Santa Cruz Brewery/Bar Recommendations

Definitely visit sante adairius.

For a place for your whole crew....burger. There's one in SC proper but the one in Aptos has a sweet deck when the weather is nice.

 

In addition to SARA I'd definitely recommend Discretion Brewing only a couple miles away. There is also Santa Cruz Mountain Brewing, Seabright Brewing, and Santa Cruz Ale Works (in that order) which I won't quite 'recommend' but rather just inform you that they are options.

And agree on burger. santa cruz - they usually have a pretty solid tap list.

 

Aptos/Mission St BBQ > either burger. in every catagory

 

I can't disagree re: Aptos. Haven't been to Mission St. Is it on par with Aptos St?

 

Same ownership/management. Same great food and one or two things that the Aptos location doesn't have. And yes, Aptos/Mission St BBQ > burger.

 

Beer Thirty just opened Soquel. Lúpulo Craft Beer House should be open downtown Santa Cruz by April...
Check out Boulder Creek Brewery if you make it into the mountains. Winslow is making some good beer.

 

99 bottles is a nice stop downtown, food is decent, tap list is usually pretty good

 

It's a pleasant place to have a beer, but it's still a brewery. It's way better than most of the super industrial tasting rooms I've been in, but there are no offerings outside of beer, water and merch there.

 

SARA and SARA

 

Sante's a great little space, but people who don't care about beer might not have a good time. The beer might be worth losing a friend or two though. Check beermenus.com for Mission St's tap list. I think they have 26 taps or so. Actually, check that site for most Santa Cruz beer spots.

 

Sante
Aptos St.
burger.

In that order. Now tell me more about your group...ages, husbands and wives, co-workers, etc? Kids in tow?

 

http://www.beermenus.com/places/14259-mission-st-bbq

 

What @burgundysmoke said. They have two lists, one from when they opened and one from when they added the other 20+ taps. Site glitch maybe. Also, Sante's 831 is nothing to turn your nose up at. I'm not a hop head, so grain of salt, but to me it's on par with PtE. The bottle releases at Sante are fairly sporadic but have been more regular lately. Just stay up to date on their FB page for when you come in to town, and know that anything they bottle is worth the effort.

 

A little late to the thread, so mainly just echoing what others have said here, but if you're enough into beer that you're posting on Beer Advocate looking for beer related travel advice, and you come to Santa Cruz and don't hit up Sante Adairius, you've really missed out. You'll just have to take your chances on bottles or not, they don't really give folks a heads-up, just post on their Facebook page the day of. They've recently expanded their hours, and Tuesday and Sunday seem to be the most chill days if you're worried about your friend. Their growler fill policy is they will fill pretty much any growler/container you bring in, but they do not sell their own glass, so come prepared. It's almost always 831 (sometimes they surprise you), but this beer is nothing to sneeze at by any means. Also, if you stop by, bring a bottle or two to share - the staff really appreciate that.

Every other brewery in the area is pretty meh, but some of them have nice tap rooms.

As far as bars/eateries go, again Mission St. or Aptos St. BBQ and Burger. (there are two Burgers - 1 in Santa Cruz and 1 in Aptos). Both have great food and great tap lists, and the people that work at both are really excellent. Mission St. and Burger. Santa Cruz are about a block apart, so you can easily stumble between the two. Burger Santa Cruz also has a great atmosphere.

If you happen to be downtown, 99 bottles is a decent place to go for "pub type" food, and well, 99 different types of beer (usually about 2/3 of which are meh, but they do get good stuff on draft). You might also check out Pizza My Heart downtown. They have killer slices, are cheap, and have recently expanded to 12 or so taps. I also hear great things about the new restaurant Assembly, but have not yet been myself.

 

Crows nest has my favorite calamari of all time

not beer related, but it needed to be stated, their calamari is the best

 

Yeah, usually I am sarcastic but I wasn't this time. I was just trying to get a feel for the kind of group you were talking about. I think you guys will dig burger. and Aptos St./Mission St. Someone mentioned Crow's Nest and while not my favorite place around, it's hard to beat sitting upstairs on the deck while drinking a beer on a nice day. Crows Nest is kind of a go to for when we have family or visitors because the location is great and the menu kinda meets everyone's needs. Their beer selection is kinda standard but there's usually something decent.