| The
Quest for the Holy Grain - Best Brew Pubs |
| Missouri |
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Urban Chestnut Midtown Brewery & Biergarten Nothing signals German beer like the name Urban Chestnut, so what better way to arrive than to Uber over. Located in a wide-streeted semi-abandoned commercial district of St. Louis that, in a stretch, can be called Midtown, in what in another lifetime was a large auto repair shop, is the Urban Chestnut. In the bays are stockpiles of barrels and the brewery works and in the former office is the bar. The bar is immediately comfortable. Substantial wood tables from decades earlier, a beautiful bar structure with inlaid wooden features, a ceiling with exposed original wooden joists 18-inches on center with a huge round HVAC pipe running the length of the bar ceiling define the space. The walls are brick and showroom glass. The wall opposite the bar has a huge UC logo...impressive. The beer list looks like real fun: Zwickel, Schnickelfritz, Bushelhead, Oxnbrau, Castanna Urbana, Fantasyland, Erlkonig, Super Boss, Big Shark Radler, Mondo Maple, Urban Underdog, and Ku'damm. I used to be German so the beer list appeals to me greatly. It was not my choice to no longer be German, blame that on Ancestry.com. There is a thin dreaded man pouring beers for a queue around the beer taps. There is a diverse young woman with many piercings also behind the bar, doing what, I am not sure. Here is what you need to know about Urban Chestnut Midtown - - It has the worst beer service on the planet. You must queue up and wait for a beer. And wait you do. The two beerkeeps remained consistently indifferent to their customers during our entire stay. But then this may have been part of the German pastiche. Why did you stay, you ask, if the service was so bad? Here is the answer to that question, Gott verdammt, das Bier war gut! The clientele was young and there were more beautiful people there than I would have guessed exist in all of St. Louis. There were no beautiful people at our table. Oddly, most patrons stayed for one beer and moved on. But here was the dilemma. You have one third of a beer left and there is no queue at all. Do you chug and rush up for another or do you enjoy the beer and curse the fates when 10 people stand in line waiting for a beer? We were going to eat there but a party of ten arrived before we could get to the bar to order. Oh yeah, not knowing we have new technology, if you open a tab they hold your credit card. So there is the problem of getting that back while 15 people wait for beers. The best beer and the worst service make for a truly perplexing experience. But just to say Schnicklefritz aloud again after 60 years and then to be rewarded with one of the best American made German Hefes ever is worth the torment, but only barely.
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Square One Brewery Square One Brewery is a neighborhood bar in a mature St. Louis neighborhood. Relatively small, the dark and cozy bar area seats perhaps 30 with a small dining section in the rear, as well as an outdoor area used in nicer weather. The brewing operation takes up lots of room and is visible on either side of the hallway to the back of the restaurant. The beers are good and seem true to style. |
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The Schlafly Tap Room The Schlafly Tap Room is in a large, renovated brick building near downtown St. Louis, Mo. The medium-sized bar is separated from the dining area by a small partition. One can look through a window into the smoking bar in another wing of the building. This Questor was there twice. The first evening they had 12 beers on tap and a cask. Two nights later, 5 of the 12 beers were different, with two different casks. All of the beers are good, inexpensive, and true to style. |
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Morgan Street Brewery The Morgan Street Brewery is huge. It takes up half a block of the trendy tourist district, and parts of the building have as many as three levels. Although the main bar area is spacious, the bar itself has only three stools; one is encouraged to sit at a table. The brewing operation is behind glass at the main bar. They have five of their own drafts as well as Bud and Miller Lite guest bottles. |
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Springfield Brewing Company The Springfield Brewing Company is in a large renovated brick building in an older section of Springfield, Mo. A very large, modern brewing operation takes up about half of the ground floor and is behind glass walls. The rest of the floor space is bar area; a large oval bar and about 20 tables and booths. The dining area is on the second floor. They have six of their own beers on tap. The beers are good and seemed true to style. The pub grub is tasty and reasonably priced. |