After getting a few necessary things done Sunday morning we headed out to Herkimer to give them another try now that there is a new brewer in place. We seated ourselves out on their patio (as the sign instructed) and waited and waited and waited for a server to arrive. Since it didn’t seem like that was going to happen anytime soon Mag went in and ordered beers directly from the bartender. I’m not a big German beer fan so the majority of their lineup didn’t interest me so I went with the Alt. Mag ordered their Toolers Weiss, which had far too much clove aroma for me to even sip, but he liked. Both beers had nice flavors and thankfully none of the sulfur qualities that seemed to be present in many of the beers in the past. Although I could have been persuaded to hang around for another Alt the bad service prompted us to move on.
Many a times we’ve talked about going to Bryant Lake Bowl but up until today just never made it over there. I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, other than maybe it being a little bigger, but overall it’s a place I’d return to. The tap selection is nice and varied, the menu looked pretty good (although we didn’t order food) and the staff was friendly. They even helped us as we tried to pin down the name and location of our next stop, Merlins Rest. In fact, the woman who knew the place we were looking for had the location dead on- 36th and E Lake.
So into the car, out of Uptown and down Lake we found Merlins Rest. I can’t recall exactly who had mentioned this place and we didn’t know much about it other than it’s an expatriate bar. Not surprisingly for a beautiful Sunday afternoon the place was pretty quiet. The majority of their taps are imports with the two local beers represented being Summit EPA and Finnegan’s Amber. While it’s no craft beer bar the selection is good, there are no TVs to be seen (although at least 5 video cameras from our vantage point) and the bartenders were friendly. It seems like it could be a cozy, friendly place to spend some time in on a winter’s day.
Okay, the thing about Merlins Rest is they really push live, folksy music and trivia nights, so TVs are kind of counterproductive toward that goal. It's about as friendly an atmosphere as you can get in an authentic Irish bar with a mixed crowd that draws plenty of young professionals. I went late last night (a Thursday night) from 11 p.m. until near-closing, as the band was wrapping up, and had a blast. I'm not a whiskey drinker, but their whiskey list is four pages long!!
ReplyDeleteYeah, the "no T.V.s to be seen" comment was a positive. I like to have background noise in a bar (some kind of music that doesn't cause me to grate my teeth), but I could do without tvs in most.
ReplyDeleteSounds like a good time to me! Maybe even good enough for me to give the whiskey a try.
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