Denver and for bills that were still open to vendors after he closed the Boiler Room.

In the meantime, Northwestern Mutual Real Estate Investments had taken over the Shoreline Village shopping complex in Long Beach after the previous owner had defaulted on a loan they held.  Looking for an exciting restaurant to go into the nearly empty shopping center, Platt, along with partners Carlito Jocson and Harald Herrmann walked into a meeting with Northwestern Mutual officials and pitched their idea of a place with 200 beers on tap.  The group's concept was to offer good food, a great selection of beer and good music in the restaurants.  The only problem was the group had no money and Platt had previously filed for bankruptcy.

Taking a large leap of faith, mainly because they believed in the concept and after they had thoroughly checked out Platt's history in Denver, Northwestern Mutual invested about $2 million dollars in the Yard House.   The first Yard House had a two story keg room with five miles of beer lines going to the bar. At any given time, the Yard House could move 6,000 gallons of beer through its line system. That same delivery design is used in the other Yard House locations.  

The first six months were the toughest - cash was tight and the group was under-capitalized. But they made it through the first bumpy months and the business took off.  By 2003, Yard House was the 3rd largest privately owned restaurant group in Southern California.  And today, Shoreline Village has full occupancy and is the premier shopping, eating and entertainment destination in Long Beach. 

In August of 2007, the group sold a majority interest of Yard House to TSG Consumer Partners, an investment group from the San Francisco area. Platt and Herrmann are still is involved with the business as they continue to expand in the coming years. The company doesn't franchise any locations, keeping all of the Yard House locations under private control.   Today, each of the over 30 locations average over $8 million dollars in sales annually.  Yard House is doing pretty well.  

It was a hot and very humid evening when I was lucky enough to find a parking spot just down Tower Drive from the Yard House in Glenview.  A storm was brewing on the horizon, but a number of patrons were outside on the street side patio enjoying their dinner.  The restaurant was packed, but the hostess told me that if I didn't mind eating at the bar, there were some seats open.  I found one and parked my butt waiting for the bartender to greet me.

Being that they were very busy, I finally got a bartender's attention after a couple of minutes.  I looked through the beer menu and saw that they had the Bell's Pale Ale on tap - one of my all-time favorites.  I signed up for one of those and took a look through the menu.   

I really didn't know what I wanted to eat that evening and the menu wasn't helping things.  The Yard House has so much to choose from - jambalaya, garlic chicken and noodles, pan seared ahi tuna, lobster garlic noodles (I've heard those are just scrumptious), pepper-crusted beef filet, Cuban roast pork dip, pepperjack cheeseburger with roasted garlic aioli.  I didn't know which way to turn.  The Yard House is just not your typical chain like Applebee's or T.G.I. Friday's.  

I had eaten pretty large the night before and I thought I would take a closer look at some of the salads they had on the menu.  I looked very hard at the New York strip salad.  They take a big bowl of lettuce greens, add roasted peppers, avocado, green beans, fried potatoes and a red onion, topped with a gorgonzola vinaigrette with beefsteak tomatoes and fried pickled egg.  Then they put strips of steak with the salad.  The bartender asked if I had any questions and I said, "Yeah, on the New York strip steak salad, how much steak do you get?"

 He said, "It's a regular sized 12 to 14 ounce New York strip.  Then they slice it into strips."

I said, "Can I get the steak rare?"  He said I could.  "Sold," I exclaimed.  

The Yard House is not only a pretty good restaurant, but it's an upscale sports bar, as well.  Dozens of flat screen televisions hang from the walls and around the bar area.  A Chicago Cubs game was on and I was glancing at that from time to time while I looked through that day's edition of the Chicago Tribune.  

 My steak salad showed up in a little while and it looked outstanding.  The steak was cut into deep red strips and the salad was a jumbled mass of veggies.  And from the first bite it was outstanding.  The steak was juicy and tender, the salad greens were fresh, including the veggies.  The little bit of gorgonzola on top of the meat was a great taste sensation.  It was simply wonderful.  I was highly surprised and very happy with what I got.  

As I was sitting there enjoying my meal, outside the storm front that had been brewing off to the west had finally hit.  High winds and howling rain forced a number of the people who were outdoors eating their meals inside.  Suddenly, the lights flickered and finally went out for a couple minutes.  Emergency lighting came on for a moment, then the electricity came back on.  As I left the restaurant later that evening, workers were picking up chairs, tables, umbrellas and other items that had been blown about by the storm.  It turned out that gusts of over 75 miles an hour had hit the area knocking power out to hundreds of thousands of electrical customers around the Chicago area.  The northern suburbs were especially hard hit with many people not getting their power back on for up to three days.  It was a tough drive back to the hotel with all the tree limbs and power lines down along and in the major streets and roads.  I was happy to find that my hotel in Skokie had power when I got there.

I really didn't know what to expect in terms of food quality at the Yard House.  But I was pleasantly surprised with the quality and the taste of the food- as well as the seemingly endless eclectic selections on the menu - at the Yard House.  I guess you'd have to call it "American Fusion" cuisine at the Yard House.  They take a lot of basic favorites and add a little splash to bring out some wonderful taste sensations.  I liked the Yard House a lot, not because they have a ton of beers to choose from, but more for the selection and quality of food.  In fact, to me, the beer will almost be a secondary reason I go back to a Yard House in my travels.  

But having close to 200 beers to choose from doesn't hurt... 

Dundee Dell - Omaha

I'm figuring the last time I was in the Dundee Dell in Omaha was probably 35 years ago. It was a dive bar of the highest quality, but had some sort of an endearing atmosphere to the place. I believe it was  the first place where I ever had a reuben sandwich and I sort of remember that I immediately liked what I was eating. When I found Pitch Coalfire Pizza, the pizza place that is owned by Godfather's Pizza founder Willy Thiesen, the Dundee Dell was just down the street. I made a point to go there for a sandwich at some point in the future. On a recent visit to Omaha, I had lunch at the Dundee Dell.

Dundee Dell is located at 5007 Underwood Ave. in the Dundee/Happy Hollow neighborhood of Omaha (see map). It's a bustling area both day and night and I was very lucky to get a parking spot right in front of the restaurant just after 1 p.m. When I walked in, I was immediately confused. This was not the same Dundee Dell that I remembered. And after reading some old articles on the wall, it turned out that it was not.

The original Dundee Dell was on Dodge Street, the main east-west drag through Omaha. It officially began in 1934, just after the repeal of prohibition. But Omaha historians say that it was probably open as a speakeasy before that. Three Depression-era brothers - the Cohens - were mobster/bootleggers who ran a speakeasy in the area during the height of Prohibition. They opened the Dundee Dell and ran it for a few years before selling it off.

I read somewhere that Dundee Dell had 11 different owners over the years before Pat Gobel bought the place in 1989. Gobel had an affinity for single malt scotch and began to procure bottles of rare and unique scotches to serve at his little place. He had a handful of friends who shared his passion for scotch whisky and he began serve a large number of single malts.

In 2000, Gobel bought the current property on Underwood and when he moved, he had a large parade up 50th street from the old Dundee Dell to the new location. I understand it was quite the party. The new Dundee Dell is larger and not quite as dingy as the old location. (The old location is still a bar. It's now called the Old Dundee Bar and Grill.) And his new location gave Gobel the chance to expand his liquor selection.

Today, Dundee Dell claims they have over 750 single malt scotches to choose from and served in pegs (1 ounce servings), drams (1.5 ounce servings), or full bottles. Some of the most obscure and rare single malts are available at Dundee Dell, making it a famous landmark amongst scotch aficionados both nationally and internationally. The have scotch boxes all along the walls and rafters of the place (pictured below left), as well as distillery memorabilia on the walls. 

In addition to all the single malt scotch they have, Dundee Dell also boasts an incredibly large selection of liquors to choose from. If you have a favorite drink and the bartender knows how to make it, they have it. Their "Isle of Spirits" behind the bar (pictured above right) is pretty damn impressive and would make even the most modest drunk salivate. 

Not only does Dundee Dell have a large single malt and liquor selection, but they also an impressive beer menu. Their beer list has over 200 different types of domestic, imported and micro-brewed craft beers to choose from. Dundee Dell is a tee-totalers worst nightmare.

Seated in a booth along the wall in the main dining area of Dundee Dell, I looked over the food menu to figure out what I wanted to eat that particular day. Of course, the reuben sandwiches are awesome at Dundee Dell, but I had been sort of "reubened out" from visits I'd had to other restaurants as of late. There were a number of sandwiches that caught my eye - the tuna melt, a French dip sandwich, and something called the "BBLT" which stood for Big Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato. They use thick slices of bacon on the BBLT and that was sort of tempting.

I wasn't really in the mood for a burger, but I got to looking at their fish section of the menu. Dundee Dell sells a lot of fish and chips dinners, it's one of their signature meals. But at the bottom of the fish menu, I noticed fish tacos. Oooo... I'm a sucker for good fish tacos, especially if they aren't breaded. The description said the cod was grilled, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's unbreaded.

When the waitress came to take my order, I asked her if the fish tacos were filled with grilled and unbreaded fish. She said, "Yes! That's exactly right. It's one of my favorite things on the menu!" So I ordered the fish tacos - two flour soft shells filled with grilled North Atlantic cod and topped with black bean salsa. Lettuce, chopped tomatoes, and a tangy chipotle ranch dressing comes on the side. I ordered a Sierra Nevada pale ale to go along with my meal.

I had just finished my Sierra Nevada when my fish tacos showed up. The cod filets were resting on the black bean salsa. And while the lettuce was fresh, I prefer cabbage on my fish tacos. Oh well, when in Omaha. I ordered another Sierra Nevada and dug in.

And quite actually, the fish tacos at Dundee Dell were very good. The cod was light and flaky and not very fishy tasting at all. With a little lettuce and tomato on top, I put a little bit of the chipotle ranch dressing on the tacos. The dressing was excellent - it had a little bit of a bite to the taste, but the fish, tomatoes and lettuce helped cut into the sharpness of the sauce. Two tacos were more than enough on a hot, dusty afternoon in Omaha. Three would have filled me up way too much, especially with a couple beers under my belt.

 

The Dundee Dell is one of those places that isn't fancy, but they've cut a niche in the market with the vast selection of Scotch, beers and liquors to choose from. And the food is above average, as well. The ambiance of the place is very laid back and inviting. And I was more than impressed with my fish tacos. The waitress asked me how I liked them and I said, "They were very, very good."

She said, "See? Didn't I tell you? It's my favorite summertime food here at the Dell."

35 years is too long to stay away from a place like the Dundee Dell. With Pitch just down the street and a handful of other restaurants and bars in the area, the Dundee neighborhood is quickly becoming one of my favorite destinations in Omaha.

Tilted Kilt - Peoria, IL

I had to do an early morning training in Peoria earlier this spring, so I ended up spending the night at the Hampton Inn at Grand Prairie, a new hotel next to the Shoppes of Grand Prairie shopping and entertainment complex on the northwest side of town. I noticed a sushi restaurant on the east side of the mall and decided to eat there that evening. However, after I checked in at the hotel and went back over to the restaurant I found it wasn't open yet as there was construction equipment inside. From the outside, it looked open. It was time to go to Plan B. Right next to the hotel was a place called the Tilted Kilt. It looked sort of like an Irish pub and I thought I'd just cut my losses early and go there for a bite to eat.

I'll have to say that the Tilted Kilt is quite interesting. I would categorize it as a three-sided combination of a Buffalo Wild Wings, an Irish/Scottish/English pub and a Hooter's with waitresses running around in short tartan skirts, matching tops that lift and compress their boobs until they look like they're ready to pop out, and white knee socks. It was easily a ratio of 19-1 men vs. women in the place, and I'm not too certain about the sexual preference of the women that I saw dining in the Tilted Kilt that evening.

I also wasn't certain if I'd ever heard of the Tilted Kilt before my visit there. The first Tilted Kilt opened in 2003 as part of the Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas and was founded by Mark DiMartino, the owner of the Tillerman in Las Vegas (for my visit to the Tillerman, click here). DiMartino, along with business partners John Reynaud and Shannon Reilly, conceived the Titled Kilt to be a "contemporary, Celtic-themed restaurant staffed with beautiful servers."

Not long after the Las Vegas Tilted Kilt opened, an Arizona businessman by the name of Ron Lynch visited the Rio and fell in love with the restaurant's concept. He approached DiMartino and his partners about the possibility of franchising the Tilted Kilt theme. Lynch bought the franchise rights to Tilted Kilt in 2005 and opened his first franchise location in Arizona the next year. The restaurant began to grow as DiMartino and his partners began to sell franchises. Many Tilted Kilt's have gone into what were old Bennigan's location that closed when that chain of Irish-themed restaurants declared bankruptcy in 2008 and closed 150 of their corporate-owned locations. Tilted Kilt is one of the fastest growing restaurant chains in the nation with 53 locations in 18 states. And more are in development.  They hope to have 300 Tilted Kilt locations across America and Canada within five years.  

However, one city didn't think that Tilted Kilt reflected the core values of their residents. Evanston, IL recently rejected an application for a liquor license for a proposed Tilted Kilt location in that city. City leaders had been presented with a petition of over 2000 names of people who opposed the opening of a Tilted Kilt in Evanston based primarily upon the suggestively clad young ladies who worked in the restaurant. Given that Evanston was a dry city up until the early 70's, there is still a large temperance movement in the city. Adding a bar that appears to glorify sexy women while selling booze was too much for some. The owner of the Tilted Kilt franchise is now looking to open a location in nearby Morton Grove.  In fact, Tilted Kilt looks to have 10 locations in the greater Chicago area by the end of this year.   

The menu at the Tilted Kilt locations are virtually the same with a combination of Scottish, Irish and English dishes such as Irish Stew, Fish and Chips and Shepherd's Pie. But the majority of the menu features your normal American-style bar food items and American-ized British Isle food. Actually, the menu is better than what you'd find at a Hooters.

 But the girls are the clear draw at the Tilted Kilt. I'm not trying to be disparaging, but most of the girls at the one in Peoria looked like they had been recruited from local gentlemen clubs as they all seemed to have over-sized breasts, helped in part by the push up tops that revealed a canyon of cleavage. (The picture at right is a stock photo I found on the Internet and are not of girls from the Peoria location.) But, they were all cute, yes, including the female bartender who waited on me that particular evening.

One of the "company policies" that Tilted Kilt employs is that the girls must be "personable" and be able to chat up the customers.  If time allows, Tilted Kilt even encourages their female servers to sit with their customers and carry on conversation.  I suppose this is to help garner more of a tip for the girls.

Not all of the servers at Tilted Kilt restaurants are female, however.  They do employ a number of men servers who wear man kilts.  They aren't as suggestively dressed as the female servers, but I suppose by having the waiters wear kilts, the restaurant somehow thinks that it will quell any outrage by feminist groups over the waitress' skimpy outfits. 

Pro basketball was prominently played on the number of flat screen televisions that hung from the walls all through the Tilted Kilt location in Peoria, which opened in late summer of 2010. I sat at the large wooden bar and the bartender dropped off a menu and I ordered up a Smithwick's, one of what looked like a couple dozen different types of beers they had to offer at the Tilted Kilt.

I could see right off the bat that the selection, while broad at the Tilted Kilt, was somewhat limited as to what I would call haute cuisine. They had burgers and your normal appetizers on the menu. About a half dozen different types of salads were available, as were a number of sandwiches including something called Fat Bastard's Meatloaf Sandwich. They also featured flat bread pizzas and entrees that included battered fish tacos, fried chicken and an Italian-herb seasoned chicken breast dish. I didn't necessarily see anything that really tripped my trigger and I was having a hard time trying to figure out what would be good to have that evening.

I finally decided upon the pastrami sandwich - you had your choice of traditional pastrami sandwich with Swiss cheese and spicy mustard, or reuben style with sauerkraut and Thousand Island dressing. I've been on a reuben kick for the past few months and I got the reuben style pastrami sandwich. As a side, you got your choice of sweet potato fries, garlic fries, onion rings, cottage cheese or a side salad. I decided to try their garlic fries.

The bartender, in addition that she wasn't bad to look at (below left - I know, I need a new phone with a better camera, and I recently got one), was very attentive to my beer levels and was also very accommodating when I forgot to ask for an extra side of Thousand Island dressing when I initially ordered my sandwich. She was cheery and friendly, chatting up the middle-aged businessmen who were not looking directly in her eyes. There seemed to be a number of local regulars at the bar, but there were also a number of guys from the two hotels that were walking distance from the Tilted Kilt.

Another waitress brought out my sandwich and it as your standard reuben sandwith on toasted swirl-marble rye bread (above right). The pastrami was thick, yet tender and pretty flavorful. It was a pretty good sandwich, actually. The garlic fries weren't all that garlicky, at least not as much garlic as I'm used to. They were pretty average, overall. But that was fine with me as I concentrated on the sandwich and not so much on the fries.

My first visit to a Tilted Kilt location was average, at best. The eye-candy is definitely the draw to the restaurant/pub, the food is your average bar food and they do have an abundance of televisions to watch any type of sporting event that is on at that time. The beer selection was sort of impressive, but typical of what you'd find at other places that have that similar sports bar/Irish pub theme that Titled Kilt had. I don't think my wife would like going into the place, but I know a number of friends who would and who would probably think the food was outstanding. But quite actually they'd be blinded from culinary reality by those short tartan skirts and those tight tops.

The Claddagh Irish Pub - Middleton, WI

Claddagh (pronounced "CLAW-duh) Irish Pubs are a chain of upscale authentic Irish pubs with 15 locations throughout the Midwest.  About four years ago, I had a brief entry on Road Tips about the original Claddagh in downtown Indianapolis (see that entry here).  I've had beers at a couple three Claddagh's during my travels and had always meant to eat at one, but had never gotten around to do so even though I've certainly had the opportunity to do so.  It was a cold evening in Madison and I didn't feel like venturing far from the hotel that evening.  The Claddagh Irish Pub was a short journey from my hotel and I figured some good ol' Irish comfort food would be in order that evening. 

One of the big reasons the Claddagh pubs appear to be authentic Irish pubs is that they were started by an Irishman and an American who lived in Ireland for a time.  Kevin Blair was an Cleveland-area native who worked for a number of years for the Taco Bell corporation when it was owned by Pepsi.  He was hired in the mid-90's to go to work at the Supermacs fast food chain in Ireland.  During Blair's stay in Ireland, he loved the feel of the Irish pubs and the many friends that he met while frequenting those pubs.  The Irish have a term - craic (pronounced "crack") that describes a place that is fun, lively and friendly.  Blair decided that the United States needed authentic Irish pubs with "craic".

Blair talked Supermacs chairman Patrick McDonagh to help him start a chain of upscale Irish pubs in the Midwestern United States.  In 2001, the first Claddagh Irish Pub opened in Indianapolis.  Both Blair and McDonagh were looking at aggressive growth during the first few years growing the chain to nearly 20 locations.  However, like most partnerships, this one went sour with McDonagh withholding funds to keep the company from expanding while trying to force Blair to sell his shares.  McDonagh had already invested over $20 million dollars into the Claddagh chain and wasn't willing to invest more money for expansion.  Lawsuits and court dates ensued and the chain eventually declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy.   McDonagh's CDG Acquisitions group came in and bought the assets for $10 million dollars in 2008, about an estimated third of the value of the Claddagh chain.

By the way, the Claddagh Irish Pubs get their name from a small fishing village - Claddagh - that was legendary for the friendliness of the people who lived there.  Many writers lived in Claddagh over the years (Claddagh is now part of Galway, Ireland - home to Pat McDonagh) and they wrote about the hospitality they received from the townspeople during their stay. 

Each Claddagh Irish Pub has a dining area, a bar and a handful of small rooms that feature overstuffed chairs giving the place sort of a cozy feel, allowing patrons to sit down with friends in a comfortable setting and enjoy a Guinness or a Jameson whiskey.   The dark wood walls and broad-beamed ceilings give Claddagh pubs an authentic Irish pub look.

I rolled into the parking lot of the Greenway Station shopping center in Middleton where the Claddagh is located (see map) around 7:30 p.m.  The Claddagh is located next to Cheeseburger in Paradise, the Jimmy Buffett-owned chain of upscale burger joints (click here to see my entry on Cheeseburger in Paradise) and the parking lot in front of the businesses were full of cars.  I was able to find a spot and I went in to get a seat at the bar.

The first thing I noticed behind the bar at the Claddagh was where there should have been bottles of different types of liquor, there were nothing but bottles of Jameson whiskey.  Yes, I was definitely in an Irish pub!  The bartender came over and asked if I wanted a menu.  I got a Smithwick's as I perused through the selection they had at the Claddagh and glanced up at a football game and a hockey match they had on the flat panel televisions behind the bar. 

Claddagh Irish Pubs have a wide selection of authentic Irish food including Shepherd's Pie, fish and chips, corned beef and cabbage, and Irish beef stew.  They also have some American-based foods with an Irish twist such as the Guinness barbecued ribs made with a Guinness bar barbecue sauce, the Jameson burger that's topped with a Jameson sauce, along with the normal staples - steaks, chicken and a couple of pasta dishes.  

I needed a "stick-to-my-ribs" dinner as it was cold and I was having trouble warming up.  I thought about the Chicken Kildare - a garlic encrusted chicken breast filled with spinach, mushrooms and Irish rasher (a type of Irish bacon).  The bangers and champ sounded good, too - Irish sausages served over Irish champ (baked potatoes) and topped with an onion gravy.  But what I ended up getting was the old fashioned meat loaf, topped with a sweet glaze and then served with mashed potatoes and gravy and a side of vegetables.   For a starter - and to help warm me up - I got a cup of the Guinness onion soup, basically a French onion soup that is made with a Guinness beer stock. 

I was seated next to a guy from Indianapolis who was in Madison on business and we got to talking.  He was a really nice guy, in his mid-to-late 30's, I'm guessing.  He said, "We've got three Claddagh's in the Indy area.  When I go on the road to Columbus, Cleveland or Cincinnati I always go to the Claddagh's there.  It's like a home away from home."  He said this was his first trip to Madison and he was surprised to find a Claddagh near his hotel.  Some people like that familiarity with their restaurants, I would rather explore.  Although, I have to admit that it's getting tiresome to find new and exciting places in some locations. 

The Guinness onion soup was very good - a large crouton was on top along with an ample amount of Swiss cheese.  Large onion chunks were in the broth that had a hint of a taste of Guinness to it.  Actually, a bowl of the soup alone would have been a good meal.

The bartender brought out my plate to me and I sort of looked at it funny.  It certainly didn't look like meat loaf to me - and it wasn't.  It was the Irish beef stew.  It looked very good, but it wasn't what I ordered.  I got the bartender's attention and pointed out that I think I got the wrong meal.  He said, "You had the beef stew, right?"  I said, no, I had the meat loaf.  "Ah!  Yes, the meat loaf!"  He said he'd get me the right meal straight away.  That's the problem with people who don't write down your order - they space out from the time they take your order and then enter it into the system.  But he did give me a free beer for waiting.

And the wait was worth it.  I was served two large slices of meat loaf that had a nice smoky glaze on top the slices.  There was a little bit of a heavy beef gravy on the slices of meat loaf, but the mashed potatoes were swimming in the gravy - just as I like it.  The vegetables were a medley of broccoli, cauliflower and carrott slices.  

Everything was very good - the meat loaf was flavorful and hearty, the mashed potatoes were real and the rich, thick gravy was a great compliment to the meat and potatoes.  The vegetables were also cooked perfectly with a little bit of a crunch with each bite.  The meal was exactly what I was looking for - generous portions of good ol' comfort food on a cold late fall evening.

The guy from Indy next to me had the Shepherd's pie.  "I've tried the meat loaf before," he said.  "I like it, but I think these guys make about the best Shepherd's pie I've ever had in the States." 

After I finished what I could of the meal, I sat at the bar savoring my meal, watching the football game and enjoying one more Smithwick's.  The guy from Indy had polished off his Shepherd's pie and had ordered the bread pudding for dessert.  On the menu, the bread pudding comes under the heading of "split to share" desserts.  And it was huge, easily covering an 8" dessert plate.  And this guy was going to eat the whole thing!  And he did!  I said, "Jesus, buddy!  You need to watch it!  I was your size one time and when I started traveling on the road that's when I started to gain weight.  When you have a company credit card and you're in a city far from home, it's not hard to over-indulge." 

He said, "Oh, I know it.  I've gained 15 pounds over the past couple of years.  This (pointing at the bread pudding) doesn't help, but it's so darned good that I have to indulge myself every once in a while." 

I'm glad I finally got to try the food at one after stopping in for just the beer on my previous visits.  The meat loaf was very good, the portions were generous, the Smithwick's was great (any place that has Smithwick's on tap is OK by me) and the service - other than screwing up my order - was adequate.  There are Claddagh Irish Pubs in four of the cities that I travel to and now that I know that the food is very good, I'll go back at some point when I just need the feel of some comfort food in my tummy. 

CND Gyros and Lounge - Chicago

A casual acquaintance of mine who I run into a couple three times a year in the Quad Cities - WQAD news anchor Jason Fechner - was telling me a while back about this hole-in-the-wall lounge in downtown Chicago that he's known about since his days in college.  The name - CND Gyros and Lounge - was intriguing enough.  What Jason stressed to me was that it was the quintessential dive bar with great gyros and burgers.  "This is the kind of place you'd love," he told me one evening over a couple beers during the Christmas holiday last December.  I made it my mission to give it a shot at some point.

I was in downtown Chicago one evening in late January, staying at the Hilton Garden Inn on East Grand at State.  Jason had told me that CND Gyros was on East Grand just east of Michigan Ave.  (East Grand goes underneath Michigan Ave.)  It was about a five minute walk on a cool night when I went there around 8:30 p.m.  It turned out that the lounge was open until 10 p.m., but I was told by the raspy-voiced lady behind the bar that when food orders are slow, they'll close the kitchen early sometimes.  Ohhh, OK.  I ended up walking back to the hotel and having dinner at the Weber Grill Restaurant, so the evening wasn't a total waste. 

I was back in Chicago in the Spring and happened to stay at the Hilton Garden Inn again.  This time, it was a warm evening as I walked down busy East Grand to CND Gyros and Lounge (see map).  The place is situated just to the east of the corner of N. St. Clair and East Grand, right next to the Volare Restaurant, an Italian restaurant that is favored by the local population.  (I really need to try Volare at some point.) 

  
CND Gyros and Lounge is owned and operated by John Xamplas, a Grecian immigrant who has run the place for years and years.  How the "CND" name came about borders on legend.   The story I got is that when Xamplas bought the business a guy by the name of Chris owned the building next door.  Xamplas couldn't come up with a name for his place, so he decided to call it "Chris Next Door" or shortened to CND.  I don't know if that's the true story, but that's the one I heard. 

The menu for the restaurant is located in the front window of the restaurant/lounge.  Not only is CND Gyros known for their gyros and burgers, they also have a homemade chili that is supposed to be pretty good.  "Behind our gyros, our chili is the second best seller on the menu," the same raspy-voiced bartender told me.  They also have something called a "Gyro Melt" - a Texas Toast sandwich with gyro meat topped with grilled cheese and cheddar cheese.  While the Gyro Melt sounded interesting, I wanted to give their regular gyro a try. 

I walked in and the kitchen was open this time.  Not knowing the drill at the place, I stepped up to the counter at the kitchen under the "Order Here" sign and ordered a gyro.  The guy behind the counter asked me if I wanted a "gyro sandwich or a gyro platter."  The gyro platter basically came with french fries.  No, I'll just get the regular gyro. 

While he made up my gyro, an elderly guy came to take my money.  It turned out this was John Xamplas, the owner.  On the right is a picture of John behind the counter. 

What I really wanted was to have a beer in the lounge area of the restaurant.  I figured that they made the food up front and then you had to order the beer at the bar.  I got my gyro - it was in a plain brown paper bag - and I went to the bar to order an Old Style.  "Bottle or draw, darlin'," the raspy-voiced bartender asked.  I got it in a bottle.  It wasn't cheap - $3.50 a bottle.  Yow!  But, yes, I was in downtown Chicago and it certainly beat the $7.00 bottles of beer I was buying out in Hawaii. 

I found a table in the back of the place and sat down to eat my gyro.  Actually, instead of a gyro on a flat piece of pita, this was more of a pita pocket.  Two chunks of tomatoes were at the top and the tsaksiki sauce was served in a cup on the side.  The pita pocket was stuffed full of the gyro meat and I have to say it was very good.  The meat was a little salty, but the onions were fresh and forward tasting.  It was pretty damn good. 

Equally impressive was the cold beer.  Now, I like cold beer.  And the beer at CND Gyros was ice cold.  It was a great compliment to the very good gyro I finished in rather quickly. 

    
I decided to go back up to the bar and have another beer.  There weren't many people in the place, only a handful of people eating gyros.  I understand that it can get pretty packed during the lunch hour and later in the evening, especially on weekends when they have karaoke on Friday nights.  I ordered up another ice cold beer from the friendly bartender and took a good look around the place.  Even though there were pennants, team pictures and other sports memorabilia on the walls of CND Gyro and Lounge, they had a sitcom on a regular national network on the two televisions behind the bar.  I thought it was rather strange considering the Cubs were playing on television that evening. 

There was a great stained glass ceiling light above the bar area.  Behind the bar was cluttered with lottery tickets, signs and notices, liquor bottles and a line up of beer bottles of the brands they sold.  You could tell from conversations going on between the bartender and some of the people seated at the bar these were regulars who were there. 

Jason was right.  It was the exact kind of joint that I love - a homey, comfortable dive bar that just happened to have very good gyros.  It's far from fancy, but it's not a skid row slum bar, either.  I'm not certain they've changed the decor or many of the fixtures since when they first took over the place.  And that's helps add to the charm of CND Gyros and Lounge.  It's not a tourist destination by any stretch, but I can see why the locals in Chicago keep coming back for the great gyros and cold beer.  I may have to come back in the winter and try a bowl of chili with a cold beer.  Actually, that doesn't sound too bad in the middle of the summer. 

(Update - Jason went into Chicago on August 21 for one last meal at CND Gyros.  As his comment below states, the owner, John Xamplas decided 37 years was long enough.  It's not that he wanted to close, but his lease expired and the building had been sold to a new landlord - a new landlord who obviously saw the old building has being more of a liability than an asset.  Jason told me it was a bittersweet occasion - one that he'd remember for years.  I'm glad that I was able to, at least, have one experience at CND Gyros.)

Six Pence Pub - Savannah, GA

We got into Savannah on a sultry Sunday afternoon around 1:30 p.m.  After getting our bags and our rental car, we got to our hotel - the Hilton DeSoto - about 2:15.  We went to check in and our room wasn't ready at that time.  The girl at the desk said it wouldn't be long and they could store our luggage if we wanted to come back in about an hour.

Cindy was getting kind of hungry and we asked if there was any place around to get something to eat.  The girl at the front desk said, "We have a restaurant here." 

 

I said, "Yeah, but we're probably going to be eating there while we're here.  Any place close where we can get a sandwich and a beer?"

She immediately said, "Oh, yes.  Just right over there (pointing over her shoulder to the northwest) is a great little English pub."   We went back out the front door and almost caddy-cornered from the hotel was a little pub called the Six Pence Pub (see map).   The place offered outdoor seating, but the tables were full.  We went inside and waited for the hostess to come and seat us. 

We were seated at a small table just off the bar area.  The place was about half full and they had the Indianapolis 500 on the television at the bar.  A few people were watching the race, but mostly they were in conversation with one another over a cold beer. 

The Six Pence Pub in Savannah is one of a family of three Six Pence Pubs in the Southeast.  There is one in the Charlotte area at Fort Mill, SC, and one in Blowing Rock, NC.  The menu is typical of what you'd find in an authentic English pub.  They had the usual "Bangers and Mash", Fish and Chips, and Shepherd's Pie.  They also had a series of burgers, sandwiches, soups and salads to choose from.  

And just as nearby Chippewa Square was featured prominently in the movie Forrest Gump, It turns out the Six Pence Pub was featured in a major scene from the 1995 Julia Roberts, Dennis Quaid  movie Something to Talk About.  The front window of the Six Pence Pub was where Julia Roberts' character saw her husband, played by Quaid, with another woman and a confrontation took place on the street across from the Six Pence Pub.  I don't know if I've ever seen that movie, or if I did, I don't remember it. 

I wasn't overly hungry after having a big breakfast at the Milwaukee airport, but Cindy has to have three square meals a day or she can't function.  When our waitress showed up to ask us what we wanted, I just ordered a Smithwick's.  Cindy asked, "What kind of pale ale's do you have?"

I said to the waitress, "You probably have Bass, don't you?"

She said, "We do, yes."

Cindy said, "Bass is a little too heavy for me."

The waitress said, "We have a local beer out of Atlanta called Sweetwater 420.  That's a good pale ale." 

Cindy said she'd take that.

The decor in the Six Pence Pub features a lot of dark wood paneling along with an antique tin ceiling.  There are faux antique ceiling fans and lights hanging from the tin.  The main dining room was long and narrow, making for a cozy environment. 

As I said, I wasn't overly hungry so I went with the Tuna Salad salad - generous portions of tuna salad over a bed of lettuce.  You got your choice of dressing and I went with a basic vinegar and oil dressing combo.  Cindy also had tuna salad, only this was a sandwich.  She also got a cup of Six Pence Pub's Manhattan clam chowder. 

Cindy told me, "Take a drink of this beer."  I took a drink and deemed it to be "not too bad."  Actually, it was pretty good. 

I said, "What was the name of that beer?"

Cindy said, "I don't remember, but we need to find out."

When I finished my Smithwick's before our lunch came, I asked the waitress, "What is the beer my wife is having?"

She said, "Sweetwater 420.  It's a microbrew out of Atlanta." 

I said, "I want one of those."  It was very good.  It reminded me more of a good west coast pale ale, like a Sierra Nevada, and it was very good for a warm summer-like afternoon.

Our food came out and I have to say the portion of tuna salad and lettuce leaves were perfect.  It wasn't a lot of food, but enough to put something in my stomach.  We didn't have much of an idea where or even when we would eat that evening, so getting something in the gut before dinner was probably pretty smart. 

Cindy's tuna sandwich and Manhattan clam chowder was pronounced as "good".  She said, "This was all I needed."  Once Cindy gets to fading and needs food, she can be impossible to be around.  This kept her happy and good-to-go for the time being. 

The Six Pence Pub was a cool place.  I thought of my neighbor, George, because he's big on old English and Irish pubs.  I kept thinking that he would have loved this place.  I knew we probably wouldn't be spending much time in bars during our trip to Savannah - there was going to be too much to do and see.  But given the close proximity to our hotel, I knew we'd be back for a cold beer.  The funny thing was, we never did.  We found there were a number of good English and Irish pubs in and around the Savannah area for us to visit.  But for our first meal in Savannah, we certainly weren't disappointed with the Six Pence Pub.

Slim McGinn's West - Brookfield, WI

Working for a day with one of our national distributors during a recent visit to Milwaukee, I invited the branch manager out to lunch.  He said, "Where do you want to go?"  I told him some place local, no national chain and who had a good sandwich.  He said, "Come with me," and he promptly drove me to Slim McGinn's West (see map).

Slim McGinn's West is the third location for the original Slim McGinn's that was established in the Walker's Point area of Milwaukee, south of downtown (see map).  But most of the locals call the place just plain ol' "Slim's".  The second Slim McGinn's, known as "McGinn's" is located on West Bluemound near the Miller Park area (see map).

And, yes, there really is a Slim McGinn.  R.J. "Slim" McGinn (right) worked at a number of restaurants and bars in the Milwaukee before opening up his own bar/restaurant in 1995.  The original "Slim's" is housed in a building that has been a bar of one type or another for over 100 years.

Earlier this year, Slim McGinn's opened up the Slim's West location in what was the old Meadow Inn in Brookfield.  It carries on the tradition of the Slim McGinn's in the area with good food, great beer and lots of televisions to watch sports.

We got into Slim McGinn's West around 2 p.m. and there was just a handful of people in the place.  We sat at a table near the bar and carried on a conversation about the audio business.  Our waitress showed up with a couple menus and we were so engrossed in conversation that we didn't get around to ordering for another 20 minutes or so.  I could kind of tell that she was getting a little annoyed when she came back on her fourth time and we hadn't even looked at the menus yet.  I finally said that we needed to order something or we may get tossed out of the place. 

Slim's menu is something a little more broad than most Irish bar fare.  In addition to sandwiches and burgers, they also offer steaks, meatloaf, Shepherd's Pie and ribs.  They also have some eclectic add-ons to their burgers and chicken sandwiches such as an Irish whiskey peppercorn sauce and a spinach and artichoke Florentine topping.

The waitress came back and we said we were ready to order.  My guest asked if they had the Reuben salad that day.  The waitress said, "Yes, we do!"

He asked me, "Do you like Reubens?"

I replied, "I was probably going to get the Reuben."

He said, "You'll love the Reuben salad they make here.  It's unbelievably delicious!

So, I ordered the Reuben and I got one choice for a side and I took the Reuben salad.  I was intrigued by what a Reuben salad could be. 

My guest ordered the Irish beef sandwich - shredded beef along with carrots, potatoes and onion, then topped with a Guinness gravy over an open faced Kaiser roll.  And he got the Reuben salad as his side, as well.

The Reuben salad they make is cole slaw with bits of corned beef and swiss cheese mixed in with a side of Slim's homemade Thousand Island dressing.  When it came to the table with the sandwiches, I sort of looked at it, then gave it a try.  It was great.  Like my guest said, it was unbelievably delicious.

And my sandwich was very good, as well.  It featured large pieces of corned beef that were very tender and juicy.  It was a good sized sandwich, so the Reuben salad was a perfect compliment to the meal.

My guest's sandwich looked absolutely fabulous.  It had large chunks of shredded beef with pieces of potatoes, carrots and onions in a great looking gravy topping.  I think I should have gotten that.  And now that I know they have something like that I'll get it on my next visit.

I've probably driven by the original Slim's dozens of times during my visits to Milwaukee, but I'm going to make a point to go there sometime in the future.  But the one out in Brookfield was very good and had a lot of character to the place, even though it had only been open for about four months.   I'm glad I was turned on to Slim's and it won't be my last visit.

Muldoon's - Wheaton, IL

Special thanx to Road Tips reader Tim Schmidt who once again turned me on to a great little restaurant that serves good burgers in the Chicago area - Muldoon's in suburban Wheaton (see map).  Muldoon's is part of a corporate triumvirate of Irish bars in the Chicago area along with the famous Tommy Nevins Pub in Evanston (with a location in Naperville), and The Kerry Piper in Willowbrook. 

Muldoon's has been in business since 2002 and is a popular lunch and dinner spot in downtown Wheaton.  Parking can be a little tricky around there, especially during the daytime.  I was able to find parking on the street just down the way from the pub.  The place is situated on a corner with great visibility.  It's tough to miss when you're driving by.

It was a beautiful Friday when I got into Muldoon's around 1:30.  I got a seat at the bar and a very personable curly red-haired bartender by the name of Andy handed me a menu.  Sometimes overly friendly bartenders or waiters come off as fakes, but I could immediately tell Andy would be the kind of guy you'd like to have a beer with.  I ordered a Smithwick's while I looked at the menu.

Although other things on the menu looked pretty damn tempting, including the Belle Isle Reuben sandwich, I ordered up a Holy Swiss burger - an 8 oz. Black Angus patty topped with sauteed mushrooms, grilled onions and swiss cheese on marble rye bread.  I think that was what Tim told me to get, so I went that route.  A side of french fries accompanied the burger. 

The interior of Muldoon's has dark wood paneling throughout.  It's actually not a small place.  But with a main dining area and seating in the bar, it still has a nice cozy feel to the place. 

After about 15 minutes, Andy brought out my burger.  It was very similar to the Hackney burger I've had many times before with the burger served on slices of marble rye bread.  (That reminds me, I need to do an in-depth review of Hackney's sometime in the near future.)  And the Muldoon's Holy Swiss burger was every bit as good as Hackney's.  The beef was moist, tender and flavorful.  The mushrooms were fresh, and even though I normally don't like to get grilled onions (because they don't like me) these weren't strong and didn't upset my stomach. 

With a couple of Smithwick's and tip, the bill came to a little over $21 bucks.  I probably over-tipped Andy a little bit, but he was just great.  I really wish I could have stayed and drank beer all afternoon with him waiting on me, but I had to go on down the road. 

So, thanks, Tim!  Muldoon's is a great find and one that I recommend in the western suburbs of Chicago.  I'll definitely be back sometime soon.

Yard House - Glenview, IL

After our meal at El Jardin Norte when we were in the Chicago area last fall with our friends Scott and Marcia Schroeder, and Dave and Pat Heusmann, we spied a place across the street in the Glen Town Center called the Yard House.  On their sign it said, "World's Largest Selection of Draft Beer".  I said, "OK, kids, I've got to go in and see this." 

Sure enough, the Yard House had over 130 spigots on a two-sided rectangular wall in the center of a large rectangular bar .  There were some duplications of the more popular beers on each side just because of their shear size of the bar area. 

On their web site, they list over 180 beers that they have at their disposal at their many locations.  Now, I've been to beer bars before where they may have over 100 beers available, but most of those are in bottles and not on draft.  It was truly amazing to see the rows of spigots with the different beers.  I had to take a slow lap around the bar just to see what they had. 

The original Yard House began in 1996 when former Denver resident Steele Platt opened the first location in Long Beach, Ca.  Platt had earlier sold his interest in the Boiler Room - a Denver bar that specialized in serving a number of different brands of beer.  Platt had run the Boiler Room for about 15 years before pulling up stakes and moving west. 

Platt's concept was to offer good food, a great selection of beer and good music in his restaurants.  The first Yard House had a two story keg room with five miles of beer lines going to the bar.  At any given time, the Yard House could move 6,000 gallons of beer through its line system.  That same delivery design is used in the other Yard House locations.   

In August of 2007, Platt sold majority interest of Yard House USA to TSG Consumer Partners, an investment group from the San Francisco area.  Platt still is involved with the business as they look to expand in the coming years.  There are now 18 Yard House locations in eight states with 3 more scheduled to open within the first part of 2008.  The company doesn't plan to franchise any locations, keeping all of the Yard House locations under private control. 

As it was a Saturday night when we were in there, the place was pretty packed.  We managed to find three seats at the bar for the ladies to sit on.  We took a look at the menu of available beers and I ordered up a Smithwick's.  I think Dave got the same.  I forget what Scott got, but the girls were able to talk the bartender in allowing them samples of some of the beers.

They did serve food, but I didn't study the food menu as I wasn't hungry.  But I thought this would have to be a place that I'd have to come back and try their food.  From looking at the menu on the web site, it appears they have some pretty interesting items on their menu. 

I was standing near the women and Pat asked me, "Are you familiar with all these beers, Will?"

Cindy just laughed.  "Oh, I'm sure he is, Pat."

So, I took a look at the beer menu and I went down the list of available beers and told Pat if I'd ever had them before or not.  They had about 110 beers listed and I have to say that I had sampled the vast majority of them.  Pat was amazed, but Cindy said, "I don't know if that's something I'd be proud of." 

Hey, I wasn't bragging - it was just a fact.

The Yard House had a number of televisions throughout the place, most of them turned to sporting events.  They also had classic 60's, 70's and 80's rock playing throughout the place.  And it wasn't at an ear-splitting level that made conversation all but impossible.  Actually, the music they were playing was pretty damn good.   

I was surprised to learn about the Yard House (which derives its name from the yard long glasses of beer handed to carriage drivers in England long ago when they'd make a stop at a rest house) as I'd never heard of it before.  We only stayed for a beer or two as everyone was still pretty full from dinner and it was getting late.  But I'm definitely going back for a meal sometime and I'll be sure to let you know how the food is.   

Ear Inn - New York

After our set up day before the AES Convention in New York recently, my colleague, Todd, suggested we go have a beer at a West SoHo landmark, the Ear Inn (see map).  He said, "You'll love this place, Will.  It's a great old Irish bar."

The Ear Inn may be Manhattan's oldest bar.  The building it's housed in - the James Brown House - was built sometime around 1817, and possibly even before that.  James Brown, legend has it, was an ex-slave who fought in the American Revolutionary War.  He sold tobacco in the ground floor of the house, which is now the Ear Inn, until he sold it in 1832.  I believe it became an apothecary shop after that.   

Even though the sign above the entrance of the Ear Inn says "Est. 1817 A.D.", it appears it never became a bar until the late 1880's when an Irish immigrant by the name of Thomas Cloke turned the shop into a place where longshoreman could come for a beer and some food after work.  In fact, there's a historical sign next to the Ear Inn that shows where the levee of the Hudson River once was.  Through land reclamation, the banks of the Hudson were moved about 200 yards to the west of the Ear Inn.

How the place got to be called the Ear Inn is sort of strange, but interesting.  The West Soho area was nearly abandoned when the commercial waterfront area moved to other areas of New York.  In the early 70's, a bohemian lifestyle movement was happening in the area.  A young college student by the name of Rip Hayman found the building in complete disarray.  Cleaning it up and fixing some broken windows, Hayman and some others lived in the building while publishing a music magazine called "The Ear". 

In 1972, the building was put on the list of historical landmarks named by the city's Landmarks Preservation Commission.    Hayman eventually bought the building and instead of jumping through bureaucratic hoops to get the OK to redo the building's facade and putting up a new sign out front, he just painted over part of the "B" on the "Bar Inn" sign.  Suddenly, it became the "Ear Inn".

Today, Martin Sheridan and Jerry Walker co-own the Ear Inn, along with the James Brown House.  They've made numerous improvements to the property and the second floor is a combination private party room/historical museum. 

The Ear Inn has a delightful mix of people who frequent the place.  In the mid to late afternoon, you'll find some older people who sit in the place and catch up on the neighborhood gossip.  As the work day ends, a mix of both blue collar and white collar workers converge on the place to have a beer before going home.  Then later in the evening, the hip crowd shows up for drinks and food. 

With the weather unseasonably warm for early October, we sat outside in an area along the sidewalk as the sun was setting over the hills in New Jersey.  I went inside to order some beers for Todd, our other colleague Simon, and myself.  I was surprised to find they didn't have Smithwick's beer either on tap or available in a bottle.  But I was pleasantly surprised to find they had Sierra Nevada Pale Ale on tap.  So I got one of those.  And I got a Guinness for Todd and a Boddington's for Simon. 

While I was waiting to order, I got swept up in a conversation with two older guys sitting at the bar.  Both had obviously been in the bar for a good portion of the afternoon and they were having a good time.  Standing there talking while waiting on my order, I got a good look around the place.  The crowd seemed friendly enough and the decor made the place look like what I would call an "elegant dive bar". 

I really didn't get a chance to take a look at the Ear Inn's menu, but I was told they have the usual bar food including burgers, sandwiches and appetizers.  And it's very good.  Todd, who grew up on Prince Edward Island, says the P.E.I. mussels and clams they serve are excellent. 

After a couple three beers, Todd's girlfriend from NYC - Jennifer - and our Focal Professional dealer from Los Angeles - Fred Z (that's it, just Fred Z) - met up with us so we could go out to dinner.  We thought about having dinner at the Ear, but decided to go to another restaurant down the way.  Besides, it looked like there was going to be a wait to get a table. 

We moved on, but came back after dinner because Simon left his laptop computer outside next to where we were seated.  Fully thinking that it wouldn't be there when we got back to the Ear Inn, Simon was bummed out.  But unbelievably, it was still there - a full two hours after he left it at the same exact spot where he found it.  In celebration, we had to have one more beer at the bar.      

The New York Times once called the Ear Inn "a dump with dignity."  There's a lot of history in and around the Ear Inn and it's a cool, friendly neighborhood bar.  It's fun and relaxed - exactly what I look for in a bar in which to unwind.  I'd go back there in a moment's notice.          

Sanford's Grub and Pub - Dickinson, ND

I put on a dealer earlier this year in Dickinson, ND.  Dickinson is a long, long way from Davenport.  It's a 13 hour drive - one way.  It's in the Mountain Time Zone.  I must be crazy for putting on a guy that far from home.  But I promised that I'd be out at least once a year to look after this dealer, and part of the reason for the Dakotas Trip earlier this summer was to go see him. 

After our meeting/training session, we went out for dinner to a new place in Dickinson, but one that has been around for a few years in the Rocky Mountain and Western Plains states - Sanford's Grub and Pub.  Sanford's started in Wyoming when a bunch of college buddies decided to try their hand at a restaurant that served good food, had a lot of beers to choose from and had a ton of TV's to watch sports on.  They later expanded into Colorado, South Dakota, and now North Dakota.  The Dickinson location opened earlier this year.

Now, Dickinson is in the literal middle of nowhere, so I wasn't expecting much from this place.  I thought, "OK, I'll just go with the flow tonight and see what happens."

Actually, Sanford's Grub and Pub reminded me of a little mix each of a T.G.I. Friday's, an Old Chicago, an Applebee's, a Buzzard Billy's, a Joe's Crab Shack, and an ESPN Zone.  It had all this crap all over the walls and hanging from the ceiling, along with about 30 televisions.  They had perky waitresses who oozed sweetness.  And they had over 40 beers on tap to choose from.  That was a plus.  But they were trying to be too many things for one place.  And I was a little wary of that fact. 

Sanford's menu also features a little bit of everything - steaks, sandwiches, burgers, appetizers and salads.  They also had a number of dishes that featured Cajun specialties, as well.  They're famous for their deep fried pickles, a delicacy that we didn't partake in.  In fact, a lot of their appetizers were of the deep fried variety.  We ended up getting some chicken wings and the Baja Bites - small pieces of grilled chicken wrapped in a tortilla shell.  They weren't bad. 

For the main entree, my dealer went with the shrimp and Parmesan linguine - a Parmesan cream sauce covering linguine infused with shrimp, mushrooms and chives.  It sounded great, but I went with the BBNY - a Cajun seasoned New York strip steak, topped with chunks of garlic and sauteed mushrooms.  That sounded almost sinful.

I have to say my steak wasn't bad - but it wasn't great.  The meat was a little tough for a medium rare steak, but the Cajun seasoning and the mushroom and garlic topping made up for the lack of tenderness with a great taste sensation.

My dealer had never gotten the linguine before, but he said he was very satisfied with it.  It looked good and he said it tasted very good. 

I encountered a couple other Sanford's Grub and Pub's on my trip through the Dakotas, but I didn't think the food was worth stopping in a second location.  For Dickinson, I'm sure it was pretty good.  But, then again, since it was my first trip to Dickinson, I don't know if there's anything better than Sanford's.  I'd like to think so, but for what it is, Sanford's does a good job.  I just wish they'd concentrate on doing one thing and doing it great.      

Patrick McGovern's Pub - St. Paul

I was in the Twin Cities a few weeks ago calling on accounts and I offered to meet one of my dealers for dinner as we couldn't get together during business hours.  He suggested an Irish pub in downtown St. Paul called Patrick McGovern's Pub (see map).

Patrick McGovern's in downtown St. Paul.

I'm not overly familiar with downtown St. Paul, not like I am with Minneapolis.  But with the new Xcel Energy Center just down the street, the area has become revitalized over the past few years. 

Patrick McGovern's is run by Patrick Boehmer, who has owned the place for 34 years.  Patrick McGovern's started as a small corner Irish pub, then took over the space next to it just to the south a few years ago.  Recently, they expanded to an outside patio area with a full service bar.  They also have a party/meeting room upstairs for receptions or parties.

Actually, we were going to meet there for dinner on a Wednesday night, but it turned out that Elton John was playing at the Xcel Energy Center that night.  My dealer said, "It's going to be a zoo downtown if we go.  Let's do it on Thursday night."

So, we did.  I got to Patrick McGovern's around 7 p.m. and sidled up to the bar and grabbed a Summit Extra Pale Ale.  The bar area has a very warm feel to it, heavy on the dark walnut paneling.  The bar, itself, looks to be well worn - possibly older than the 34 years Patrick McGovern's has been around.

Due to traffic (the main roads around the Twin Cities always seem to be under construction), my dealer didn't show up until about 7:30.  We sat at the bar and talked for about a half hour before we retreated to a booth in the half-full bar area for dinner.

Patrick McGovern's menu is varied with steaks, burgers, pork chops and ribs.  They also featured a number of comfort food items on the menu.  One that jumped out at me was the meat loaf on sourdough bread, with homemade mashed potatoes and gravy.  I was a little hungover from going to the Twins game the night before, I thought I needed to have a "stick-to-your-ribs" meal.

My dealer ordered his favorite - Jalapeno Halibut sticks.  They're basically halibut filets cut into fingerling sizes, then dredged in a breading with chunks of jalapenos and deep fried.  They sounded good, but I stuck with my meat loaf.

And the portions were huge.  The waitress brought me a huge piece of meatloaf - close to a pound of meat - on a large slice of homemade sour dough bread, with the mashed potatoes and it was all topped with a great beef gravy.  Oh, it was a spot hitter.

Total bill with our food and beer came to just over $40 with a tip.  It was a lot of food for not a lot of money. 

There's plenty of parking in the immediate area in the form of parking ramps just to the west of the place.  If you're up in the Twin Cities and want a change of scenery from downtown Minneapolis, Patrick McGovern's Pub is a great place for a cold beer and a good meal. 

Firkin - Libertyville, IL

Firkin in the northern Chicago suburb of Libertyville, IL (see map) is reminiscent of an old English pub right down to the cask hand drawn beers they serve.  In fact the term, Firkin, is what the English use to call the volume size of a keg of beer. 

Once again, I didn't know whether to call this a "beer bar" or a "restaurant" because both fit the description of Firkin very well.  They have over 25 different beers to choose from including over 15 beers on draft.  But they also have an extensive menu with some very good food, as well. 

Now, Firkin in Libertyville is not to be confused with the Canadian Firkin Pubs which is putting franchise locations across the U.S.  This is a one of a kind experience.

Firkin is one of two side-by-side restaurants owned by Rick Jamsen - the other being the upscale American-style steak house, The Tavern.  While The Tavern is more of a buttoned-down place that has been in existence since the early 80's, Firkin is more of a "business-casual" restaurant that has been open now for nine years.

(I've eaten at The Tavern a couple three times and I'll do a report on that place coming up very soon.)   

Although it faces Milwaukee Ave in downtown Libertyville, you enter Firkin from the rear of the building - there's plenty of parking behind the business in a city parking lot.  Go down a long hallway and the bar is on your left and the tables for the dining area are on your right.  A number of colorful lights adorn the ceiling area of Firkin, giving a festive feel to the place.

I went to dinner with a friend of mine, Steve Weiner, and his girlfriend when I was in Libertyville on business recently.  We walked from his house to Firkin, not any more than three blocks away.  Libertyville is one of those great Chicagoland suburb communities that features some pretty good restaurants in the area.  My friend says that's one of the reasons he likes to live in Libertyville. 

We were seated at a table along the wall and each of us ordered up a beer from their extensive list of fine ales.  Steve and his girlfriend each got a Maredsous 6 from Duvel, a fine Belgian Pale Ale that looks dark, but has a light beer taste to it; and I got a Great Lakes Burning River Pale Ale - one of my favorite Pale Ale's, and one that's tough to find outside of Ohio.

Firkin had a series of dinner specials the evening I was there, including a great looking soft shell crab with pasta in a white sauce dish.  Of course, they'd sold out of it by the time we got there.  I ended up getting the horseradish encrusted halibut - a breaded halibut with horseradish incorporated within. 

My buddy got the hot Caribbean sandwich - a grilled pork loin, smoked ham, topped with a spicy sauce.  His girlfriend got the Spinach Chicken sandwich - a grilled chicken breast topped with a creamed spinach sauce and cheese.  Both looked great.

And my horseradish encrusted halibut was good - not great, but very edible.  There wasn't much of a horseradish taste to it, but the fish was flaky, encased in a light breading.  It came with garlic mashed potatoes and a cream sauce.  It was surprisingly a very light meal.

Our waiter was attentive and informative.  He got a good tip.  Our final bill ended up around $60 for the three of us, including tip. 

If you're looking for a good meal at reasonable prices in a place that caters to men and women in business suits or golf shirts and shorts, Firkin is a wonderful place to visit.  I've eaten there four or five times and have never been disappointed.

The Sanctuary Pub - Iowa City

This was a tough decision - is The Sanctuary Pub a great beer bar with over 15 beers on tap and over 100 bottled beers - both domestic and imports - to choose from?  Or is it a great pizza joint with excellent thin crust pizza and fresh natural toppings?

Actually, it's a lot of both. 

The Sanctuary is known as having a number of good and eclectic beers to choose from, and they're also known as a place to get one of the best pizzas in Iowa City.

One of the things this blog sort of makes me do is to visit new restaurants - or revisit ones that I used to go to, but haven't been to in a number of years.  The Sanctuary is the latter, in this case.  I used to go to The Sanctuary a lot years ago, especially when one of my dealers had his store right next to the pub on Gilbert Street just south and east of downtown Iowa City (see map).  It's been, probably, four years since I was last in the place. 

Opened in 1973 by Daryl "Woody" Woodson, The Sanctuary has long been a hang-out for the counter-culture crowd in Iowa City.  For years, they have had folk, blues and jazz singers come to play on their little stage opposite the bar.  The little pub has a friendly and intimate feel to it, even when the smoke from cigarettes pours out of the place.

But I like A) their beer selection; and B) their pizza.  Many of the interesting domestic and imported beers I like these days, I first tried at The Sanctuary.  The selection of beers - especially those on tap - will change from time to time, giving people a great chance to try a number of great beers over the course of the year.

Cindy and I drove to Iowa City one evening earlier this week to have dinner with her son, Eric, and her sister, Anita.  No one had really decided where to meet up for dinner, so I suggested The Sanctuary.  Anita said she used to come to The Sanctuary to listen to the music years ago.  "This was my hang-out," she said when we met up at the pub.

Since there's no parking on Gilbert Street in front of the place, we parked in a lot just to the south of small complex of stores next to The Sanctuary.  There is also a city-owned metered lot directly behind The Sanctuary, but they quit enforcing the meters at 5 p.m.

When we got inside the front door, I noticed something different - they'd added on since I was last in there.  Or at least I thought they had.  They had a signs pointing to the "pub" area - or smoking area - of the place, and one pointing to the "cafe" area - or non-smoking area.  I had only been in the "pub" area and don't ever remember the cafe being part of the mix. 

We went in and sat at a booth toward the back of the cafe.  It was early, about 6 p.m., and there were just two other couples in there having an early dinner.  The old brick walls were exposed above the high backs of the booths along the wall.  The lighting was the same as it was over in the pub side, low and understated.  But not having to deal with cigarette smoke was a definite plus.

Our waitress gave us our menus, but I went directly to the beer list, which showed the beers they are featuring for the months of May and June.  While the beer selection doesn't change all that much every two months, they do feature some good seasonal beers during that time. 

The first beer I got was a pint of the Three Floyd's Brewery Alpha King pale ale.  Three Floyd's is a brewery just across the border from Illinois in the far SE side of Chicago.  It's not far from a dealer that I call on down there and have told myself that I really need to go try the food at their little brew pub they have.  And having an Alpha King reminded me that I do like their beers, as well.

We ended up ordering two pizzas - the Sanctuary Special, a good ol' standby where they throw everything on it (spicy sausage, pepperoni, ham, fresh onions, green peppers, black olives and mushrooms); and a simple sausage, pepperoni and jalapeno pizza. 

I ended up ordering a Boulevard Pale Ale for my second beer, which is one of my all-time favorite pale ale's.  But I have to say, the taste of the Boulevard was not as vibrant as the Alpha King pale ale.  I went back to the Alpha King after finishing the Boulevard.  Looks like I'll have to get some Alpha King the next time I go into Chicago.

Cindy and her sister were hungry, so they ordered the spicy spinach/artichoke dip.  It was a creamy concoction that had a spicy bite to it.  Served with toasted bread topped with herbs, it wasn't bad.  In fact, Cindy thought it was some of the best spinach/artichoke dip she'd ever had.

After about 20 minutes, our waitress brought out our pizzas - except she screwed up the ingredients on the one.  She had the cook put mushrooms on the one with the sausage and pepperoni.  Cindy doesn't like mushrooms (which is funny - everyone in her family, including her son and daughter LOVES mushrooms), but she was a gamer and said she'd just take 'em off the pizza.

The pizza was exactly has I remember it.  Thin, crisp crust with a thick crust edging.  The toppings and cheese were heaped on top of the pizza.  I remarked, "Why can't they have pizza like this in the Quad Cities?"

(As an aside, Anita was telling me there is a pizza place in Cedar Rapids called "Cranky Hank's".  They bill themselves as having "Quad City Style Pizza", similar to Happy Joe's, Wise Guys and Harris Pizza - all three of which are not very good, in my opinion.  See my synopsis on Quad City pizzas here.  In fact, the name - Cranky Hank's - is an obvious take-off on the Happy Joe's name.)

The food was too much for all of us and we had to split up some of the remaining slices for Eric and us to take home.  But that was fine with me.  The reheated Sanctuary pizza I had for lunch the next day was every bit as good as when it was served hot and fresh the night before. 

I haven't been too happy with Pagliai's in Iowa City the last couple three times I'd been there.  In each case, the pizza crust was burnt and that burnt taste permeated the pizza.  And they've begun to skimp on the toppings.  They've begun to put very little meat on their pizzas.  They've been very disappointing, to say the least.  I used to think Pagliai's was the best pizza in Iowa City, but now I'm not too certain. 

I have to say that I was very happy with our pizza at the Sanctuary.  Along with the great selection of beers on tap and in bottles, it's one of the more interesting and unique restaurants in the Iowa City area.  And being in business for 34 years now, Woody must be doing something right.

Pippin's Tavern - Chicago

Pippin's Tavern is an old town Irish tavern situated on N. Rush Street just off the Magnificent Mile in downtown Chicago (see map).  Our friends Scott and Marcia Schroeder always stop at Pippin's for a beer or two when they're in downtown Chicago.

Scott was describing the place to me one time and I said, "Does it have a square bar?"  He said it did and I said, "I think I've been there a couple times before."

When we were in Chicago recently, we were shopping not far from Pippin's so I told Cindy that I'd like to go in for a beer, just to make sure I was thinking about the same place.  Walking up to the place, I immediately recognized the outside of the building.  And then after going inside and seeing the square (actually more of a rectangular) bar, I said, "Oh, yes.  I've been here before." 

Back when I worked for Bang and Olufsen of America in the 80's, I was part of a group of people in for training.  But we were stuck out in the suburbs with a bunch of guys from all over the country wanting to go see the night life in Chicago.  Since I was the only guy with a car and a sense of how to get around Chicago, I was suddenly the most popular person there.  I piled four guys and a gal into the car and drove into Chicago.  Getting off the Kennedy Freeway at Ohio and then a left on Rush St., the first bar we encountered was Pippin's.

A couple years later, we were in the Chicago suburbs for another Bang and Olufsen training and a couple guys came up to me and said, "Hey, you've got a car.  Let's go into the city to that funky little bar on Rush Street."  So we did. 

Pippin's hasn't changed much from the last time I was in over 15 years ago.  It's a cozy little funky Irish place that serves bar food and has 16 beers on tap.  The bartender said, "The Italian beef sandwiches are the best in the city."  Too bad we were still full from lunch. 

But if you're shopping Chicago and want to take a break to get a cold beer and a sandwich, Pippin's is a pretty cool place to go to. 

Kelly's Westport Inn - Kansas City, MO

Here's one of my all-time favorite places to have a beer - Kelly's Westport Inn in the heart of the Westport district in Kansas City (see map).

I think the first time I was in Kelly's was in the mid-70's and it's a treat to go back in and have a beer when I get a chance.  During our trip to Kansas City this past summer we were walking around the Westport area taking a look at some of the small shops in the area. 

It was getting to be late morning and we were walking near Kelly's and I mentioned to Cindy that the place was one of my favorite places to have a beer.  She - to my surprise - suggested we go in and have a beer.  Wow!  Sure, dear! 

Kelly's Westport Inn has been around for nearly 60 years.  It is truly an institution in Kansas City.  The building that houses Kelly's dates back to the mid-19th century.  I've heard it's the oldest building still standing in Kansas City.  And I understand it was once a grocery store that was owned and run by Albert Boone, the grandson of Daniel Boone. 

The grocery store eventually evolved into a high-end grocery store - Wiedenmann's (left) -by the turn of the 20th century.  With the repeal of Prohibition in 1933, the grocery store was turned into a tavern - The Wrestlers Inn.  After World War II, Art Brock and two partners bought the bar and renamed it The Westport Inn.  Brock eventually bought out his partners to become sole owner.

An Irish immigrant by the name of Randal Kelly came to Kansas City and became the head bartender at The Westport Inn (right).  Kelly eventually became partners with Brock and took over the operation as sole owner.  It soon became Kelly's Westport Inn.

Randal Kelly, who was ultimately associated with the establishment for over 40 years, turned over the reins to his son Randy.  Randy eventually moved to the Ozarks and opened up Kelly's Port, a popular marina on the Lake of the Ozarks.  Randy, in turn, handed over the operation to his two younger brothers, Pat and Kyle.  They continue to run the bar to this day.

The inside of Kelly's is typical of older restaurants - hard chairs, wooden floors, high ceilings.  The bar has a lot of history and the stories people have told about a night at Kelly's are numerous. 

Kelly's doesn't serve food, per se, but they do have a pizza place in the back - Joe's Pizza.  They serve full pizzas, pizza by the slice and sandwiches.  Since we were in there around noon time, we noticed a lot of people grabbing a couple slices of pizza and having a beer with them.   

Of course, I had to have a Boulevard Pale Ale on our visit there.  Cindy ordered up a Smithwick's.  Here's a picture of Cindy enjoying her cold beer on a warm day in Kansas City.

 

The daytime usually sees more of an older, eclectic crowd at Kelly's; while at night it gets younger and more crowded.  St. Patrick's Day at Kelly's can get a little crazy as evidenced by this picture (right).  In fact, at one point, Randall Kelly used to close Kelly's on St. Patrick's Day because he was worried the place would get TOO full.   

Kelly's is a great place to get a beer.  If you like history, beer and a good time - Kelly's Westport Inn is the place in Kansas City.   

Harry's Chocolate Shop - West Lafayette, IN

One of the more unique bars I've ever been to in the Midwest is Harry's Chocolate Shop near the Purdue University campus in West Lafayette, IN (see map).

From the outside, Harry's isn't much to see.  Inside, it's even worse.  It sort of looks like a Jaycees haunted house that was turned into a bar after Halloween was over.  It's dark, dingy and cramped, and given the amount of beer that has probably been spilled on the floors over the years, it has the smell of a frat house after an all night party. 

But all that just adds to the charm of Harry's, a place that has been open since 1919.

Harry Marack opened Harry's Chocolate Shop as a soda fountain that also served burgers and sandwiches.  After Prohibition was repealed, they applied for one of the first beer and liquor licenses in West Lafayette.  While still selling ice cream sodas and malts, they would be selling beer at the other end of the bar.

Harry Marack, and subsequently, his son, Harry, Jr., ran Harry's through 1977.  Harry Marack, Jr. sold the establishment to Herschel Cook, who also owns (or owned) three other area bars - Wabash Yacht Club, The Pub and The Other Pub.  Cook and his family have run Harry's ever since.

I was in Harry's recently more for nostalgic reasons than anything.  Well, and to have a couple beers.  My first trip to Harry's was about five years ago when we met up with our friends, Scott and Marcia Schroeder, and Dave and Pat Heusmann in West Lafayette for the Iowa/Purdue football game that year.  Scott had read about Harry's and he said that was on his immediate agenda when he got to West Lafayette. 

Harry's has two floors, and upstairs they have an area called "The Fishbowl", which is the center of the universe to students at Purdue.  Getting a seat in the Fishbowl and holding it all night is usually a story of legacy proportions. 

Harry's unofficial motto is "Go Ugly Early" - a take off the old standard college student's rule of if you have to go home with an ugly girl it's better than going home alone.  They have Go Ugly Early shirts, mugs, and other knick-knacks for sale at Harry's.

Another interesting shirt or hat you can buy there is "Harry's - Home of the Great Indoorsman!"  I almost got one of those as many times over the years my wife has questioned my sanity as to why I would like to be inside in a bar on beautiful days.  Harry's is one of those kind of places that you'd like to hang out at even on sunny days.

Harry's gets pretty crowded on the weekends.  We were there both Friday and Saturday night when we were there for the football game.  But it was a fun crowd and we didn't feel out of place either in our Iowa shirts or because we were about 20 years older than most of the people in there.

However, the last time I was there, it was in the middle of he week.  It was early in the evening and pretty tranquil.  I was able to move freely around the place and take a look at the stuff they had on the walls and get an even better feel of how small the joint really is. 

Harry's is truly an institution in West Lafayette and one of the best college beer bars I've ever been to.  If you're ever in the West Lafayette area and looking for a beer, give Harry's a shot.

O'Connell's Pub - Redux

I drove thru St. Louis on my way home from Springfield, MO recently and decided to have a late lunch at O'Connell's Pub again.  Since it's just off of I-44 at Kingshighway, it was easy to get to (see map).  Plus, I wanted to stop at some of the food shops on the Hill to get some items, so it all worked out.

On my previous visit when I took a couple guys there for lunch, I had the burger which was good.  But one of the guys got the roast beef sandwich with lean, rare beef piled high on a hoagie bun, served with au jus over the top.  It looked killer.  Then again, so did the roast pork sandwich, with the pork piled high on a similar hoagie bun smothered in gravy that the other guy got.  And they told me they were both wonderful tasting. 

However, I was in on a Friday and the special at "Oc's" on Friday's is fish and chips, so the chance of getting the roast pork sandwich went out the window.  I went for the roast beef sandwich and ordered it the way my guest ordered it the time before, "Roast beef sandwich, rare, juice."   And an ice-cold Budweiser. 

When the sandwich came, it was piled high with thick cut rare roast beef.  The beef was a little chewy and not as tender as it looked on my last visit.  In fact, I sort of got heartburn from the sandwich - it was a lot of beef, that's for sure. 

The beef sandwich was *OK*.  I'm glad I tried it, but I probably won't order it again when I go back to Oc's.  It will more than likely be back to a good ol' O'Connell's cheese burger. 

Alpine Inn - La Crosse, WI

One of my favorite places to have a beer in La Crosse, WI is the Alpine Inn high atop Grandad Bluff, the highest bluff in the area, towering 590 feet above the city.  First opened in the early 60's, the Alpine Inn specializes in cold beer, good sandwiches and a fun time.   

When I was in La Crosse recently, I went up the bluff to take some pictures of a beautiful early fall day.   Here's a shot of the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse campus.  The Mississippi River is barely visible in the distance and beyond that, the apple tree bluffs of Minnesota. 

This is a picture of downtown La Crosse.  The bridge over the Mississippi is easily identifiable in the distance.  The leaves were just getting ready to change when I was there.  I was just a little too early. 

I thought while I was up there, I'd stop in and have a cold beer at the Alpine Inn (see map).  Cindy and I have been up there before - we had a burger up there one time and it was pretty good.  There was one other guy in the place when I was in there and he was playing some video game.  I got a beer and talked with the bartender. 

He said the original building was built in the 1940's, but he wasn't certain what was originally there.  He said, "I'm 37 and it's been a bar all my life." 

He told me that sometime in the 60's, the original owners of the Alpine Inn added a section on to the west side of the building, practically quadrupling the space.  They also added an outdoor deck that allowed for a nice view into the valley. 

The people who own the Alpine Inn now added tiers to the back deck a few years ago, allowing for a top deck, middle deck and a ground deck area, along with a sand volleyball pit.  Here's a picture of the back deck area from the upper deck outside the building.

The bartender was telling me about the city's Oktoberfest celebration and how they just had thousands of people at the Alpine Inn the weekend before.  I said, "Thousands?!  Where do you put everybody?  And better yet - where in the hell does everyone park?"

He said they have a shuttle service from the Oktoberfest grounds in downtown La Crosse, and the back area and along the east side hold all the people.  He said, "It's wall to wall.  You can't move, people are stumbling drunk, it's a madhouse, but it's the most fun you can have.  It is easily our biggest day of the year."   

I just can't fathom thousands of people at the Alpine Inn, even outdoors.  But if you want to experience a quaint Wisconsin tavern, and get a nice view up the road a bit, it's tough to beat the Alpine Inn.

The Claddagh Irish Pub - Indianapolis

During a recent trip Cindy and I took to Indianapolis with our friends, Scott and Marcia Schroeder, and Dave and Pat Heusmann, we had one last late night beer at The Claddagh Irish Pub in downtown Indianapolis (see map).  I've been to The Claddagh (pronounced CLAW-duh) a couple times before, but this was the first for the others.

The Claddagh Irish Pub started in Indianapolis in 2000 by Kevin McDonagh, an Irishman who owns the Supermacs fast food chain in Ireland; and Kevin Blair, an American who was McDonagh's operations manager for Supermacs.  Blair went to Ireland in the mid-90's to work for McDonagh at Supermacs and he was intrigued by the quaint Irish pubs that he went to and unwind with his wife and small children. 

Even though he knew there were a number of authentic Irish pubs in America, Blair wanted a pub that "reeked" of Irish heritage and culture.  The Irish have a term called "craic" (pronounced crack) that is used to describe a place that is fun, lively and friendly.  Blair wanted to bring that "craic" to America, and with McDonagh's help he was able to open The Claddagh Irish Pub in Indianapolis (right). 

The Claddagh was named after the legendary Irish fishing village of Claddagh which is now surrounded by present day Galway, Ireland.  The Irish Claddagh attracted many visitors to the area - many of whom were writers - who wrote about the charm of the town and the friendliness of the Claddagh people.

The Claddagh Irish Pub soon began to expand into other larger Midwestern cities and there are now 17 different locations (with three more slated to open) in 7 states.  Blair and O'Donagh made each Claddagh unique in layout and design, and put them in locations that would be easily accessible to most people.  And each Claddagh is decorated with authentic Irish fixtures and furnitures sent over from Ireland. 

The menu at The Claddagh consists of authentic Irish cuisine with a number of American favorites with an Irish bent added to them.  I had the melted Irish meatloaf sandwich one time at The Claddagh and it was outstanding.

But the place is more of a true Irish public house with a large variety of Irish beers on tap and in bottles.  Even though it was late and we were tired, we had to go in for the one last beer of the evening.  We sat at a short table with short stools right near the fire place.  It was great having a late night Smithwick's with my wife and good friends in a great place like the original Claddagh.

I travel to many of the cities in which other Claddagh's are located.  I'll have to check a couple three of them out to make sure they have the great ambiance and "craic" of the original in Indianapolis.

Growlers Pub - St. Louis

One of my more favorite places to have a beer in the St. Louis area is Growlers Pub.  Styled after English pubs, Growlers offers a quaint atmosphere for food and good beer. 

Started in 1996 in Creve Coeur (see map), Growlers prides itself on a place where people can go to for good food (consisting of standard pub fare), a great beer selection (over 30 different beers on tap and nearly 100 more in bottles), and a place for good conversation.  There's no blaring music and little live entertainment that can distract from having a good ol' conversation with friends.

Growler's Pub has two locations in the greater St. Louis area, the second one in Sunset Hills.  They used to have three, but the one out in St. Charles County closed in early 2005.  The one in Sunset Hills is a little bigger than the original one in Creve Coeur and offers a nice beer garden that seats up to 200 people. 

Like I said, the food is good - primarily appetizers, burgers and sandwiches.  However, they also do steaks, seafood and some pasta.  They have a very extensive sandwich menu.  Their reuben is very good and I have tried their muffaletta, which is OK, at best.  But their burgers are good - I've had the swiss, mushroom and bacon burger a couple of times.  And while it might not be in my all-time Top 10 favorite burger places, it's still very good.   

Growlers is a good place to go for beer and a sandwich.  But take along a friend as it's a great place for conversation, as well. 

O'Dowd's Little Dublin - Kansas City

During our recent trip to Kansas City, the weather was almost unbearably hot.  Walking around the Plaza area one very hot afternoon, we came across a little Irish pub called O'Dowd's Little Dublin.  Cindy suggested that we go in and get a beer.  Well, anytime that she suggests to go get a beer, I can't say no. 

O'Dowd's is at the corner of Pennsylvania and Nichols Road in the Plaza (see map).  Even though the exterior remains true to the Spanish architecture found in the Plaza area, the dark walnut panels on the outside of O'Dowd's immediately gives it a warm, inviting appeal.

O'Dowd's has been in business since 1996.  The interior woodwork, cabinets and many of the signs on their walls came from Ireland.  It really has an "old country" feel to the place.

Cindy and I both grabbed a beer and headed for one of the window seats looking out into the Plaza.  O'Dowd's has a rooftop beer garden that is one of the more popular places to be most of the time.  But with temperatures hovering around 100 degrees, there was no way we were going to go upstairs and outside the air conditioning to have a beer that would turn warm inside 3 minutes. 

We checked out their menu (it was around 4:30 and we weren't going to eat there) and it's typical Irish bar food.  But it looked damn good.  They have a long list of appetizers and sandwiches, and they also have a number of good Irish entrees including Shepherd's Pie, Irish Stew and corned beef and cabbage. 

Their beer selection was wide and varied, but typical of most Irish bars in America.  But they did have a large number of Irish Whiskey and Scotch Whisky to choose from.  I thought it would be a great place to come back to for a nightcap. 

Our visit was a little tense, however, as a couple seated near us was having a family argument, and it ended with the guy storming out of the bar.  As we watched him stomp across the street, the guy had his cell phone to his ear. I remarked to Cindy, "I think he's getting a hold of his divorce lawyer."  We felt bad for the lady.  She just sat there looking out of the window with tears in her eyes.  I almost thought about buying her a drink.  But, it was probably best to not get involved.

All in all - other than the marital blow-up we witnessed - O'Dowd's is a neat little place to get a beer and a nice meal.  They've opened a second location in far north Kansas City at the new Zona Rosa mall, but I'm sure it doesn't have the warm, comfortable feeling as the original O'Dowd's in the Plaza.         

Duffy's Tavern - Utica, IL

Duffy's Tavern in the small Illinois town of Utica, IL is a long time favorite of people who for years have traveled to the beautiful Starved Rock State Park just south of town.  Utica is a neat little town with a number of little shops and restaurants, but Duffy's is probably the most well known of the places in the downtown area (see map).

On April 20, 2004, Utica was hit by a massive tornado that killed 8 people, damaged over 100 homes and destroyed a number of businesses in the downtown area.  The total cost of destruction in the small town was well into the millions.  It took the people of Utica months to rebuild and to get their lives back to normal.

Duffy's was one of the businesses hit by the tornado.  Here's a picture of the front of Duffy's after the storm came through.

I hadn't been to Duffy's since the tornado hit, so on my way into Chicago yesterday I decided to take a side trip off of Interstate 80 and go into town for a Duffy's Burger. 

Actually, I first stopped in at Princeton, IL to get a burger at The Spoon restaurant.  I heard that The Spoon had good burgers, so I thought I'd get one there.  I walked into the place around 1:40 p.m. and there were four guys sitting toward the back playing cards. 

An older guy got up from the game and sauntered up to counter where I was seated.  He asked what I wanted and I told him I'd take a cheeseburger and a cold beer.  He said, "Well, I turned off the grill about a half hour ago.  We don't serve dinner and once the lunch crowd is gone, I usually turn the grill off." 

Jesus.  Oh well.  On to Utica, about 20 miles away. 

If you didn't know there was a big tornado that tore apart the town over two years ago, you probably couldn't see the scars the town still has.  The inside of Duffy's didn't suffer much damage, but the building, which was built in 1892, did have some structural damage to the second floor.  Lisle and Pat Elsbury bought Duffy's in 2003 and were in the building when the tornado hit that evening in April. 

They were lucky.  Their friends, Larry and Marian Ventrice, and six others who were in the basement of the Milestone Tap, a restaurant/bar down the street, weren't.

I went into Duffy's and sat at the bar.  Pat Elsbury, a kind of a tough looking middle-aged blond - but in a good way - who calls everyone "Hon", was behind the bar talking with a restaurant supply salesman.  She got my order - a Duffy Burger (1/2 lb. hand-formed patty topped with your choice of cheese - I had Swiss) - and a cold Berghoff on tap.

Duffy's is a good little Irish pub.  The inside of the place shows no effects of the tornado.  The original tin ceiling is still in place, the long walnut bar is still there, and there's still the interesting signage on the wall (such as "Beer Hall of Foam" - whatever that is). 

The previous owners started doing dinners of steak, seafood and pasta a number of years ago and the Elsbury's have continued that tradition.  Actually, I've never been there for dinner, but I have had their burgers before and they're good.

This one was no exception.  I do remember the bun being a little dry, and I'm a firm believer that in many instances the bun can make or break a good burger.  However, it isn't a breaker with the Duffy Burger.  The burger was cooked a perfect medium, the Swiss cheese was fresh and pungent, and the dry bun quickly became moist from all the juices from the burger. 

After I finished, I got to talking with Pat Elsbury.  I remarked that the place looked pretty good considering what they'd been through.  She said the restaurant, itself, sustained little to no damage.  They were shut down for about two weeks before they began to serve beer and liquor again, and it took about a month before they could start doing burgers and sandwiches.  She said they were back to normal for full business in a couple months. 

She told me that the biggest problems they had initially were the gawkers that would come to town, park their cars, get out and walk around and not stop in for something at Duffy's.  "We had a lot of problems with no parking around here.  We finally had to put up signs in the lot across the street telling people this was for Duffy's and they'd be towed if they didn't come in to the place."

I'm glad that Duffy's didn't suffer the damage that many other Utica businesses had.  It's a neat place and one worth stopping at.

Bodega Brew Pub - La Crosse

I would have filed Bodega Brew Pub under "brew pubs", but they no longer brew their own beer.  Actually, they never did brew their own beer, even though beer was brewed in the place.  Huh?  How can that be?  Well, read on. 

Anyway, the Bodega Brew Pub in downtown La Crosse beckons me each time I go there.   

The Bodega Brew Pub is housed in building that was the home of the Bodega restaurant - a popular lunch cafe in La Crosse that began in 1897.  Over the years, The Bodega served thousands of people some good home-cooked meals.  When the downtown area of La Crosse began to suffer in the 1980's, the Bodega closed in 1984.  It reopened a short time later, but closed for good in 1989.

In 1994, Jeff Hotson, a former railroad worker; and Michael Breckel, who farmed and owned a brewery supply business, bought the Bodega building and began to restore it.  They opened not long after that featuring a number of upper Midwest microbrews and a long list of imported beers, as well. 

In 1999, Joe Katchever, a La Crosse native who had been brewing beer out in Colorado, leased the Bodega's basement brewing operation from Hotson and Breckel and began to brew the beer under the Pearl Street label.  Katchever's beer was good - I really like the Pearl Street pale ale - and it became apparent that he needed more room as he wanted to eventually bottle his beer.  In 2005, Katchever moved into part of the old La Crosse Footwear factory building.  Pearl Street is still available on tap at Bodega. 

The Bodega Brew Pub's beer selection is still very impressive.  They have a number of beers on tap and a much larger selection of beers in bottles.  I had to have a Pearl Street pale ale when I was in there and then I got a Pioneer lager from the Pioneer Brewing Company from Black River Falls.  Only I found out from the bartender that the Sand Creek Brewing Company recently bought out Pioneer. 

The Bodega Brew Pub is certainly a great little beer bar.  The thing I like about it is that it's a smoke free bar and they don't serve food.  They just do one thing - serve beer - and they do it right.  It's one of my all-time favorite places to get a beer. 

Pat's Bar and Grill - St. Louis

Pat's Bar and Grill is located in the "Dogtown" area of St. Louis, directly across Highway 40/Interstate 64 (known to the locals as "40 Highway") from Forest Park and just down the street from Forest Park Hospital (see map).  It's located right across the street from Turtle Park, home of huge sculpted turtles.

I can't tell you how many times I've driven by Pat's (it's clearly visible from 40 Highway), but I never knew it was there.  Until this last week. 

Pat's has been in business since 1942 when Pat Connolly moved from Ireland to settle in St. Louis.  Pat died in the 60's and his longtime bartender, Tom McDermott, bought the place and renamed it "McDermott's".  It became a hugely popular Irish bar in St. Louis. 

The daughter and son-in-law of Pat Connolly, Teresa and Paul Jovonovich bought McDermott's and changed the name back to Pat's Bar and Grill.  After the death of her husband, and wanting to get back into teaching full-time, Teresa Connolly Jovonovich sold the bar to long time bartender Joe Finn. 

Pat's is a wonderful little neighborhood place that not only is a good beer bar, but they have a pretty extensive food menu.  They're famous for their fried chicken, and their "chicken fried chicken" - a variation of a chicken fried steak dinner.  They have sandwiches, burgers, grilled pork chops and tons of appetizers.  Unfortunately, a lot of it is deep fried, but they stress they only deep fry with canola oil. 

I was in St. Louis recently and it turned out that Wicked Liz and the Bellyswirls were going to be playing there on a Thursday night.  So I went to see them.  I asked Bob Kelly how they got the gig in St. Louis and he said that one of the bartenders, Erin, is a friend of theirs who grew up in Davenport. 

He introduced me to Erin and we became friends immediately, being that we had the Davenport connection.  Erin took good care of me all night long - in fact, she probably over-served me. 

Pat's isn't all that big, and the band was a little cramped.  There wasn't that large of a crowd in there, but they gave the band some good love all night.  The floor plan of the bar isn't quite conducive for a four piece band to be playing there, but they made it work.

Pat's also has an upstairs bar area - the "Roost" that handles overflow from the downstairs area.  Erin told me the place gets extremely packed during St. Patrick's Day and during St. Louis Mardi Gras even though they're a ways from the Soulard area. 

They have a number of the usual beers on tap, the bottles were cold. The people in the bar were laid back, the atmosphere was warm and cozy, and I had a good time in the place.  I think I would have had a good time in the place even if Wicked Liz wasn't playing there that evening.

A large "thumbs up" for Pat's Bar and Grill - a nice little place to get a cold beer while you're in St. Louis.   

The Dubliner Pub - Omaha

Here's a fun place to grab a cold beer - The Dubliner Pub in downtown Omaha's Old Market area.  Just as the name suggests, The Dubliner is a classic Irish-American bar in the basement of a building that was built in the 1890's (see map).  The basement was the coal storage area for the businesses upstairs. 

The Dubliner opened in 1980 and was initially known as Horbach's.  The name was changed in the mid-80's to The Dubliner and it became somewhat famous back in the "old country" as a home away from home for Irish ex-pats and people of Irish ancestry.   

The Dubliner Pub is not too big, but it's not too small where you feel cramped.  They have bands and musicians in the back of the place from time to time, so it can't be too small. 

The Dubliner has over 100 different beers from all over the world to choose from.  There are around 20 different beers on tap.  But I'm kind of disappointed there isn't the kind of eclectic beers either on tap or available in bottles that I've seen in similar beer bars elsewhere.

The Dubliner has two clubs that you can join - both involve drinking the beer.  "The World Mug Club" is where you gain your own drinking mug that is hung in the bar with your name on it if you drink every beer from around the world. (Not in one sitting, of course.)  They give you a little score card and they check off each beer you drink on your visits.  They've been doing this for years and I have a sneaking suspicion that Old Chicago and other bars ripped off this idea for their world beer tour promotions. 

Or, if you would like to garner one of their shirts like the one above and to the right, you can take their "Fear No Beer Tour".  By drinking each of the 20 tap beers in the place (once again, not in one sitting), you get yourself the neat Dubliner Pub long sleeve t-shirt.

The Dubliner has basic pub fare - wings, nachos, burgers, chicken sandwiches, brought down by the people at The Brass Grille upstairs.  They even offer The Brass Grille's oysters on the half shell, but I thought they were too small and marginal, at best, the last time I had 'em.

I like The Dubliner - the staff is friendly, the place has a good feel to it, and the beer tastes great after a hard day.  When you go to the Old Market, you have to stop in for at least one at The Dubliner. 

C & G (Chrys') Tap - Newton, IA

A shout out to my good friend Robert Dey Jackson, Jr. who said, "How come you don't have Chrys' Tap in the 'Rest in Peace' category?"

Actually, that was a good tip.  OK, Bob - here you go.

Chrys' Tap was actually C & G Tap in Newton (see map) for a number of years.  Gail Morrow and his wife, Chrystal, bought what was the old "First Chance Tap - Last Chance Tap" a number of years ago.  It was called that because it was the first tavern coming into Newton heading west, and the last place to get a beer going out of Newton heading west. 

Gail and Chrys got a divorce and Chrystal continued to run the place.  Chrystal was a hard, but good woman.  She didn't take any shit off of anybody and when she had something on her mind, she said it.  If you got on her good side, she was a friend for life.  If you got on Chrystal's bad side, don't bother coming in.  And a few people did get on her bad side. 

Fortunately, I was one of the many on her good side and Chrys' Tap (or the Tap, as the locals called it) was sort of a home away from home.  When I moved back to Newton in 1986 from Texas, my good friend Matt Denniston ran the place in the day time, and Dennis (Maynard) Claseman was the long time night time guy.  When Matt went on to bigger and better things, Chrystal's sister, Bertie, came in to run the place in the day time. 

Now, Bertie was possibly harder than Chrystal, but just as kind.  She was a short, large woman who had a sharp tongue.  If you ever crossed Bertie, you may as well just moved out of town. 

And there were days that she didn't feel like cooking.  I would go in for lunch, sort of gauge how Bertie was doing - sitting at the end of the bar, smoking a cigarette and watching TV - and then I'd say, "Are you cookin' today, Bertie?"

Most of the time she'd say, "Oh, sure..."  But every once in a while she'd say, "You want something - fix it yourself."  It didn't happen all that often, but it was kind of fun when she would let us go cook in the kitchen. 

The Tap wasn't too much to look at, but it was the gathering spot for a lot of my friends in Newton.  Once Chrystal sold the place in the late 90's, it just wasn't the same any more.  Bertie stayed on, but died in May of 1999 when Cindy and I were in California.  I'm still upset that I never got to go pay my respects to Bertie.  The last link to the Tap's past was broken.  She was one of a kind.   

As it went through a couple more owners, the Tap - as we knew it - ceased to exist.  Oh, it's still there, but it's not the same. 

I told you that story to tell you this one - the biggest draw for the Tap was their food, especially their cheeseburgers.  Dubbed "Cheeseburger in Paradise" or "Bertie Burgers", the Tap burger was grilled on a flat metal grille and they were always juicy and tasty.  Served with a toasted bun and fries, it was heaven.  But you always got 'em in the daytime, because Maynard couldn't cook 'em as well as Bertie could.      

They had the regular condiments, but if you asked for lettuce or tomato, Bertie said, "Bring your own, next time."  So to be smart asses, a couple guys brought a tomato and a head of lettuce in one time.  Bertie looked at them and said, "Well, if you expect me to cut up those things, you got another thing coming."  She made them go into the kitchen and cut the tomato and chop the lettuce.  Bertie was that way. 

The Tap was a real dive, but one of those types of dives that you felt comfortable in.  People from all walks of life would frequent the Tap - executives from Maytag, insurance agents, factory workers, farmers, sales guys (like me), a whole lot of people that mixed together.  When I would bring people from out of town into the Tap, they immediately loved the place.  Except for my wife, who never understood what I liked about the place. 

It was the burgers.  And the friendship.  And Chrys.  And Bertie.  And the mixing of people from all walks of life.  I really do miss that place.  As do a lot of others.

Llywelyn's Pub - St. Louis

When I go to St. Louis, it's always a treat to kick back and have a bunch of beers at Llewelyn's Pub in Webster Grove.  I was initially turned on to the place by the guys at Music for Pleasure, one of my dealers who is not far from the place.  Llewelyn's is a wonderful Welsh tavern that has the feel of merry old England throughout the place.  The staff is friendly and attentive.  The food is good for a beer bar, and is somewhat interesting, at that.  And the beers they have to offer are an eclectic mix of some of the best beers in the world.

The food is a mix of traditional Welsh and Irish favorites, with a number of twists on some old American favorites.  Their burgers are good, as is their reuben sandwiches.  But what I like most is the tuna melt sandwich.  It's one of the best tuna melts I've ever had in any restaurant.  And if you're just going in to have a few beers and munch on some appetizers, try the Welsh potato chips, the stuffed crabcakes or the beer battered chicken strips. 

There are two Llewelyn's - the one on Moody in Webster Groves is the one I like going to, but they have another one in the central westend of St. Louis on McPherson that is equally popular.  Either place is good to go to and about as authentic of an old Welsh pub that you'll get in the Midwest. 

The Map Room - Chicago

The Map Room in one of Chicago's more trendy neighborhoods - Bucktown - north and west of downtown Chicago.  It isn't a huge place, but the ambiance is cozy and it's a very friendly place to go to.

It's situated in a corner building that has a nice bar in the place.  Behind the bar are rows and rows of the current bottled beers they're carrying - when I was in there the first time there had to be over 150 different types of bottled beer.  And they had over 25 beers on tap, too. 

Of course, they had collages of maps on the wall.  There are shelves and bookcases full of maps, travel books and National Geographics.  The Map Room has a tin roof ceiling and a little stage for live music on the weekends.  Every once in a while, they'll have an International night where they have a restaurant bring food in and they feature food and beer from that given country. 

The staff is very friendly and knowledgeable.  They offer information sheets on the beer that you are drinking or on any beer that you ask about. 

I like the Map Room.  I wish I had a neighborhood bar close to my house like that one.  It's a great place to get a beer.

Harry's New York Bar - Paris

I had the pleasure of going to France for business in February of 2003 with my company, Audio Plus Services.  We stayed a couple nights in Paris and had a chance to walk around the city and see the sights.  We went to the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre (although we didn't go in to see the Mona Lisa), the Arc de Triomphe, and Place de la Concorde.  We saw the artists and bohemians on the Left Bank, toured Notre Dame Cathedral, walked by the Opera House and Moulin Rouge, and we walked the length of the Champs d'Elysee - twice. 

But what I wanted to do more than anything was to go to Harry's New York Bar and get a Bloody Mary.  Now, the guys in our group kind of looked at me like, "Huh?"  But when I explained to them that Harry's invented the Bloody Mary in the 20's, they all followed suit. 

Actually, Harry's wasn't that far from the Opera House or our hotel.  It's not a huge place, but it's very ornate with a lot of dark wood paneling on the walls, covered with pictures and other offerings from over the years.  It's definitely got an English/American feel to the place as the staff and bartenders all spoke English - quite well, actually. 

We all had a Bloody Mary and it was a spot hitter.  It was a little expensive - 9.50 Euros, which, at the time, was about $9.00 US.  But what the hell.  I had two. 

We looked around the place and ended up going downstairs into their piano bar room.  One of the waiters let us go down, even though it wasn't open.  It wasn't very big, almost gave me a clausterphobic feel to it.  The waiter said that George Gershwin used to play the same piano they had in there when he was living in Paris years ago.  He said that people such as Elton John, Harry Connick, Jr., and Diana Krall had all been in the piano bar in recent months playing the piano.  Unfortunately, the lid was down and locked or I would have played chop sticks.

The walls of the piano bar were also adorned with some interesting French sketch art.  I kind of liked it, but some of the guys in the group were making noises about being bored, so we took off (always happens when you're in a group of people). 

I know that Harry's isn't a beer bar, and it probably isn't a destination, per se.  But I'm glad we went. 

Conor O'Neill's - Ann Arbor

We were in Ann Arbor last fall for the Iowa/Michigan football game and sort of stumbled into Conor O'Neill's on Main Street.  It's typical of most American Irish bars, a lot of dark woods through out the place.  They have soccer shirts and homages to Irish poets adorning the walls.  We were in there on a Friday night before the game and it was a little too packed. 

Beers are what you'd expect from an Irish bar - Murphy's, Guinness, Harp, Bass, Smithwick's, Newcastle, Boddingtons, etc.  The guys behind the bar were pretty helpful in discussing the differences between some of the lesser known beers they had.   But I grabbed a Smithwick's from the get-go and stayed with that the rest of the night.

They do serve food there and we did eat there.  It was typical bar food, nothing outstanding.  They have about four or five entrees for dinner, but most of it is of the sandwich mode.  I had the Corned Beef Reuben and that wasn't too bad. 

I understand they have Irish bands that will come in and play from time to time.  But I'm sure it's more enjoyable to be in there when it isn't as crowded as it was that night. 

Brocach Irish Pub - Madison

We just got back from Madison spending the weekend up there with our friends Scott and Marcia Schroeder, Dave and Pat Heusmann, and Tom Kakert for the Iowa/Wisconsin football game.  Madison is always a great time and a wonderful city. 

Before we left, Dave's barber told him that we had to go to this place called the Brocach on the state capitol square in downtown Madison.  He said it was a great bar.  Well, any bar that serves a lot of eclectic beers is on my agenda!

The Brocach is on the south side of the square, directly across from the Wisconsin State Capitol building.  Brocach, in Gaelic, loosely means a "Fox Den" or, more appropriately for Wisconsin, a "Badger's Den".  The crowd was mixed for a Friday night with a lot more college aged kids in the place than middle aged people like us. 

They have two bars in the Brocach - the main bar downstairs, and when it gets busy, they open up the upper bar.  We opted to go upstairs and go to the smaller of the two bars.  They had all the traditional beers on tap - Harp, Guinness, Bass.  One thing I liked is that they had Smithwick's on tap, a nice Irish brew that I first had last year in Ann Arbor.  Smithwick's (pronounced "Smitticks") has a good flavor to it and a nice little bite. 

The girls all opted for "foo-foo" drinks while the guys bellied up and went for the beer.  They had New Glarus Brewing Company's Spotted Cow on tap and Dave went with one of those.  Just like me, Dave didn't care for it.  In fact, I know that New Glarus is reknown for their beers, but I have never cared for the taste of most Belgian style beers.  It was all he could do to choke it down. 

They have food at Brocach, it appears to be a little more upscale than regular bar type food.  And they have a nice selection of Scotch's, as well.  The crowd is a little older through the day and early in the evening, and on the weekends it tends to skew more toward a younger crowd.  But if you're in Madison and have some time on your hands and want to get a beer downtown, I'd say this is the place.