Gastropubs

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8th Annual South Bay Tap Takeover Photos

These photos were taken Thursday, September 1, at Tortilla Cantina in Torrance, where they hosted my 8th Annual South Bay Tap Takeover. The event, meant to celebrate the South Bay’s vibrant craft beer scene featured 19 breweries from Torrance, Redondo Beach, Inglewood, Torrance, Carson, Lomita, Hawthorne, El Segundo, Gardena, and Lawndale.

The featured South Bay breweries included Smog City, HopSaint, Scholb, Hermosa Brewing, Yorkshire Square, King Harbor Brewing, Far Field Beer, Crac, Honest Abe, Eureka Brewing, Common Space, LA Ale Works, Tortugo Brewing, Three Weavers, Crowns & Hops, El Segundo Brewing, Upshift Brewing, Burnin’ Daylight, and Project Barley. Continue reading

Photos of the 7th Annual South Bay Tap Takeover

These photos were taken Thursday at Tortilla Cantina in Torrance, where they hosted my 7th Annual South Bay Tap Takeover, featuring 28 of the South Bay’s craft breweries, with more than 50 taps pouring, and a couple brews that came in cans as keg space was becoming an issue.

I do not know what to say other than thank you to everyone that came out to enjoy the liquid gold provided by the participating breweries, cidery, and meadery. And thanks definitely have to be given to the servers who were kept pretty busy from noon until well after 10:00. The star of the day has to go to Rick who literally took things into his own hands when kitchen staff came up short. Continue reading

Photos of the 6th Annual South Bay Tap Takeover

These photos were taken Wednesday at Tortilla Cantina, where they hosted the 6th Annual South Bay Tap Takeover. This annual event took a little more to accomplish this year, but Tortilla Cantina, our local breweries, and hundreds of their fans made this possible “last hurrah” of 2020 a great success.

My first tap takeover was held on the first Thursday of September in 2015, and as the craft beer scene around here grew, there started to be overlaps when it came to craft beer festival dates and brewery anniversaries, and everyone started changing dates of their events to avoid conflicts. The fact of the matter is that there was just too much going on out there, so I set it in stone that all subsequent South Bay Tap Takeovers would be held on the first Thursday of September; that worked out okay until COVID-19 struck and the State of California and the County of Los Angeles decided restaurants, breweries, and bars had to discontinue in-person dining. Continue reading

River Visits Tortilla Cantina

These photos were taken Sunday afternoon at Tortilla Cantina in Torrance, where they hosted a family event for one of their regulars, Paul Quintana. You may recall that back in July I covered a baby shower at Tortilla Cantina; Sunday’s family gathering was the formal introduction of the Guest of Honor of that shower, River, to his extended family.

There had to be at least 50 friends and family in attendance and River seemed to be enjoying all the attention he was getting as much as the aunts and cousins giving it to him.

Tortilla Cantina is a great place to hold events like this, especially if you have friends and family that enjoy craft beer. You could never provide Tortilla Cantina’s beer variety at home, and they provide really good food; I will personally vouch for the taquitos. Continue reading

Christmas Eve at The 4th Horseman

These photos were taken Tuesday, Christmas Eve 2019, at The 4th Horseman in Long Beach. The 4th Horseman is a pizza and beer bar that opened in November of 2018; they specialize in craft beer, fine wine, and apocalyptic pizza. The primary reason it is even on my radar is that two of the four founders are Martin Svab and Ryan Hughes, previously of Carson’s Phantom Carriage Brewery. The other two founders are Jeremy Schott of The Dark Art Emporium, and Chef Adam Schmalz who helped open Gabi James in Redondo Beach and used to run the kitchen at Phantom Carriage.

While The 4th Horseman has been open for a little more than a year, this was my first visit. While I am not really a pizza guy, I could not help but notice the accolades they have been receiving in the press over the last several months, as well as some amazing photos I have seen friends post on Facebook and Instagram. When The 4th Horseman first opened, they did not open until 4:00 PM and driving to Long Beach from the South Bay at that hour just didn’t make sense. Well, they now open at 11:00 AM, and since they were having a Christmas Eve special going on I headed out, confident traffic would not be an issue. Continue reading

Shelby’s Baby Shower at Tortilla Cantina

These photos were taken Sunday afternoon at Tortilla Cantina, in Torrance, where local craft beer aficionado Paul Quintana held a baby shower for his daughter Shelby, and her boyfriend Zach, to help welcome his first grandchild into the world.

While you may not find a lot of baby shower photos on this site, Paul and his daughter both follow Craft Beer Guy, either via this website or its Facebook or Instagram pages; or all of the above. Combine that with the fact that they were holding the event at Tortilla Cantina, the new home of the South Bay Tap Takeover, and it was an invitation that would be hard to turn down; in retrospect, I am very glad I attended, it was a fun event. Continue reading

Great Society Cider & Mead Closing Doors

UPDATE: Friday, March 15, 2:00 PM – The doors are officially closed

These photos were taken Monday evening at the Great Society Cider & Mead gastropub in Long Beach as they prepare to close their doors in the very near future.

If you have been waiting to visit Great Society, I highly recommend you do it now as they have are closing their doors in the near future; I cannot give an exact date, but if they stay open past St. Patrick’s Day I think everyone will be surprised. They are currently in escrow, which ends as soon as the transfer of the beverage license is complete; it will be soon and they could either be closed before this weekend or several days after. In the meantime, they are doing their best to sell the craft beer, cider and mead that they have on tap, so look for specials. Continue reading

Celebrating SF Beer Week with Humphry Slocombe Ice Creams

These photos were taken Thursday afternoon at Humphry Slocombe in Venice, and Firestone Walker’s The Propagator in Marina del Rel. Humphry Slocombe is an ice cream shop that opened in Venice this past August; it is the fourth in a chain of ice cream shops that has two locations in San Francisco where it was founded, and one in Oakland. The Propagator, if you were unaware, is Firestone Walker’s Los Angeles area brewpub; but you probably already knew that.

I frequently mention that I am not a foodie, I said that in my last article, so why am I visiting and writing about an ice cream shop? Well, as I mentioned above, Humphry Slocombe was founded in San Francisco, and it is currently SF Beer Week (it runs from February 1 – 10). In honor of the event, Humphry Slocombe joined forces with a few of its favorite Bay Area breweries to launch a series of one-time-only, beer-infused ice creams. As I was invited to try out some of these creations, I accepted the invitation and brought my friend Jaymes, of King Harbor Brewing and formerly AJ’s BBQ. Jaymes is a foodie the way I am a beer guy; maybe more. He plans vacations around the food he will find there, so I figured he would enjoy this adventure; I was right. Continue reading

Photos from the Media Preview of California Sun

These photos were taken Tuesday evening at California Sun, a new gastropub in the Silver Lake area of Los Angeles. California Sun is part of the Artisanal Brewers Collective, a restaurant group co-founded by Tony Yanow, formerly of Golden Road Brewing. California Sun features New York and Detroit style pizzas, for vegans, vegetarians and omnivores, as well as lots and lots of craft beer from around the country and beyond.

Anyone that knows me personally, or reads my site on a regular basis, is probably aware that pizza does not rank very high on my list of food choices; so what the heck was I doing at a pizza place that took over an hour of driving to get to? Well, there are three reasons actually. Continue reading

Photos from The Slice and Pint Soft Open

UPDATE: Soft open to the public begins Thursday, January 24 at 5:00 PM

These photos were taken Sunday afternoon at the soft open of El Segundo Brewing Company’s, The Slice and Pint, a new restaurant featuring craft beer, local wines, and a variety of pizzas, salads and appetizers including such items as chicken wings, meatballs, Garlic Knots and calamari.

The event was limited to friends, family, and craft beer industry types, but was very well attended; even with the Rams game on. Of course, those that wanted to watch the game were able to do so as The Slice and Pint had six or seven large screen televisions placed strategically so that you would have to go out of your way to avoid seeing one. Continue reading

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