Road Tips

Seamus McDaniel's - St. Louis

I've been staying near the Clayton/Tamm area in central St. Louis for a number of years, but it's only quite recently that I've made an effort to find interesting places to eat in the neighborhood.  Also known the locals as Dogtown, the neighborhood has long been known as the original Irish enclave in St. Louis.  So, it's only fitting that one of the oldest and more popular Irish pubs in the city is located in the neighborhood - Seamus McDaniel's.  On a trip to St. Louis last fall for a dealer event I was working, I went to Seamus McDaniel's for lunch.  

The building that houses Seamus McDaniel's - which sits just south of the corner of Clayton and Tamm (see map) - dates back to the 1920's.  After Prohibition ended, the spot became a bar and was in business for about 12 years before local politician Jack O'Shea bought the place toward the end of World War II.  O'Shea - a former state legislator in Missouri and a local Democratic Party operative - named the place O'Shea's Shamrock Pub and it became a popular watering hole in the neighborhood and a gathering spot for politicians.  It also became a rather notorious place in the 1950's as O'Shea kept a private poker room in one of the upstairs rooms.  One afternoon, an illegal high-stakes poker game with a number of men playing in the room was busted by St. Louis police officers.  O'Shea, who was downstairs in his bar at the time, along with five men who were unable to flee the room when the cops broke in were arrested.  

O'Shea retired soon after that episode and sold the place to Eddie Brady.  Trying to clean up the image of the place, Brady made the place a more traditional Irish pub and was instrumental in some of the first planned St. Patrick's Day celebrations in the neighborhood.  In 1966, Brady sold the place to novice tavern owner Norman Journey who kept the Jack O'Shea tradition of free corned beef and cabbage on St. Patrick's Day.  

However, in 1983, the Irish pub was sold to two brothers by the name of Burke who overhauled the decor in the place, turning it into a more modern bar with mirrored walls and a drop-down white ceiling while changing the name to Burke's Place.  Of course, that didn't go over well with the regulars and the Burke brothers were forced to close the business in 1985.

Jim Venincasa grew up in the neighborhood - just a block away from the original O'Shea's Shamrock Pub -and soon after he graduated from high school he started working in a restaurant kitchen.  After becoming a chef and working at a handful of restaurants in the St. Louis area, Venincasa and his good friend, Danny Liston (who was locally famous as a guitar player in Mama's Pride, a Southern rock band who had a some success in the early 70's) decided to buy Burke's Place.  They pulled down the stick-on mirrored walls, they pulled down the white drop-down ceiling to re-expose the original tin ceiling.  They found the original Anheuser-Busch ornate backbar that was in storage and re-installed it.  Turning it back into a cozy Irish pub, they renamed the place Seamus McDaniel's and opened in November of 1985.

Venincasa and Liston added a back dining room to the small bar just before St. Patrick's Day in 1986, and added a beer garden behind the building some time later.  In 1990, they took over a space next door to their pub that they leased out to an upholstery shop to expand their place even more.  The pub became known for their burgers, reuben sandwiches, and homemade potato chips.  And it was also a favorite place to gather before and after St. Louis Blues hockey games when they played at the old St. Louis Arena until 1994.  Seamus McDaniel's used to run a shuttle bus for fans to and from the nearby arena when the arena was open.  

Liston was a recovering alcoholic and owning a bar was always a challenge.  In 2002, he spearheaded a reunion of Mama's Pride playing some dates around the area.  By 2003, Liston was through with the bar business selling his shares to Venincasa and his wife, Susan.  The Venincasa's continued to run Seamus McDaniel's, but, quite tragically, Jimmy Venincasa died suddenly at the age of 56 in April of 2015, weeks after he and his wife were the co-Grand Marshalls of the Ancient Order of Hibernians St. Patrick's Day Parade held each year along Tamm Ave. in Dogtown.  Susan Venincasa continues to own and operate Seamus McDaniel's today.  

Parking along the stretch of Clayton and down Tamm can be pretty challenging most times, but an unseasonably early November snowstorm had blanketed the city with over six inches of snow the night before and the parking situation along the streets was sort of a mess.  However, Seamus McDaniel's has a small parking lot in back and even though there were piles of snow in some spots I was able to find an open parking space.  

Inside Seamus McDaniel's, the original bar area is just inside the front door.  The original tin roof ceiling and the original ornate back bar were very eye catching.  This was a great little neighborhood bar.  

In back of the bar area was the back room that added in 1986.  It featured dark walnut wall panels, a stone floor and a stone fireplace in the corner.  The room added about a couple dozen seats to Seamus McDaniels when it was open.  

Off to the side area from the bar was the addition that was opened in 1990.  This was a much bigger room with natural light coming in from windows on the south side.  This space more than doubled the number of patrons Seamus McDaniels could serve.  

In the far back of the place beyond the back room was an "L"-shaped all-seasons room that had garage-style doors that would open up to a back outdoor patio and to the parking lot.  The all-seasons room tremendously expanded the number of seats in the place.  If you just looked at Seamus McDaniels from the front, you would be surprised - as I was - at how big it really is in the place.    

I ended up seated at the bar and was greeted by Maria, the bartender on duty that day.  She gave me a food menu and asked what I'd like to drink.  They had all the good Irish beers on tap - Guinness, Smithwick's and Harp - as well as some domestic beers.  I decided to have a Harp while I looked through the menu.  

They had about a dozen appetizers on the menu including the St. Louis staple - toasted ravioli, as well as a garlic bread topped with provel cheese, breaded mushrooms, and chicken wings.  Soups and salads were also available, along with a number of burgers, sandwiches, and main entrees that ran the gamut from steaks to chicken dishes to pasta selections.  

Seamus McDaniels is famous for their burgers and their sandwiches.  I had a burger the day before or I probably would have signed up for their Swiss cheese and mushroom burger where you get your choice of either sautéed mushrooms or a mushroom gravy on the burger.  I probably would have got for the mushroom gravy.  Sandwiches included a roast beef sandwich with a choice of either au jus or beef gravy, a buffalo chicken sandwich topped with provel cheese, and an 8 oz. ribeye steak sandwich with sautéed mushrooms and sautéed onions.  

I ended up going with the reuben sandwich.  Instead of fries, I asked Maria if I could get a side salad with their house-made Greek dressing.  Maria said, "Oooo, good choice."  The salad was very good and I really enjoyed the tangy Greek dressing.  

The reuben featured thin-cut corned beef piled high on marbled-rye bread topped with Swiss cheese and sauerkraut.  Instead of putting the Thousand Island dressing on the sandwich, a small container of it came on the side.  That was fine with me as sometimes restaurants will put too much dressing on their reubens.  

The corned beef on this reuben was, well, in a word, fantastic.  Some of the best and most flavorful corned beef I've ever tasted.  The spices they use were very prevalent with each bite of the sandwich.  I asked Maria if they cooked it in-house and she said she wasn't sure.  She checked with someone else and came back and said that they do cook and slice the corned beef in house, however, they get the corned beef from a local food purveyor who seasons it in advance for Seamus McDaniels.  The marble-rye bread was thin, but held together very well with the moist sauerkraut and oozing Swiss cheese on the sandwich.  Occasional dips of the sandwich into the dressing made it a multi-flavored experience.   

I've been coming to St. Louis on a regular basis for business for over 30 years - about as long as Seamus McDaniels has been in business.  I seriously can't believe that I hadn't found the place until this visit.  It's not far from where I stay in St. Louis and I could see myself hanging out at Seamus McDaniels on future trips to the city.  The reuben sandwich was one of the best I've had, I thought it was a great value considering how much corned beef (and how good the corned beef was) they put on the sandwich, and I really liked the atmosphere of the place - which is surprisingly larger than it looks from the front of the place.  The service was prompt and friendly, and it really gave me the feeling of being in an authentic Irish pub.  Now that I found the place, they could be my home bar away from home when I go to St. Louis.

White Dog Black Cat Cafe - Green Bay, WI

During a previous trip to Green Bay some time ago, I happened to be reading in a local publication about a quirky little bar/cafe in the Broadway District of the city - White Dog Black Cat Cafe.  I had put that on my list of places to go to and on a trip to Green Bay last fall before the snow began to fall, I headed over to check out what the place with a double dichotomy as a name was all about.  

White Dog Black Cat's Cafe owners - Anne Fiorello and Holly Hebel - were both social workers in the area for a number of years.  About 20 years ago, Holly decided that she needed a change of scenery from the rigors of social work, so she moved out to Egg Harbor in Door County to work in a restaurant with some friends of hers.  It turns out that she enjoyed the restaurant work more than social work.  From her friends restaurant, she moved on to the popular White Gull Inn working as a cook for about a dozen years and learning the restaurant business.  (Click here to see an over 10 year old Road Tips post on the White Gull Inn.) 

Around 2003, Anne Fiorello and Holly Hebel (pictured at right - photo courtesy Glidden Drive Association) decided to open their own restaurant in Green Bay.  Now, this is just a guess, but I believe they may have named their restaurant after the White Dog Cafe in Philadelphia which was owned by entrepreneur/author/urban activist Judy Wicks whose restaurant was one of the first in the nation to feature locally grown and sustainable foods cooking and to promote responsible business practices including offering a living wage to its employees.  Wicks also ran the Black Cat gift boutique located next door to the White Dog Cafe which featured locally made goods and fair trade gift items.  (Well prior to her life as a restaurant/boutique owner/author/activist, Wicks co-founded the Free People store with her then-husband Richard Hayne as part of an entrepreneurial class at the University of Pennsylvania.  Hayne and Wicks divorced in 1971 and the store eventually evolved into Urban Outfitters of which Wicks has no involvement with today.)   

White Dog Black Cat Cafe featured artwork from local artists and garnered a following the Green Bay community offering craft beers, good burgers and a great place to hang out.  The success with their little bar/cafe in Green Bay prompted Fiorello and Hebel to buy a long time Door County establishment called The Hitching Post in 2015.  The two transformed the bar and grill into The Tin Plate that somewhat mirrored the vibe and menu found at White Dog Black Cat Cafe.  Unfortunately, having a second location proved to be somewhat too much for Fiorello and Hebel and they closed The Tin Plate last July.  But they continue to run White Dog Black Cat Cafe today.  

I found White Dog Black Cat Cafe at the corner of S. Broadway and N. Howard near the Fox River.  (see map)  Much of that stretch of Broadway is made up of small shops, coffee houses, and restaurants.  I was able to find a parking spot on Broadway just past of Howard and walked back over to the White Dog Black Cat Cafe.  

From the outside, you wouldn't think much about the place.  It's a nondescript block style building with a brick facade and pastel colors on the side.  But walking inside the building, it comes alive.  The restaurant is segmented into two parts.  The bar area along with high-top tables along the wall is to the left as you come into the restaurant.  The "L"-shaped bar featured high-backed chairs with a barn board facade.  

The burnt orange wall opposite the bar gave the room some vibrancy.  The sound system was playing an interesting mix of artists such as 10,000 Maniacs, The Police, and Jade Bird.  I immediately liked the funky vibe to the place.  

Off to the right side as you come in to White Dog Black Cat Cafe was a more common style dining area.  There was a certain funkiness to the space with the walls and curtains in pastel colors.  As with the bar area, some interesting art work - all of which, I understand, was available for purchase - was on the wall.  Chairs were mismatched, as were the lamps hanging from the ceiling.  An antique stove stood at one end of the dining area, while on the opposite end there was a lime green couch under the window with an antique coffee maker on one side and a small wood burning stove on the other side.  

I ended up seated at the bar and was greeted by my server/bartender James who had a soft-spoken, amiable and laid-back demeanor.  He gave me a food menu to look over and I ordered up a Fantasy Victory IPA from the Karben4 Brewing Company, a small brewery from Madison, WI that I wasn't familiar with.  I liked the beer immensely and had to pick up a couple six packs when I got to Madison later that evening.  

Burgers and sandwiches are the main items on the menu at White Dog Black Cat Cafe.  On Fridays, they have a number of fish and seafood items that are added to the menu.  And on Saturdays and Sundays, the cafe has a popular brunch menu available.  Soups, salads and appetizers are also available.  

In the article I read about the place previously, it talked about how good their burgers were at White Dog Black Cat.  I had a burger the day before and I wasn't certain that I was going that direction two days in a row.  I considered the fish tacos or the muffuletta sandwich for a moment, but the White Dog burger is what I ended up with.

The burgers at White Dog Black Cat Cafe all come with potato chips, but I asked James if I could get a cup of the chili they had listed on the menu.  This was a thick chili, but not nearly-concrete thick, with beef and beans, then topped with shredded cheddar cheese and chopped onions.  It had a very noticeable and forward chili powder taste.  The chili was very good - a spot-hitter, if you will, considering there was a noticeable chill in the air in Green Bay that day.

The White Dog burger consists of a 1/2 pound of premium ground beef and served with lettuce, tomato and onions.  For an uncharge, you can get cheese, bacon and sautéed mushrooms on the burger.  I got all three - Swiss cheese, of course.  The burger was piled high with the toppings and it looked pretty impressive.  The Swiss cheese just oozed off the top and onto the sides of the burger.  

The burger, itself, was very juicy and very good.  Even with the load of toppings on the burger, I could still get the good grilled beef taste with every bite.  The only quibble was that there was too much bun.  The base was very thick and the crown - although light and spongy - was a little chewy.  I pulled away much of the bun using parts of it to hold as I ate the burger and the toppings.  Overall, it was a very good burger.  

If you're looking for a fun, laid-back and quirky place to eat in Green Bay, I would recommend seeking out the White Dog Black Cat Cafe.  I liked everything about my visit - the interesting artwork, the decor, the choice of music and I thoroughly enjoyed both the White Dog burger and the cup of chili that I had.  James, the bartender/server, was a nice guy, friendly and not pushy.  While there's not a lot to choose from on the menu, even if you want to go there to get a beer they have a good selection of local and regional craft brews.  This is the kind of place I wish I had in my neighborhood to go hang out at.  

Willy McCoys - Bloomington, MN

Up in the Twin Cities last fall, I was looking for someplace to go that would be showing playoff baseball where I could get a cold beer and some above average bar food.  I looked for places around the hotel where I was staying and I found a place that I wasn't familiar with - Willy McCoys.  I sort of cringed thinking that this was going to be one of those family-friendly "good-time-had-by-all" theme restaurants.  But then I found out that they had the Kona Big Wave Golden Ale on tap - my beer of choice these days.  I thought, "What the hell.  If the food sucks, at least they'll have baseball on TV and Big Wave on tap."  I took off to go find Willy McCoys in Bloomington.  

Tom DeQuattro grew up on the East Coast and got into the restaurant business at a very early age.  He was running restaurants in Michigan and in the Miami area in his 20's.  It was in Florida where he met Korey Bannerman, a former gymnast at the University of Minnesota who was a partner in a company called Premier Restaurant Management.  Bannerman convinced DeQuattro to head to the Twin Cities to manage a restaurant called The Lodge.  DeQuattro didn't know how long he would be staying in Minnesota, but it wasn't too long after he moved to the state he met his future wife, Tracy.  Suddenly, the Upper Midwest became DeQuattro's permanent home.  

DeQuattro and Bannerman became involved in other restaurants, most notably the former Whiskey River Saloon that had locations in Madison and LaCrosse, WI, and a restaurant called The Pub also located in Madison.  (They have also opened a couple of restaurants in the Naples, FL area.)  In 2012, they decided to take over a former restaurant location in the far northwest Minneapolis suburb of Ramsey and open a new concept restaurant that would be family friendly - complete with its own PlayStation area for kids - as well as a sports bar with a number of craft beers available on tap.  They called it Willy McCoys and it became an immediate hit.  Today, there are six Willy McCoys in the Twin Cities area.  The Bloomington location that I went to opened in 2015.  

Now, most theme restaurants like this usually have a made up name with a made up story behind the name.  But it turned out that there really was a Willy McCoy - William "Bill" McCoy, to be exact.  McCoy and his brother were sea captains and yacht builders in Florida in the early 1900's.  When Prohibition took effect in 1919, McCoy became a bootlegger, or as they were known in the Caribbean a "rum runner", who would fill his boats with cases of rum from Caribbean islands and bring them to the United States.  He became proficient at the task earning millions of dollars for his efforts and becoming the darling of criminal folklore in the early 1920's.  The federal government finally caught up to McCoy in 1923 sentencing him to 9 months of prison time.  After serving his sentence in New Jersey, McCoy went back to Florida and invested his ill-gotten gains in real estate, living there until he passed away in 1948.  

Since I'd been experimenting with the OMAD (One Meal a Day) Diet that has helped me lose over 50 pounds, I'd been eating usually late in the afternoon.  And it was just after 5 p.m. when I pulled into the Willy McCoys in Bloomington located in a strip mall on the southwest corner of West Old Shakopee Road and France Ave. South. (see map) 

The Bloomington Willy McCoys has a large and open space with a bar area in the middle.  Overhead garage doors opened to a patio, but it was a cool fall afternoon when I was there and they were closed.  The place was packed with an after work/early dinner crowd.  I took a seat at the crowded bar, a couple young ladies scooched over to let me have some room.  Major League playoff baseball games were playing on the sets hung over the center of the bar area.  

Amongst the dozen of handles on the row of taps I saw the distinctive ocean blue Kona Big Wave Golden Ale tap handle.  I ordered one of those up and started to take a look through the food menu.  The bar area had a tin ceiling about it and it was enhanced by a blue light around the edge.  

When the bartender brought me my beer, he actually brought two beers.  I soon figured out that happy hour at Willy McCoys meant two-for-one beers.  So, I suddenly had two pints of Kona Big Wave sitting in front of me.  And that really wasn't that bad of a thing.   

Looking through the menu, I saw number of typical items that you'd find at a similar family/sports bar - appetizers, burgers, salads, sandwiches, flatbreads, soups and a few entrees.  But they were actually pretty different and rather interesting compared to menus at similar restaurants.  Appetizers at Willie McCoys included pot stickers that were pan-seared in a whiskey ginger sauce, blackened beef bites, and a Southwest-style shredded chicken dip that was made with a creamy concoction mixed with diced tomatoes, jalapeños, onions and sweet corn.  

The crispy buffalo chicken salad topped with blue cheese caught my eye, as did the beef brisket sandwich.  The blackened mahi mahi tacos on the list of entrees were a large possibility, but I was sort of intrigued by the Juicy McCoy burger - Willy McCoy's rendition of the Twin Cities staple stuffed cheeseburger.  But I had a burger the previous evening, so I didn't want to get into that rut.  Quite frankly, they had a number of interesting things on the menu where one minute I'd decide on something, only to have that trumped by something else I found on the menu.  

The two bartenders let me think about the four or five dinner items I had to choose from over a couple of beers.  When I ordered up another Big Wave - it was still happy hour, so I got two more pints - I was ready to order.  I first ordered a cup of Willy McCoy's house-made wild rice soup - a Minnesota staple.   It was thick, creamy, very rich and very good.  I probably could have gotten a whole bowl of the wild rice soup and been happy with that for my meal.  

I ended up getting the Jambalaya sandwich.  It had crispy buffalo chicken, sautéed shrimp, and andouille sausage mixed in with peppers, onions and tomatoes.  It was served open-faced on French bread and was drizzled with a creamy and spicy Cajun sauce.  I got a side salad with ranch dressing instead of a choice of fries, tater tots, waffle fries, cole slaw or other side items.  

I concentrated on what was on top if the bread - the crispy chicken, andouille sausage and sautéed shrimp covered in the cream and spicy Cajun sauce.  The sauce was spicy enough where it caught my attention on top of the already spicy crispy chicken and andouille sausage.  But it wasn't overpowering where I couldn't enjoy all the different flavors on the sandwich.  It was actually pretty good.

As I was seated there enjoying the sandwich, an older gentleman came in and sat down next to me at the bar.  The female bartender had a drink ready for him and called him by his first name.  Obviously a regular, he asked the bartender what the special was that evening.  She said it was open-faced sliced turkey sandwich topped with the wild rice soup.  Now, they never told me what the specials were before I ordered off the menu and I would have DEFINITELY ordered that!  Not that what I had was bad - far from it.  But an open-faced turkey and creamy wild rice sandwich would have been a spot-hitter.  

When they brought it out to the gentleman next to me, I couldn't help but comment on the sandwich.  I said, "I like what I got, but that looks delicious."  He said it was very delicious.  He said that he eats there on a regular basis - "probably too much," he said - and the food is always consistently good.  

Going in to Willy McCoys for the first time, I was a little worried that it would be one of those theme-restaurants that I usually despise.  But I have to admit, the food choices they had on the menu made it very hard for me to make up my mind.  While I settled on the open-faced jambalaya sandwich and a cup of the house-made wild rice soup, the open-faced turkey sandwich topped with the wild rice soup special they had that evening - which wasn't offered to me by my servers - looked like a winner.  Not that I didn't like the jambalaya sandwich, it was a true spot-hitter.  I just wish I would have had the special options given to me that evening.  Nonetheless, Willy McCoys has a wide and varied menu and a number of great craft brews on tap.  I'm sort of surprised I hadn't known about this place sooner than my first visit this past fall.  

O'Rourke's Public House - South Bend, IN

Staying overnight in South Bend late last year, I decided that to try a German restaurant that wasn't far from the hotel.  The only problem is that when I pulled up to the place, it turned out they are closed on Monday and Tuesday nights.  Well, Plan B was going to be an Irish pub for that evening's food choice.  I had already tried Fiddler's Hearth last year in downtown South Bend (click here to read the Road Tips entry on Fiddler's Hearth), but my old neighbor who is a huge Notre Dame football fan told me after my visit there of an Irish pub literally across the street from the University of Notre Dame campus on the north side of the city.  I looked the place up and found the name - O'Rourke's Public House.  That's where I went for dinner and some beers that evening.  

Even though the O'Rourke's Public House is owned by a number of investors who went to school at Notre Dame, the backstory of how it got to South Bend is one of those "Only in America" kinds of stories.  It all started with a young guy by the name of Dave Magrogan who, along with two siblings, were raised in near poverty by their single mother.  Forced to move multiple times before Magrogan started high school, his mother always stayed positive with her outlook in life and eventually got her degree in nursing.  

Magrogan inherited much of his mother's positive "can-do" spirit and after college he looked at becoming a chiropractor.  He opened his first practice in suburban Philadelphia on a shoestring in 1996 and he quickly found that normal chiropractic techniques of multiple patient visits with fee scheduled payments wasn't working out.  Moving to a "Pay-what-you-can" philosophy, adding seminars, and giving patient discounts for referrals turned out to be the Midas touch for Magrogan.  Within a short time, he was seeing over 800 patients a week, opened a second clinic, and had a local weekly cable television program on chiropractic health where he was known as "Dr. Dave."

By 2003, Magrogan had grown bored with the practice of chiropractic medicine even though he was immensely successful with his business.  He started to look into starting a restaurant, even though it was a risky venture as a study found that nearly 60 percent of all restaurants fail within their first three years.  But, he had worked in restaurants since he was 12 years old all the way through high school, into college and through chiropractic school first as a busboy, then a waiter, then becoming a bartender to help get himself through college.  He focused his first restaurant - an Irish pub by the name of Kildare's - in the wealthy suburbs west of Philadelphia.  

By 2007, there were five Kildare's in and around the Philadelphia area and Magrogan drew the attention of Bernie Spain who, along with is brother Murray, sold their Dollar Express chain of dime-stores to Dollar Tree.  Bernie Spain was looking to invest his money and he was taken by Magrogan's entrepreneurial spirit.  He invested into Magrogan's plan to open 25 more Kildare's locations by 2010.

However, the Great Recession of 2008 put a large hold on those plans and Magrogan had to rethink his outlook.  He discovered that putting Irish restaurants in affluent suburbs wasn't the smartest thing because most people didn't like Irish food - they would end up ordering burgers, sandwiches and appetizers - and they would only have a couple beers since most people had to drive to and from his restaurants.  And beer was a huge money maker in restaurants.  He decided that focusing on Kildare's locations in cities near college campuses to help cater to younger crowds would be the answer.  

It was a group of 8 Notre Dame alumnus who entered into a franchise agreement with Magrogan's restaurant group to put a Kildare's in the new Eddy Street Commons just south of the Notre Dame campus.  The restaurant opened in August 2010, but it wasn't long before the group of investors began to splinter away from the Kildare's concept.  They broke their franchise agreement with the rapidly failing Kildare's concept and rebranded their restaurant as O'Rourke's Public House in the spring of 2011.  (Kildare's formally closed their last company restaurant in Philadelphia in 2016, but Magrogan continues to run other restaurants today.  He sold the original Kildare's in West Chester, PA to his manager there in 2015 and it continues to this day.)

Parking around Eddy Street Commons can be a little tricky, especially near O'Rourke's Public House situated at the corner of E. Angela Blvd. and N. Eddy St.  (see map)  However, there's a large public garage with free parking up to 2 hours most evenings just around the corner.  That's where I ended up parking that chilly fall evening.  

Inside O'Rourke's Public House, I found a nice open space with a long bar with a curved turn-out at one end.  Like the other Kildare pub's that were built before this place became O'Rourke's, the interior of the restaurant was designed and built by a company in Dublin, Ireland that was shipped to South Bend for installation.  The restaurant has five different Irish design themes depicted in the space - Victorian, Cottage, Brewery, Shop and Gaelic.  I didn't know which was which, nor did I bother to ask anyone for a tour.  It's an Irish pub, for god's sake!  Let's drink and not worry about various architectural themes!

I ended up seated at the bar and I was immediately greeted by one of the bartenders, Aubrianna.  She introduced herself to me, stuck out her hand and asked my name.  I've been noticing more places are doing that.  Actually, I sort of find it somewhat forced and canned on the servers part to do that, but I guess it's all right.  She gave me a food menu and I ordered up a Bell's Two Hearted Ale from the somewhat impressive craft beer tap list they had. 

Now, this was an Irish pub, right?  I thought it was sort of strange that they were playing country music over the sound system in the place - something that would drive my somewhat Irish pub-puritan ex-neighbor crazy.  (When I told him after the fact that they were playing country music in an Irish bar across from the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, he went apoplectic.)  

Well, it got better.  At 8 p.m. they switched the music to urban.  I just had to laugh over that.  It had to be the first time I'd ever heard hip hop in an Irish pub.  And at 10 p.m. that evening, they were going to have karaoke.  I thought it may be pretty late on a weeknight for karaoke.  

O'Rourke's Public House featured a number of sandwiches, burgers and entrees including Irish favorites such as fish and chips, and a Guinness beef stew.  Their pub burgers consisted of ground prime rib and available with five different types of cheese and a number of other toppings including Irish-style rasher - thin slices of bacon.  The Four Horsemen burger consisted of a prime rib burger topped with corned beef, sauerkraut, Swiss cheese and Thousand Island dressing.  It's for people who can't make up their mind between getting a reuben or a burger.

And I was sort of that way that evening.  I was contemplating between getting a sautéed mushroom/Swiss cheese burger and the reuben.  But the guy seated a couple seats down from me was just finishing up his Shepherd's Pie.  Aubrianna asked him how it was and he said it was very good.  I decided to go with the Shepherd's Pie that evening.  After I ordered, the guy said to me, "Good choice.  I was happy with this."

After getting a dinner salad that had too much other stuff on it than lettuce - it was covered in croutons and had too many sliced cucumbers and red onions on it, but the balsamic vinaigrette was very good - I was served the Shepherd's Pie.  It was served in a dish with a ton of mashed potatoes topped with broiler-melted cheddar cheese (a $1 add-on) and onion straws on top.  I certainly didn't need - or really want - that heavy layer of mashed potatoes covering the rest of the Shepherd's Pie.  The potatoes really got in the way of getting to the ground beef and veggies mixed in with the stout beer gravy.  It was good, but it was a lot of food.  I was able to maybe eat just over half of the Shepherd's Pie, picking around the potatoes where I could.  It was very rich, very filling and pretty good.  

Given that O'Rourke's Public House was my second choice that evening since my first choice was closed for the night, I can't say that I was disappointed.  The pre-fab Irish decor in the place gave it a true pub feeling, but the curious choices of blaring country music and then urban hip hop after 8 p.m. sort of destroyed any type of Irish ambience to the place.  Aubrianna's service was friendly and efficient, and while I had a couple quibbles with the food - too many toppings on the salad, and too much mashed potatoes on the Shepherd's Pie - I thought it was good for what I got.  They had a good selection of craft brews and there were enough flat-screen televisions to keep a single diner entertained for the duration of their stay.  O'Rourke's Public House wasn't the best Irish pub I've been to, but it was better than others that put up an Irish flag on a wall and call themselves an Irish bar.  

Eagle Park Brewing Company - Milwaukee

My neighbor is a craft-beer enthusiast who likes to take drives to brewpubs and microbreweries around the Midwest. He's turned me on to a number of brewpubs over the past few years.  He likes to go to Milwaukee as he's a big Brewers fan and I was telling him that I was going to the city to call on a couple three accounts last fall.   My neighbor told me of a place that I really needed to check out called Eagle Park Brewing Company.  After meeting with an account in the afternoon, I sought out Eagle Park Brewing Co. for an early dinner and a few beers.  

Jackson "Jack" Borgardt and his older brother, Max, were musicians living in their parents home in the Milwaukee area.  Once Jack reached legal drinking age (which, in Wisconsin, could be 16 in most families, but 21 legally), Max and he started to brew their own beers in the family garage.  Their parents were supportive of their budding musical career - the brothers formed a band by the name of Eagle Trace along with their younger brother, Cass - and they were equally supportive of the home brewing hobby the brothers developed.  

The first beer the brothers brewed was an India Brown Ale that they liked immensely.  After the success of their first small-batch brew, the brothers were as hooked on brewing their own beer as they were with their music.  

Like most home brewers who are proud of their beers, the Borgardt brothers had a number of their friends try their unique brews.  One friend, Jake Schinker convinced the brothers to do their own micro-brewery and the brothers made him partner in the venture.  Starting the brewery out of their parents garage in 2015, the trio named their new nanobrewery Eagle Park Brewing Co.  

The trio needed to get out of their parents garage to expand their brewery and they found a spot on the second floor in the Lincoln Warehouse, a former warehouse built in 1928 that was refurbished to house businesses as diverse as recording studios, hair salons, a distillery, and boutique shops.  The Borgardt brothers and Stinker started out with a single brewing vessel and a small tap room.  They brewed 10 different styles of craft brews and almost immediately they realized they were outgrowing their space in the old warehouse. 

Like Minds Brewery opened a restaurant/tap room/seven-barrel brewing operation in 2016.  After a partner left in 2017, the operation just became a craft brewery/tap room.  It was in late 2017 when the owner of Like Minds decided that he needed to find another spot for his operation and was looking at relocating to his hometown of Chicago.  Like Minds closed in December of 2017 and put the building up for sale.

The Borgardt brothers and Schinker immediately jumped on the property in early 2018.  It gave them a larger space to brew more beers and room for a canning facility.  The kitchen was intact (Schinker joked that the only thing they had to buy was a can opener) and the group hired Nathan Heck to run their kitchen.  And true to the brothers musical roots, they added a small live performance area in the space.  Eagle Park Brewing Company relocated to their new location in April of last year.  

That new location is at the corner of E. Hamilton and N. Marshall just north of downtown Milwaukee.  (see map)  There's a parking lot on the north side of the building, but there is also parking along Marshall if needed.  

Inside the small brewery was an open taproom with a skylight that allowed natural light to filter in during the day.  A number of tables were placed in the middle of the room with a small conversation area in the corner that could be taken out when live music was played.  Dark gray walls featured a flat screen television surrounded with a number of music posters.  The original floor still had oil stains from back when it was a garage for the owners of the tannery that originally occupied the space years ago. Exposed duct work and brick walls gave the space a sort of industrial vibe.    

The brewing area was in the back of the building down a long hallway.  It was tough to see how big the brewery was, but the smell of hops and grains were prevalent in the air.  A small window underneath a sign that said, "Order Here" was the portal into the brewery.  Cans of Eagle Park beers were in coolers near the window.  

I ended up sitting at the bar in the corner of the taproom.  A door to the outdoors beer patio was off to the side.  One of the bartenders, Sarah, came up to great me.  The beer menu was on a flat screen television mounted to the wall behind the bar.  The selections rotated two or three times on the screen with the beers they were serving that day.  

Kind of a hip urban millennial kind of place, Eagle Park falls in line with their owners - who are musicians - by playing vinyl albums on their sound system behind the bar.  They played the first side of Abraxas by Santana, but when someone put on Make It Big by Wham!, the selection was roundly booed down by the crowd that was in there.  That record was quickly taken off the turntable and replaced by Tattoo You by the Rolling Stones.  It was a much better choice in my opinion.  

Eagle Park has a number of seasonal brews and at this time they had over a dozen beers available on tap.  You can get full pints for generally $7.00, half-pints for $4.00, or you can get a trio of half-pints for $10.00.  That's what I ended up doing and I went with the Goon Juice New England IPA, the Loop Station Golden Ale, and the Demon Haze New England IPA that didn't have as much alcohol content as the Goon Juice.  Out of the three I liked the Goon Juice the best - I wasn't too enamored with the Loop Station Golden Ale.  

They do have a limited food menu at Eagle Park with appetizers, burgers and a handful of sandwiches.  The burgers consist of a combination of ground chuck and short rib beef, smashed during the cooking process.  They also had a smoked brisket sandwich, a smoked pulled pork sandwich, a fried chicken breast with a buffalo curry sauce, and a grilled cheese sandwich made with Hook's Cheese Company's five-year old cheddar.   

I ended up going with the Smashburger - a 1/3 pound patty topped with in-house cured bacon, Hook’s aged American cheese, mixed pickles, pickled mustard seeds, lettuce, tomato, caramelized onions, and finished with a garlic mayo.  Eagle Park's karate chopped fries - basically hand-cut fries mixed with a Cotija cheese, pickled mustard seed and herbs - came on the side, but I asked Sarah if I could get a side salad instead.   

The burger was served along side the salad in a wax paper lined oblong tray.  The fringes of the burger had that signature flat-grilled crust and it came on a toasted bun.  The burger, itself, was very good - a good burger for a good burger city like Milwaukee.  It was juicy and very messy - it was at least a four napkin burger - with all the toppings on it.  But the toppings didn't mask the overall taste of the ground chuck/short rib beef patty.  It was a surprisingly outstanding burger.  

Eagle Park Brewing Company was a good place to visit.  Beer is really the focus at Eagle Park, but food is also available in terms of burgers, sandwiches and appetizers.  A couple of the beers I had were good, the burger was even better, and I really liked the urban industrial atmosphere of the place along with the selection of 70's and 80's vinyl music they were playing on the stereo system.  With a number of choices of small craft breweries in Milwaukee, Eagle Park may not be the biggest or the most popular, but it's definitely worthy of a visit.