The Bar Towel

atomeyes wrote:
Buffalonians are incredibly optimistic about the direction their city's moving. like, huge sense by them that it's hugely on the upswing.

Very true. Taht Riverworks I mentioend is a great example...open-air curling and hockey rinks, indoor roller derby to open soon, big bar being built (hopefully with craft beer), plans for integrating the run down grain mills into outdoor art/music shows...cool stuff.

Buffalo is the 2nd largest city in NY state....so opportunity abounds.

ate at ABV last night.
Burgers are great. they'll cook them medium rare (or less!) if you ask. juicy as hell.
fries need work, though. limp.
place was packed on a wednesday night

The Bisons have a Great Lakes Brewing Co. Pack for $30US:
"The all-new Great Lakes Brewing Company Ticket Pack includes two reserved seat tickets to any Bisons game (excluding special events) and four great-tasting Great Lakes Craft Beers."

Posted in another thread a little about ABV, but worth repeating. This place is great. My wife and I had different burgers and both were super flavourful and cooked perfectly. I had the truffle fries, which were crisp and pretty rich, while my wife had the, uh artisanal? tater tots, which were also pretty damn good. Didn't try the Mac 'n Cheese, but 4 different kinds available.

The place was indeed packed to the rafters at 2pm on Saturday, but the staff were great and handled it very well despite bing short staffed. Great vibe. Went during game 1 of the TO-Wash series and had to listen to how dumb the "we the north" nickname was from several groups around us. Haha.

The draught list doesn't quite have the breadth of Blue Monk, but with 2 dozen taps, still pretty amazing. Non-draught limited to cans, but who really cares. It'll be a tough choice between ABV and BM when in town.

Pretty sure we were there the same time as boney

boney wrote:
The draught list doesn't quite have the breadth of Blue Monk, but with 2 dozen taps, still pretty amazing. Non-draught limited to cans, but who really cares. It'll be a tough choice between ABV and BM when in town.

nah.
drink at the Monk until you're hungry, then walk over to ABV to eat. then go back to the Monk for more booze.

A couple of new additions to the Transit Rd ( Clarence ) beer scene; these two are north of Pizza Plant, across the road from each other.

The Griffon Gastropub http://www.thegriffonpub.com/
100 craft beers on tap, quite a diverse selection, with a big NY State representation.
This is the 2nd location for this group, the 1st being on Military Rd, Niagara Falls, by the outlet malls.

The Tavern at Windsor Park http://www.tavernatwindsorpark.com/
Over 40 craft taps, with a British food menu

A new addition to the Shatzel group of craft beer bars
Moor Pat http://moorpat.com
On Spring St. ( off Main St ) in Williamsville, not too far from the closed Pizza Plant.
Great looking, but small, space; 20 unique craft taps, plus some bottles you won't see anywhere else.
Food is sausages, fries, and pretzels.
Opens at 4, weekdays

Spent a couple of days visiting these great spots, along with others mentioned previously + Community Beer Works ( well worth the visit )

If you've got the time, Buffalo has the ( beer ) places.

Shatzel's at it again.
Opening a brewery in Elmwood (right near Blue Monk) in March

went down there this weekend.
sour tap list at Blue Monk. some very good US stouts at Coles.
and then a wicked burger (a take of beef on weck) at ABV with a pretty decent tap list.

after that, some light shopping at Premier Beer and, you know what? 24-48 hours in Buffalo's pretty great

There is absolutely a crazy amount of great new beer down in Buffalo right now.....Almanac Farmer's Reserve, Grimm, Crooked Stave, Anchorage, new Mikkeller's, Alpine etc. etc.

If anyone hasn't travelled the extra 25 min into Aurora to go to Aurora Brew Works, it's more than worth it. New and rare bottles hang around a little longer than Premiere and they get a few things Premiere doesn't. They even had Cantillon bottles a couple of weeks ago.

Went to Allen Burger Venture again. My wife and I had some fantastic burgers and some great beers. Then something wierd happened. After eating our meal and drinking 3 beers between the two us us, I tried to order another beer. The waitress told us "just so you know, you've been here more than an hour and we have people waiting for tables". My wife and I looked at each other, completely perplexed, in an uncomfortable silence. So I replied, "okay, I guess I don't need that beer. Just the check?". The waitress thanked us, appologized profusely, took one of the beers off our bill and honestly seemed a little embarrassed. Were were indeed there more than an hour (an hour and 10 minutes!) but no one notified us of any time limits when we got there and were being seated. We still tipped very well, because our service was good, we love the place and it was obviously some management issue the waitress doesn't have control over. Still, really not cool for a beer centered establishment to deny paying customers who want to DRINK BEER. Has this ever happened to anyone else?

boney wrote: Went to Allen Burger Venture again. My wife and I had some fantastic burgers and some great beers. Then something wierd happened. After eating our meal and drinking 3 beers between the two us us, I tried to order another beer. The waitress told us "just so you know, you've been here more than an hour and we have people waiting for tables". My wife and I looked at each other, completely perplexed, in an uncomfortable silence. So I replied, "okay, I guess I don't need that beer. Just the check?". The waitress thanked us, appologized profusely, took one of the beers off our bill and honestly seemed a little embarrassed. Were were indeed there more than an hour (an hour and 10 minutes!) but no one notified us of any time limits when we got there and were being seated. We still tipped very well, because our service was good, we love the place and it was obviously some management issue the waitress doesn't have control over. Still, really not cool for a beer centered establishment to deny paying customers who want to DRINK BEER. Has this ever happened to anyone else?

Weird. "Would you mind sitting at the bar now if you are done eating?" would be 100% better way to deal with that.

JerCraigs wrote:

boney wrote: Went to Allen Burger Venture again. My wife and I had some fantastic burgers and some great beers. Then something wierd happened. After eating our meal and drinking 3 beers between the two us us, I tried to order another beer. The waitress told us "just so you know, you've been here more than an hour and we have people waiting for tables". My wife and I looked at each other, completely perplexed, in an uncomfortable silence. So I replied, "okay, I guess I don't need that beer. Just the check?". The waitress thanked us, appologized profusely, took one of the beers off our bill and honestly seemed a little embarrassed. Were were indeed there more than an hour (an hour and 10 minutes!) but no one notified us of any time limits when we got there and were being seated. We still tipped very well, because our service was good, we love the place and it was obviously some management issue the waitress doesn't have control over. Still, really not cool for a beer centered establishment to deny paying customers who want to DRINK BEER. Has this ever happened to anyone else?

Weird. "Would you mind sitting at the bar now if you are done eating?" would be 100% better way to deal with that.

The bar is normally full of people eating too.

Odd that they would ask you to stop buying beer and comp you one though. Booze is where the margins are, it seems unlikely they end up ahead by giving one away like that.

If anybody's heading down this weekend I'm told the transit pizza plant has KBS, cuivre, and Vietnamese speedway on tap and bottles of 14 and 15 kbs

Going for a Bills game in December - staying about 10 minutes from Blue Monk and Coles. What else is there to see around there?

rfrf wrote:Going for a Bills game in December - staying about 10 minutes from Blue Monk and Coles. What else is there to see around there?

you into architecture/Frank Lloyd Wright?